Do your dogs use raised food and water dishes?

Ashlee and Nina are not the same height so our stands had to be made for each one of them. It seems so much more comfortable to eat with the dish up off the floor. Any thoughts? Seems more so for the bigger dogs. Kelcee has to use her paws to stand up on ithem to get a drink now. But she does have her own bowls in other rooms.:) One of Kelcees's food dishes (she has 3 eating areas:D ) is elevated too. Maybe it isn't as important for a cat.
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mickey's dished have a little stand but they are not very high. i read a big dog should have an elevated dish because it helps prevent athritis in his paws. a lot of pressure go on those things when they bend down to eat or drink :p

those are neat ideas...ill have to get some of those little shelves:)

Bowls for our dogs are set on the floor, and they seem to do well with this.

When we recently fostered a great dane, we bought a set of food/water bowls that were raised about a foot in height.

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We have a raised dish, as well as ones on the floor. I read that it helps in their digestion, and it's the perfect height for Abbey. It has storage for food underneath, but Abbey can pull it off:rolleyes:

We have a raised dish stand for the dogs, but since there is a high incidence of bloat in GSDs and the latest thought is that raised dishes may contribute to the problem, the stand is just for show. When I feed them, I put their bowls on the ground. There is back and forth controversy over raised dishes, so I don't want to take any chances.

http://www.globalspan.net/bloat.htm#Prevention

Prevention
Some of the advice in the links below for reducing the chances of bloat are:

Do not use an elevated food bowl


Purdue University study:
The most significant findings in this study related to preventive methods used by owners, namely raising the food bowl, actually increased the risk of bloat by approximately 200%!!

If I raised my dogs' dishes .... they wouldn't be able to reach them, and they'd starve. ;-)

Yeah, about the raised dishes/bloat issue .... I agree, back and forth, back and forth .... one year raised dishes prevent bloat, the next year they cause bloat, the next year they have no impact. :rolleyes:

Nebo has an elevated dish in his dog run. It's one where the top comes off and you can store stuff inside of it. He pulls the top off E V E R Y day!!! I find it rather annoying. Needless to say, after the first time, I no longer store dog food in it. It has several large rocks inside instead. It also has the option to make it a refillable water dish by adding a 2 liter bottle of water. After him chewing them off and playing with them twice, I gave up.

He has a regular bowl inside, but I usually put it up on this tupperware dish lol. Reggie and Smokey have regular food bowls, they are smaller anyway.

I thought it was supposed to *help* bloat....:confused: ...do they really know?

WOW, now I'm really scared to feed them anything out of anything. I just went to the site and read all sorts of stuff on raised dishes and dog food. Nothing really seems safe. Well, we will decide what to do next. One place says dogs have a 200% more chance of bloat with a raised dish, and most of the dog foods sound like they could cause it too. Just adding water to dry food if it has citric acid in the food can cause bloat. Tomorrow will be spent reading more...

Yes, our girls have raised dishes! Destiny's is just the standard one that holds food and raises. However, Dakota did have a box with her dishes on it, but she has grown out of that and we finally got one like Destiny's that raises that we put on that same box for now. We figure that she keeps growing so quickly, we have to wait until we actually build her one or else Brian will constantly be building her food bowls. This size works for now, but I'm sure we'll need more height soon, we'll just have to figure out how we're getting the height next time. They don't seem to make them tall enough for Danes! I haven't been able to find one larger than 16 to 18 inches, even in all the magazines I've gotten!

(You can see her old bowls on the box in the background of this pic!)
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Dakota's Mommy, did you read the site posted on raised dishes?

It has us scared. I did use the raised dishes again for breakfast. But I just don't know any more. I thought it was the best for them. Maybe I will call the vet tomorrow and see what if anything they have to offer on it. I'll post their input tomorrow. It seems like such a good idea. I wonder if it is because they can eat too fast if they don't have to bend over that is bad? Anyone know???:confused:

I hadn't really read about the raised dishes until you brought it to my attention a little closer. See, I was always told that not having raised dishes would cause the bloat. We've never had any problems with our girls having their dishes raised and Destiny's has been raised since she entered our home, and Dakota's has grown with her. I also don't know what to believe. I also need to take the girls to the vet in the next day or two so maybe I'll ask the vet their opinion.

In my opinion, the topic seems to be like the causes of cancer, if you do this, you'll get cancer but the next week you're told the opposite! People don't really seem to know yet so they keep releasing all these reports that stand for nothing. I hope we all know soon, but I'm not lowering the dishes for now because everything I have ever read about Danes say that they need the dishes raised. It's makes more sense to raise them to me though because you don't lower little dogs bowls to make them reach down to get the food so why would it hurt to have big dogs food at the same level to them as it is for a little dogs food being on the floor? I guess that's why I don't think raising them should really hurt them, but that's just my opinion, I could be wrong!

It just seems that the higher dishes would be soooo much more comfortable and easier to swallow from. Hopefully more people will give their input too.

Misty does! I think it is much better for her~

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It's makes more sense to raise them to me though because you don't lower little dogs bowls to make them reach down to get the food so why would it hurt to have big dogs food at the same level to them as it is for a little dogs food being on the floor? I guess that's why I don't think raising them should really hurt them, but that's just my opinion, I could be wrong!

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Good point!

Pingo does, but only because she spills everything. If her bowl is on the ground, she quite deliberately tips it over. She has a little holder that's attached to her dog house. The bowl fits inside it and she can't get her food everywhere!

We used the raised bowls with our great pyrenees and are using them for our Leonberger.I heard it was safer to use them for bloat but then I heard the opposite too recently but never from a really reliable source so I am very interested in what your vets say.That link makes me afraid to feed them. I will have to read it over more carefully.It sounds like everything causes bloat.I will try and ask my vet next week when I take my shiba for her spay.It definately looks more comfortable raised..:confused: