I believe every dog has an upset stomach or diarrhoea at some point of his life.
In these situations vets usually recommend to change a dogs diet, and that may include rice water, boiled white rice, boiled chicken, lactose free cottage cheese or plain natural yoghurt.
That means you may not be able to walk and play normally with your dog and certainly can’t use the normal food dispenser toys with this new diet.
Miki has been a convalescent a few times but he never seems to run out of energy. I came up with these feeding ideas because he needs something to do although he’s been sick.
Ice cube trays
Different shape ice cube trays are a great way to entertain your convalescent dog.
Vets usually recommend rice water for a diarrhoea patients and you can serve it from ice cube trays.
When you can give your dog just rice water and some rice and chicken you can put them in a blender before you fill the tray.
Later on I didn’t put the food in the blender any more but instead put it straight in the tray. Star shaped tray and other shapes increases the difficulty to lick the trays clean.
To make the tray last longer, you can put it in the freezer. It takes Miki about 10-15 minutes to lick a frozen tray clean depending on the shapes of the tray.
Advent calendar
I’ve put the same puréed mixture on the trays taken from an advent calendar and I froze those as well. It takes Miki about 5-10 minutes to lick them clean.
Frozen Kong
The Kong toys are always convenient but they are essential for convalescent dogs.
I usually put the Kongs in the freezer before I give them to Miki. You can put the mixture straight in the Kongs or you can purée the mixture first. I usually add some plain natural yoghurt or if you like you can add some pumpkin purée as well.
When you put puree into a Kong you should put the Kong on a cup before you put it in the freezer to avoid the fluids leaking all over your freezer.
It takes Miki about 10-15 minutes to lick a frozen Kong clean.
Wash balls
You need to thoroughly clean the wash balls before you give them to your dog. I washed them twice before I gave them to Miki.
Wash balls are a great way to entertain your convalescent dog because you can put wet food in them and it takes quite a long for a dog to lick them clean.
I put about 2 spoons of Miki’s food into each ball. I took 5 plastic cups and put some food on the bottom of them as well before I placed the wash balls on top. Finally I put them in a plastic container before I gave them to Miki.
Miki spreads some rice all over when he eats this food from wash balls but fortunately he is so eager to eat that he picks every rice from the floor so I don’t have to clean anything.
It took Miki about 10 minutes to eat all the food.
Cups in a basket
If you don’t have wash balls you can use some cups as well.
I divided Miki’s portion to 6 plastic cups and 6 paper cups. Then I slightly pushed the food down with a spoon before I placed them into the basket.
Surprisingly it took Miki almost 20 minutes to get all the food out from these 12 cups.
Slow feeding food bowls
We don’t usually give any food to Miki from a bowl. When Miki is on this rice and chicken diet I sometimes give him his food from this Northmate Green slow food bowl and it takes Miki about 5-10 minutes to eat all the food.
Ikea’s Drömmar
Ikea’s Drömmar set is far less expensive than Northmate’s Green bowl, but it actually is a great food bowl for wet food.
I washed the set and then assembled it back before I put Miki’s food on top.
It took Miki about 10 minutes to eat all the food from this.
