Updated 3 Dec 2011

Many dog trainers will inform you that you should eat your main meal before your dog eats his/hers, to help establish yourself as your dogs pack leader. I personally do not subscribe to this way of thinking. My dog for example, due to my odd working hours, regularly eats before I have my main meal, and this hasn't affected our relationship at all. My dog doesn't sit back and think, "well I ate before you, so I am the boss!". This line of thinking is quite funny actually. What is most important is that we do not reward or reinforce assertive or anxious behaviour. We must always be aware of our dogs state of mind when feeding him/her. As stated in another article of mine, most  dogs learn to be assertive over us. We teach them this behaviour. Our dogs in the majority of cases are not looking to dominate us at all, they are actually seeking leadership.

So before feeding your dog, make sure your dog is not overly anxious to get to his/her food. Wait until your dog calms, before allowing your dog access to the food. Make your dog stay back from its bowl (at least 2 metres) as you place it on the ground. Let the dog see that the food is in your space, therefore it is yours and not his.  You will let him know when you have finished with it, and then your dog can come forward and eat. This serves 2 purposes. Firstly when we make our dog wait and calm down, we are not reinforcing overly anxious behaviour, and secondly we are showing our dog that the food is ours, and therefore helping our dog respect our leadership, by setting rules and boundaries.

There is no need to worry about whether your dog eats before or after you. You should see your dogs body language relax, and your dog is making eye contact with you..not staring intently at the feed bowl, and overly anxious to get to it before allowing him to come forward to eat.

In many cases, if we allow our dog access to the food bowl when it is overly anxious, you will find that your dog devours the food as if it will be the last meal he will ever have. This is not good for your dogs digestive system, nor is it good for your dog psychologically, as we are rewarding anxiety.

If we wait until the anxiety leaves your dog, and your dog has calmed, before we allow it to come forward to its bowl,  then your dog will eat at a more acceptable and much healthier speed.

If your dog drools and is tense while waiting for its feed, that is a good indication that your dog has been allowed to approach its bowl when anxious.

Remember, ANY positive, is a reinforcer for behaviour and state of mind.  Feeding is no different.. allow your dog to calm mentally before allowing access to its feed bowl.

Always see the food as yours, and not your dogs.

This is very important conditioning for young puppies. Teach your pup at an early age to stay back and wait for permssion to come to its food bowl. Always wait until your pup gets past the anxiety of wanting to get to its food.

Anxiety is one of the most common reasons for behaviour problems with our dogs. This includes aggression, destructive behaviour, barking, and many others.  We want to make sure that anything we do, or allow our dog to do, is not triggering anxiety.

I am writing an article on anxiety in dogs, which will go into greater detail about this common problem. How anxiety is created, how to recognise it, how it affects our dogs, and how to work on removing anxiety from our dogs. This article should be published by Monday 5 December 2011