Hi everyone. I posted a while back about agression and tried the suggested method of separating their bowls. This worked, sort of, and now it's almost impossible to get the other to eat unless we coax her with something like IAMS gravy. She doesn't agress, but is rather overly paranoid. She is always looking over her shoulder. We have even put the other dog in a different room at the other end of the house. When we do this, all she does is look for her sister instead of trying to eat. We have tried to move her bowl to another location with no luck. If we take her bowl to her, she will run from it. This started exactly the same time we had them spayed. Other than that, there has been no other event or ocurrence that we see that would have caused this behavior. I'm thinking about having a behavior specialist observe what is going on and maybe help provide a solution. It's not a lack of appetite, since she will eventually eat if left to do what she wants. This is getting very frustrating. 
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Female springer spaniel littermates-food "agression"-extreme paranoia
Replies (4)
>>Hi everyone. I posted a while back about agression and tried the suggested method of separating their bowls. This worked, sort of, and now it's almost impossible to get the other to eat unless we coax her with something like IAMS gravy. She doesn't agress, but is rather overly paranoid. She is always looking over her shoulder. We have even put the other dog in a different room at the other end of the house. When we do this, all she does is look for her sister instead of trying to eat. We have tried to move her bowl to another location with no luck. If we take her bowl to her, she will run from it. This started exactly the same time we had them spayed. Other than that, there has been no other event or ocurrence that we see that would have caused this behavior. I'm thinking about having a behavior specialist observe what is going on and maybe help provide a solution. It's not a lack of appetite, since she will eventually eat if left to do what she wants. This is getting very frustrating.
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Try crating both of them in sight of each other. If she can SEE that the other dog is securely crated, she won't have to be afraid. Police the humans carefully to make sure no one lets the other dog at her whatsoever when the food dish is there. Pick up the dishes before letting the dogs back together.
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Kathy Diamond Davis, author, "Therapy Dogs: Training Your Dog to Reach Others," 2nd edition, and the free Canine Behavior Series at www.veterinaryforum.com
Thank you Kathy, sounds like a good idea. We will give it a try.
Alex
We went to my parents house with both of our girls. My folks also have a springer spaniel. When they were fed, they ate right next to eachother without hesitation (our dogs only-my parents springer was in the same room but not being fed). Now we are really scratching our heads here.
>>We went to my parents house with both of our girls. My folks also have a springer spaniel. When they were fed, they ate right next to eachother without hesitation (our dogs only-my parents springer was in the same room but not being fed). Now we are really scratching our heads here.
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That was dangerous. Don't count on it continuing or something terrible may happen.
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Kathy Diamond Davis, author, "Therapy Dogs: Training Your Dog to Reach Others," 2nd edition, and the free Canine Behavior Series at www.veterinaryforum.com
