Updated on November 29, 2022
My new puppy doesn’t chew his food enough.
When a dog eats too fast, without chewing, it causes a problem every pet owner dreads. A normal dining session at the food bowl would take many minutes, but it’s empty in a flash. Why do canines gulp down their meals? You need to investigate the underlying cause of your senior dog’s decreased food-chewing behaviour. the dog devours its meal without chewing.
For what reason does my dog simply gulp down his food?
This is a question that millions of pet owners have. Even if the dog will be fed again in a few hours, it seems to the owner as if the dog has never seen food before. Going back to the fundamentals of dog anatomy and behaviour will help you understand your dog better.
The wolf is the wild ancestor of the domesticated dog. Smaller and less abrasive than wolves, domestic dogs are well-suited to life in human homes. Domestication, environmental modifications, and dietary shifts have all contributed to significant alterations over the years. However, there are still a few constants. Domestic dogs still have carnivore-capable teeth. These teeth have a firm grip on muscle tissue, enabling for easy tearing and swallowing. Additionally, a dog’s throat is different from a human’s.
Dogs have a unique ability: they can stretch their neck area to swallow massive amounts of food. A dog’s anatomy and digestive system are well-suited to gulping down big amounts of food in a short amount of time, so it seems sense that they don’t hesitate to do so.
But, is there really nothing else to it?
Is there a specific reason that dogs will sometimes run away from or huff their food even when there is enough available and no obvious competition?
There are a few potential explanations, according to dog experts:
In families with more than one dog, pack formation is likely to be more complicated, and canines at the bottom of the pack hierarchy may be subject to food grabs by those at the top.
In light of this, a dog will rush its food as rapidly as it can, so that it can have the full quantity supplied by the owner and pack leader, rather than risk being hungry or not being content during mealtimes due to other dogs who might think it’s fantastic to dip into another food dish.
The ‘weaker’ canines in the group won’t feel safe knowing they can do as they please with their food while the pack leader offers it to the rest of the pack.
Similarly, dogs with parasites may demonstrate a tendency to bolt when disturbed. The parasites are draining the host of its energy and nutrients, causing starvation and the resulting bolting behaviour. Because of this, the dog is perpetually hungry and exhausted, and it makes up for this by consuming increasingly large amounts of food.
The dog is always in such a rush to avoid feeling hungry and helpless that it will wolf down its meals in record time. But let’s say we ignore the elephant in the room and pretend the parasitic illness isn’t to blame. The dog isn’t acting out of resource aggressiveness, resource guarding, or even competitiveness, in which case no amount of positive reinforcement will help.
It’s also possible that the dog doesn’t want to bolt food but is doing so out of necessity due to the nutritional deficiencies in the canine diet. There are a wide variety of causes of dietary deficiencies. Still, the breed’s unique demands, the dog’s age, the level of daily physical activity, etc. could all play a role in setting off this occurrence. If you’ve been keeping an eye on the bolting behaviour on a daily basis, you should start considering these issues immediately.
What If My Dog Pulls Me Down?
My dog doesn’t seem to be chewing his food very much; is that bad?
Overall, we agree that it would be preferable to prevent or severely restrict the action. Several issues may develop as a result of such conduct:
When a dog eats too quickly, its stomach expands too quickly, trapping solid food, water, and air. This condition is known as bloat.
It’s painful for the dog since his tummy keeps shifting. If your dog has a bloated stomach and appears to be in severe pain, you should take him or her to the doctor immediately.
When you have bloating and you can’t throw up, that’s a serious problem. Your dog will experience more discomfort because its stomach is too full to release the gas and bloating that are causing it. It’s possible that some foam, saliva, or mucus could be seen, but no offending food.
Without regular chewing, a dog’s teeth will eventually become severely diseased. Furthermore, there will be a lot of plaque on the teeth. The reason for this is that newer varieties of dog food are formulated to help clean the dog’s teeth while they chew. When dogs eat without chewing, they create no waste and require no cleanup.
If your dog’s stomach doesn’t twist while it’s bloated, it’ll be in so much agony that it’ll throw up most of its food before it’s digested. Constant hunger, rapid eating, and resulting regurgitation result from this situation. This will make your dog very unhappy.
How to Prevent Canines from Running Away With Their Dinner
Take the time to feed your dog from your hand. Your dog will be extra cautious while eating so that it doesn’t gnaw on your hand.
Give the kibble a new perspective by floating in a bowl of water. Including water to your meal is a natural way to limit your consumption.
Flip the bowl over and fill the rims. Because your dog’s tongue won’t be able to sweep up as much food at once, eating will become more difficult, and running away will be impossible.
