Picky eater, how long is safe

Hi all, so my lab mix is a picky eater and we are going to try and get out of the "giver her better and better food/treats" game to coax her into eating. I've read around to leave out food for 15 min at meal times, then take it away regardless of whether she eats it. Also no treats in the meantime. Also on a side note, I have also confirmed she is not sick, just very picky with her dry kibble.

My question is, how long is it safe to wait her out? I hear dogs won't let themselves starve, but I'm still concerned. It's been a day since she ate last.

Thanks for the help

 

Is it just the kibble she's always had same flavour make ? Has she just at started to be picky ?

 

Ya it's the same kibble she's been eating for a long time now (6 months). And she's been fairly picky since we got her, causing us to try and coax her into eating with more interesting food, or for the past few months, various types of treats.

 

You could try adding a small amount of warm water to make it smell more and therefore it will hopefully be more appetising.

Also you could try feeding her it from a Kong wobbler and then she might like it cause it's more fun!

 

I had a picky Cavalier. I couldn’t leave his food down as his brother was a hoover

I made sure it was food which suited him and I would wait him out, taking the food up, offer the next meal etc etc. He’d eat eventually but sometimes leave it two or three whole meals before he did.

 

Interestingly, I've just been listening to a podcast about an otherwise healthy dog who would starve himself into being very underweight. He just had no interest in food. Not a Lab, mind

Some dogs just aren't foodies, but I would be trying to find ways to enthuse him about it. For my youngster who wasn't that interested in her food as a pup, that meant playing games with her food, scatter feeding and hiding it around the room. She would walk away from a bowl of food but loved the game of hunting it out. In fact, when I was in a rush one day and tried to give her food in a bowl after scatter-feeding for a few days, she looked at it and walloped it with her paw so it went everywhere

 

Harley was a fussy eater when she was younger. I tried to wait her out, but after about 40 hours I decided to try a different kibble and start using a snuffle mat. It worked. Not sure which one done it for her. She has kibble in her snuffle mat every night and refuses to eat if it's just in her bowl.

 

My Malamute was not fond of Kibble, but would eat it after he determined that was "As good as it gets" He was a free feeder, and we just left the kibble out for him all the time. It would have been interesting if we had a Lab at the same time. I don't know if we would have had a fat Lab and skinny Malamute, or a dog fight

 

Just to be clear, you throw out the food in the dish if the dog doesn't eat it. Let her see you doing it. When you do put a new bowl down try making lip smacking, yum yum sounds. If you're like me you make those with treats, make them with her main food.

Another trick to try is more frequent but smaller meals.

Did you try a different bowl? A different place to feed?

 

Thanks for the advice everyone. As an update, she ate ravenously after missing a couple meals, and has been hit or miss on meals since then (but eating at least once a day now). So it looks like she's not coming close to the "I should be worried" threshold of refusing to eat.

Hopefully she'll start getting better, but if not I'll try some things like the snuffle pad (funny since my dog's name is snuffles), new bowl, etc.

Thanks again everyone