Recommendations for food bowls to slow down fast eaters
 

Just wondering if any of you have successfully used any of the feeding bowls to slow down your food gulpers and if so, what type of bowl?

My dogs are an adult Scottie and a nearly 6 month old Scottie pup. Long, pointy noses but very large mouths. Each dog is given 1/2 cup of kibble 2x daily (adult gets frozen green beans added to her meals). Puppy is fed in his crate. He is currently getting his kibble moistened, but is at the age I feel he can eat the food dry and want to transition to this.

I've seen the "brake fast" bowls that look like they have Lego pegs in the bottom, but these being plastic concern me (the pup is a chewer). I've been using stainless feeding bowls for the pup, but he can clean these out in 10 seconds. My adult is a fast eater and I was using a Corningware flat-bottomed soup bowl with success, but the dogs were able to chip this and I don't feel it is safe anymore. Advice?

I'm trying to research and have found this item, [url]http://www.eatslowerpetdishes.com/shop/products.php?cat=7[/url] which seems interesting, but is plastic. I'm open to unconventional items as well. Thanks.

The best suggestion I've heard to slow down fast eaters is to use a cookie sheet and spread the kibble out over it. Cheaper than buying a fancy bowl, and worse off, if it doesn't work - you have an extra cookie sheet! :)

Are the dogs close to each other (even though the pup is in crate)? Could they be eating in competition? Sometimes the faster dog gets an opportunity to check out the other bowl.

Stainless steel bowls with giant sized kong filled with kibble
or just kong alone.

Other method, is search and rescue...(throw handfuls of kibble all over the floor) that way they will have to find each kibble and you get your floor cleaned at the same time...ahahhahaha :crazy:

Where are they fed: sometimes in the same room, sometimes in separate rooms. Haven't noticed any difference in the eating speed. The adult is eating much slower than when I got her, however. It takes her about 3 minutes to finish her food now vs. about 30 seconds when she came to us. She isn't the really big problem. I think the green beans do slow her down. I can make sure her bowl is picked up before letting the pup out of the crate. He is the one banging her bowl about and I suspect the one who chipped it.

I have Kongs (just checked and my size holds 1/3 cup dry kibble) and I have a little larger stainless bowl I could put this in. I will try this. I like the idea of the cookie sheet as well, but don't think this would work in his dog crate--he is a little dude and would be standing in it. I'd much rather buy new Kongs (mine are well loved) and a cookie sheet than a questionable gimmicky gadget that may or may not work.

I free-fed my first dog as a pup and he just wasn't that into his dog food, so this is a new experience for me. My neighbors got a brake-fast bowl with their rescue Cocker and it has been chewed, was hard to wash and didn't last long at all. Thanks for the help. :thumbs up

you could boil a stone to clean it and put the food and the stone in the bowl, there are also big heavy metal covered balls you can buy which serve the same purpose

Kong or a ball in the bowl. they have to eat around it

[QUOTE=totallyhip;976602]Kong or a ball in the bowl. they have to eat around it[/QUOTE]

That's what I do for our food hoover ....it's worked well for 5 1/2 yr now. :thumbs up

I concur with the majority. :thumbs up

Just use a Kong, ball or some toy obstruction in their regular food bowls that they have to eat around. It works wonders! :thumbs up

I'd get a few Kongs for each dog, fill them with kibble, top off with canned food or peanut butter or cottage cheese, and freeze. There's no reason why you can't feed all their meals out of Kongs and they'll love you for it!

Good bowls. There are also what I call piggy bowls that have large cone like obstacles that helps slow down the dog during consumption. I have one dog using this bowl. The only downside is that they only come in plastic.

These bowls also help with food aggression in some dogs. Of course you must help the dog overcome (training/conditioning) but this bowl slows them down tremendously.

Thanks for the suggestions. Tried the Kong filled with kibble and placed in a stainless steel food bowl. This slowed the pup way down. :thumbs up Did this last night for supper out of the crate and this morning in the crate. He managed well. I did take some time last night to place just a few kibbles in the bowl before his feeding and made him sit and wait to get the food. He is a little guy, but it isn't too soon to learn some manners!

I looked at some cookie sheets today and found some very nice, heavy-duty ones, but these all seem to have non-stick coating. Not sure if this could be a safety issue, so I'll keep looking for this as well. My adult is doing well with her flat-bottomed soup bowl, but I think I'll check into a metal/stainless pie plate as well. Never thought of this until I got the recommendation for the cookie sheet. Thanks all!

I just fed Cassidy from her new food dish. I found a very heavy, heavy 9 inch stainless steel cake pan.

[url]http://www.kitchencollection.com/Temp_Products.cfm?sku=00226188&RankThis=Y&Searched=stainless%20steel%20cake%20pan&[/url]

This works great! Her frozen green beans actually "stick" to the bowl and slow her down even further. I feel this is a safer alternative to her Corning Ware bowl that chipped. I only have the one bowl, but my girl is worth hand-washing a bowl twice a day and this was inexpensive enough that I can pick up a second in the near furture. And if anyone was interested in the bowl I was asking about originally, that dish is a plastic version of a scone pan.

[url]http://www.kitchencollection.com/Temp_Products.cfm?sku=00237586&RankThis=Y&Searched=scone%20pan&[/url]

The pup is doing great with his kibble stuffed Kong in a stainless bowl. Plan to get a couple more Kongs and try the stuffing and freezing LuckyPenny mentioned too. Thanks SO much doggie friends!

Nanook is a ravenous eater as well. The vet recommended scattering the kibble all over the floor or putting large stones in the bowl, the same as some above comments. We had a "Go Slow" bowl which worked very well but is plastic, which concerned us too. One thing I did was teach Nanook to lie. I read on a Mastiff forum that dogs that are ravenous and prone to bloat should lie down to eat as it makes them eat slower and reduces the amount of air that results in gulping while standing to eat. Now, before eating he will lie on his tummy, then he gets his bowl. It has helped tremendously in slowing him down, probably more so than the special bowls or rocks.

Foraging device for cats :thumbs up
It's a hard plastic ball with holes that you can adjust to the size of your brand of food. My cats eat canned food but I have one and it was only like 8 dollars.
They move it around with the paw and while it rolls it lets out foodie one by one or depending on how much you open it, in my case it only lets one at a time because I only use it for snacks/entertainment.

[CENTER][FONT="Arial Narrow"]I use the stainless steel bowl with the round ball already in the middle. Super easy to clean, doesn't hold bacteria, it has rubber on the bottom so if you're putting it on a flat surface like the crate floor or even the floor, it won't slip. It helped Luke eat slower, as he too was a fast one when he was a pup :thumbs up[/FONT][/CENTER]