My 1.5 years old golden retriever hates eating his meals. He used to eat well before but recently he walks away from his food and we have hand feed him. When we give him ragi, chicken/mutton rice, snacks etc he eats them on his own otherwise he never touches the food. We feed him organic freshly made food everyday with some pedigree. Is this something we should be worried about?

Dr. Kaveri Giriraddi

Once u start to hand feed the pets they expect the same thing everytime Donot give him any kind of snacks he may feel full because of may not be interested in food To increase his appetite u can give appetizers like revell or aptiquick 5 ml twice daily before food

Dr. Anukarna Singh

Primarily let a veterinarian examine him and perhaps run some basic diagnostic tests like bloodwork to rule out any other systemic issue. Once a fit bill of health has been given we can attribute his behavior to selective/choosy eating. The two pronged approach is , 1) Ensuring variety in the meals by slowly introducing different types of meat/portions of the meat and egg ; cooking/roasting the meat/eggs in different manners each time and adding various flavours or tidbits as toppings .

Dr. Anukarna Singh

2) simultaneously while following above , the food should be offered only at fixed mealtimes and for only for a short time before being withdrawn . Hand feeding and feeding treat/table scraps totally avoided.