Change in eating behavior

[zd262]

Starting this Saturday, Bubba has been weird about eating his meals. He's not a crazy chow hound, but he always eats non stop in one sitting until the food is gone. Recently, he has been taking a bite and then sort of letting the food fall out of his mouth all over the floor, and then getting another bite and doing the same thing. Sometimes he then eats these pieces. Sometimes he eats more of his food, but often leaves as much as half the food in his bowl.

I tried sitting next to him, I tried not sitting next to him, I tried being normal and not doing anything different. I tried a different bag of food. I tried washing his bowls. I tried a different bowl.

He is completely normal otherwise, eats treats and other stuff normally. If it was just that he wasn't eating it wouldn't be as weird to me as the new thing with the food falling out of his mouth. Any thoughts?

[BaconsMom]

Bacon did this when he had a sore in his mouth. Check his mouth! We didn't notice it for a while, and once we knew, we just softened his food for a while with water and he ate fine until it healed!

[SunDance]

Yep...time for a mouth check. He might have broken a tooth, might have something stuck between two teeth or elsewhere in his mouth, might have cut his gum or tongue, etc.

[POPTOP]

The thoughts I had are the ones already listed. It's so hard to check inside the mouth and if you don't see anything but the behavior continues, I would suggest letting the vet take a look.

[zd262]

Thanks for the suggestions! Definitely seems like that's likely. I checked his mouth and nothing really stood out to me, but he ate the rest of his food as soon as I softened it. I'll check again this afternoon to see if I missed something.

[Berna]

A female in heat nearby?

[barry581]

I take it your feeding a dry food??? Do you wet it down every time you feed?

[zd262]

A female in heat nearby?

Normally I'd think this could be the case (because he is such a hound dog right now), but it first started when I was at my apartment in San Francisco, and has since continued even though we drove down to my boyfriend's apartment in Los Angeles (6 hour drive, ~400 miles).

[zd262]

I take it your feeding a dry food??? Do you wet it down every time you feed?

Yes feeding ProPlan Sport. I never have wet it down in the past, I just tried it today after BaconsMom's suggestion and he finished the remaining amount of his food.

[zd262]

He ate all of his food right up tonight after I added some water. I'm going to do another mouth check to see if I see anything, otherwise might be time for a vet visit.