8 Month Old Husky Not Eating?

[Dikaia]

Hello all! 

 

I have a 8 month old female husky who has always had a big appetite! I co-own her with my boyfriend and when she is at either of ours apartment she eats all her food. However, just recently when I have had her at my parents house she is barely eating and does not act interested in her food. She's eaten over there multiple times and she loves going over there but she barely touches her food. My parents have a big back yard so she goes out and runs around most of the day, making me believe that she should have an appetite. I am somewhat worried since it is winter and she should be eating more since she is outside for most of the day. We feed her blue buffalo wilderness 1 1/2 cups twice daily. Right now if she is at my parents I have been putting tiny treats in her food to get her to eat and sometimes putting hot water on it and she seems to eat that.  When she was back at my boyfriend's apartment it took her about 3 days until she ate all her food. Any thoughts? 

[BingBlaze n Skyla]

Has she had a season yet? Hormonal changes can stop a Bitch from eating if not it can be quite natural for huskies to go thru certain periods ov just not being hungry , do u free feed or are there set dinner times?

[Dikaia]

She was fixed at 6 months.. and we usually feed her in the morning around 9 or so and at night around 7. We put food out for her in the morning but she will just want to go straight outside and comes back in and won't touch it. By around 10 PM I really have to coax her to eat 

[MarkoMKD]

Any signs of illness ? Diarrhea ? Some changes in her behaviour ? What kind of food you give to her ?

[Dikaia]

She seems to be doing great with everything.. only change of behavior is that she won't come inside she wants to play in the snow, lol. but we are giving her blue buffalo wilderness puppy, chicken flavor. 

oh and she strictly on a dog food diet, we do not give her any type of human food

[MarkoMKD]

8 months same food ? Maybe she is tired from it.

My girl doesnt want to eat kibbles or anything prepared from someone else.

 

I feed her with rice and meat.

 

Maybe try to change her food,but that's only my advice.

 

Another question,does she eat the food after some time if you leave her ? 

[Dikaia]

Well, she's extremely spoiled, haha so we are trying not to change her food because she is being finicky. We left her in my parents kitchen all day with the food out and she didn't touch it at all. 

[Removed #5]

This brings up a discussion I've seen on several different "message boards" (forums, vet web sites, general dog web sites, etc).  The question being "Does my dog get bored with his food?" (and should I change it?)

 

If you search the web for "dogs bored with food" the responses range from "Of course, you idiot, wouldn't you get bored of the same meal all the time?" to "No, it causes less stress on a dogs digestive system if they are given the same food."

 

One comment that surprised me, though I guess it shouldn't have, is that food bought in quantity may degrade and thus change the taste to something less pleasant or it may develop any of several molds thus taste bad (and potentially be harmful!).

 

Here's one take on this - rotating your dogs food among varieties of a particular brand.

 

All of the above taken into consideration, there's still the accepted fact that Husky's will, from time to time "take a break from their food" and stop eating (much if anything) for anything from a day or two up to a week or so.

 

oh, I see this is going to be a long one ...

 

To revert to the OP's question - canids, in general, will eat when they're hungry unless enticed with something that makes it smell desirable.  In the wild, where it's "feast or famine", they'll gorge themselves with anything that's available and then not need to eat until what they've eaten has had a chance to digest.  When we schedule the times and the amount of food they have available, I'd think they would normally be a bit hungry so they take advantage of the available food - until the next time.

 

Dogs also tend to not eat when they're stressed or excited - food on a "nervous tummy" doesn't settle right.

 

I can see several reasons that your pup might not be eating so I'll list a few and let you see what your think:

1. The food at your boy friends place, your parents house and  yours apartment may not be the same (different lot, different ingredients, etc) so it may not be desirable.
2. Moving her continually from place to place may be (slightly?) stressing.  Dogs are den animals and want someplace to call home.  While most will accept traveling with their master (or mistress) as a matter of course they, like us, are happiest when they're "at home".
3. She simply may not be hungry.  If you're having to entice her to eat, this is at the top of my list.
4. She may be taking a "Husky break". This is also high on my list of answers to "why isn't she eating?"
5. She may be overexcited - you mention that she doesn't want to come in from play since there's (probably) this new thing - called snow - that's so "cool" (pun intended).

Thoughts on the topic of why she isn't eating ... oh, just a few ...

[aaronevolution]

I agree with Al, sometimes my boy Jasper will go a week without eating all his food, then he will be back to normal and demolish it in no time.

[Dikaia]

Thank al for the insight! She has the same food at all three places she is at so it did bring up the question if the food at my parents has gone bad, but we keep it sealed in container so that might not be a possibility. I also agree with the changing of environment, she usually eats pretty well when she is at my parents.. although this is from them because I am not around when they watch her so I am not completely positive about this. We are having to put treats in her food to get her to eat or I have been watering her food down. She did eat the rest of her food by her self last night (with out me coaxing her) so i guess it could be just a stage she is going through. I think I will need to keep telling myself that she won't starve herself