My German Shepherd Wont Eat

I’m having the hardest time getting Drax to eat. I’m interested in what he’s going to weigh at the vet tomorrow. He’s a 14 month old pure bred German shepherd. He’s always been kinda weird about food. He’s on Purina Proplan, an allergy med and Nuvet dog vitamins. It’s not that he doesn’t eat at all, it’s that he’s been a grazer most his life. He’ll come and eat 3/4 of a cup, then leave and throughout the day repeat the process. Per the dog trainer we used to scatter his food on the floor for him to find like a scavenger hunt, and he liked it. When he was a puppy we also had a lot of issues with loose stool and diarrhea, but I was told that’s common with the breed, and the vet was right in that as he got older it resolved.

Now the dog trainer wants us to put the food bowl down for 20 minutes in the morning and 20 minutes at night and then take it up the rest of the time, whether he eats or not. He swears Drax wont starve himself, and I believe it- mostly. But it’s not working. Drax isn’t falling into a pattern. Some of it is consistency between me and my husband- we just want him to eat so badly. But we’ve been militant with it these past two weeks. We took human food completely away (we never fed him scraps at the table, but we used to cook him eggs in the morning for his coat- yeah I know our dog is spoiled) and we limited the amount of treats we gave him. All in an effort to get him to eat his food. I even started mixing 1 cup wet dog food in. We tried changing the flavor of the food.

Then add in that in my German Shepherd group they were talking about how large breeds get twisted stomachs and die. I was researching it and read that eating too fast, and only eating one meal a day, were risk factors. Which would tell me that grazing isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I know why the trainer wants us to do it, because this is one stubborn personality of a dog and he needs to understand that resources come through us for the sake of obedience. I’m just thinking maybe this isn’t the best eating pattern for his wellbeing.

And Drax is not having it. He’ll skip 4 meals straight. That’s two days. And I’d still be trying, except people seem to notice that he’s lean when we’re out in public. Plus, now he’s losing fur. Which we’re to understand is an itching thing and he keeps chewing himself (he’s had several vet appointments and he goes back today actually), but now he’s literally chewing his fur off. He’s has about 6 thinning, or almost bald, spots.

So I said screw it, I’ve been trying to do it the trainers way for like a month at least. But he’s going to need the calories now to grow back his darn fur. And he may not be starving himself, but his nutrition has gone to crap. I’m going to bring it up at the vets today. And I’m adding eggs back into his diet because his coat just hasn’t been looking good and I feel he could use the protein. Maybe we can try a different allergy med.