Do these pups' appetites slow down as they near one year of age?

[lattelove]

Latte will be one year old next month. Since we adopted her at 5 months, she has always had a hearty appetite, devouring her meals in about 30 seconds and still looking for more. As soon as she saw me heading toward her food bin with the food scoop, she would follow me there and try to stick her head in the bin before I could scoop out the food. Although she is still eating the same amount of food (4-1/2 to 5 cups per day, divided into a morning and afternoon meal), for the past two weeks she has been acting rather nonchalant about her meals. She still cleans her bowl, but she takes longer to eat, watches me fill her bowl from across the room rather than trying to eat it before I even pour it, and sometimes even waits a few minutes after I fill her bowl before starting to eat.

Does this sound like a normal change in behavior? She has had no other changes in behavior or activity level recently. Does the appetite decrease a little at this age? Or perhaps she has learned that no one in our home is going to steal her food, so she is no longer feeling the urgency to gulp it down?

[SebastiansMom]

Latte’s change in appetite sounds totally normal. In her case, it could be a product of her age, or related to the weather. It is very common for these guys to eat less in the warmer months than in the cooler months.

With Sebastian, I always run a little test when he refuses to eat his food. I will offer him a known favorite treat. If he eats the treat, then I have nothing to worry about. If he refuses to eat the treat, there is something wrong.

[lattelove]

That's good to know. Thanks!

[snow0160]

Hm.. My older dog Sahara did not eat very much as she got older. Kit, our teenager will eat you out of a house and home! LOL She has a great appetite at 14 months! I expect it would slow down at about 4 years maybe?

[lattelove]

Perhaps decrease in appetite was not the right way for me to put it, as she is still eating all of her food, and happily takes a treat whenever I offer it. She just does not seem as exuberant about feeding time as she had been previously. She does seem to be calming down a bit overall and becoming much better behaved, so maybe she is just growing out of her puppy "lunatic" stage?

[Jewel]

Ren is 18 months. He gets into periods of eating spurts when he’s always hungry and then he goes through periods where he’s just not that into kibbles. Right now he’s in the kibbles are just ok period. I take a similar attitude as SM, if he’s still interested in treats and still eating kibbles albeit not with gusto and he’s not noticeably losing weight, I am usually not too concerned.