Animal Behaviors: Dog Appetites

[Rasori]

Out of curiousity, does anyone know of any tests done to see how dogs decide what, how much, and when to eat? Pretty much everyone who has a dog as a pet will agree that they always try to get food, but it's generally regarded as fair to give a dog one meal a day.

 

This suggests that either we're underfeeding our dogs or that dogs don't have a good judge of how much they need to eat. Somehow I find the latter unlikely, as if they were to keep eating, they'd never have enough food to survive as a species.

 

Is there perhaps a more proper schedule for a dog's eating habits, and have any tests been done to prove any of this? For example, I've heard of tests on humans where they remove all indicators of time, and found humans really live on a 26-hour or so cycle. I would think some similar thing, perhaps making food constantly readily available, would show what a dog's preferred, and natural, eating cycle would be.

 

Just curious, really.

[tomgwyther]

Maybe you should remove the human qualities we associate with food.

Most of us are able to procure food at will, and have done so for a very long time.

we can over-ride our prime-eval erge to eat whenever possible, most of the time.

With the exeptions of...

 

(On a plane journey, most of us eat; not because we're hungry, but to break the monotony of 6 hours in economy class on British Airways.)

 

(many people eat when upset.)

 

(Those with 'eating disorders' over or under eat in responce to nuero-chemical or external stimuli.)

 

etc...

 

Dogs, and many other carnivorous animals, will simply eat at any given opertunity, as their instict tells them.

It's a dog-eat-dog world, so eat while you can!

They lack the higher reasoning we do, so to us, it's seems like Fido is just plain greedy!

But they're just doing what evolution has made them do, without it, the kanine and lupine species would have died out.

 

Domestic dogs, in my experience, will consiously decide not to eat when they're very full, and just leave food in their bowl.

You have to feed a dog a heck of alot for this to happen though. as i found out at a friends BBQ the other day.

 

p.s. The domestic cat realises it does not have to hunt for food and will stop catching things after about a year or so. It knows there's a ready supply of catty treats on the kitchen floor.

Wild felines store food in a similar way too.

 

p.p.s. some animals, when constantly fed, will eat until their stomach lining ruptures.

[Rasori]

Good point. Thank you, that certainly does clarify it a bit. But, by the same token, I'm still curious on one aspect:

 

A wolf pack will hunt and make just one, maybe two kills, then stop and eat. After eating, though, they don't go directly out to hunt again--afaik, anyway. Why would that be? Is it because, as you said, dogs (and theoretically wolves as well) stop eating after they get a large enough fill, thus they must get a large enough fill from the kills they do make? While this likely isn't true for the omega, I can see it being workable as a single wolf can't take down a deer or similar prey, so if the majority of the pack gets their fill then the others are, excuse the pun, "boned."

 

I guess I probably answered my own question there, but feel free to confirm/correct it.

[bombus]

Most cats don't over eat, but I'm not sure why. Maybe evolution has made cats careful about their weight so that it doesn't affect their ability to hunt. Dogs, being pack animals can perhaps rely more on other pack members to bring home the bacon so aren't so bothered (evolutionarily speaking) about getting fat.

 

Also, most cats kill for 'fun' regardless of how much they are fed. They tend not to eat what they catch if well fed though (apart from my cat of course who leaves mouse bums and tails around the place!).

[goingtothedo]

Being pack animals may the reason behind dogs' heart appetites. It's a standard treatment with vets if a dog has seriously lost its appetite to put it in with a group of other dogs as this encourages them to join the scramlbe for the dinner bowls.

 

I've got four dogs and meal times are very short indeed.....

[bombus]

Being pack animals may the reason behind dogs' heart appetites. It's a standard treatment with vets if a dog has seriously lost its appetite to put it in with a group of other dogs as this encourages them to join the scramlbe for the dinner bowls.

 

I've got four dogs and meal times are very short indeed.....

 

Good theory there. I think its far more likely than mine!