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Australian Dog Lover
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Not only does this not provide them with any form of mental stimulation, it's also not healthy and in some extreme cases, dogs will suffer from canine bloat which can be fatal.
We only discovered the concept of slow food bowls four years ago after adopting our Malinois Aramis, who definitely displayed some anxiety e.g. "FOMO" - fear of missing out at meal times. We're not sure about her background so she could have had to swallow her food quickly so that no other dogs were able to steal it ...
Over the years we have been using various models but we regularly to swap these around between all three dogs to ensure they don't become complacent though our senior has now slowed down considerably.
When Perth-based business Chow Slow contacted us to trial their own Australian designed range we were more than happy to give it a shot with our three dogs as we liked both the concept and the bowls' designs.
About Chow Slow
Back in 2018, Chow Slow founders Harvey and Tran were inspired by the need to find a way to slow down the eating of their own dog, Ripley - a Beagle with a bottomless stomach. With the nickname "A nose connected to a stomach", Beagles are known for being ravenous eaters who will never refuse food. This makes them prone to becoming overweight but also to vomiting food soon after eating.
After using a slow feed bowl - the turquoise design pictured above - Ripley no longer had issues with regurgitation. He became less stressed during meal times, now that there was no rush to eat as quickly as possible.
Inspired by this success, the company has developed a selection of three different designs of slow feed bowls, all of which have been successfully trialled with both Ripley and other family dogs and cats.
#1. Chow Slow Turquoise Fun Feeder Bowl
The Turquoise Fun Feeder Bowl is specially designed to make it impossible for your dog to eat their food too quickly.
With 13 moulded obstacles (of various heights and sizes), this configuration makes it very hard to grab too many pieces of kibble at once but it also slows down eating very effectively if feeding a raw or cooked meal.
Each Chow Slow Fun Feeder Bowl's capacity is 500ml (the equivalent of 1.5 cups of dry or wet food). We tend to measure our dogs' daily portions in grams (125g of dry food or 300g of raw food twice a day) so these smaller size bowls still worked for us.
The Fun Feeder Bowls are made from food safe ABS plastic with a rubber footed non-slip base and we found them easy to clean in hot soapy water.
#2. Chow Slow Lime Fun Feeder Bowl
The Lime Fun Feeder Bowl only features three moulded obstacles in a triangular pattern, gathered towards the centre.
We found this did not present too much of a challenge for either Malinois but they've had 4 years of practice using slow food bowls so they were well ahead of the curve!
Both Fun Feeder Bowls are recommended for small to medium size dogs and all cats so for our big woofers it was a little bit more difficult to get their big heads around those bowls but they still served the purpose for which they are designed.
#3. Chow Slow Stainless Steel Fun Feeder Bowl
Our first dog food bowls were made of stainless steel and still in reasonable condition so we liked the idea of using this bowl the most.
However with just one central obstacle and a wide band all around it, it did not present too much of a challenge for our dogs. They could still grab a good mouthful each time using their big tongue and it not slow them down as much as the other two bowls.
I swear our dogs see these slow bowls as a personal challenge as they try to both beat their own times and finish first to then go and sniff each other's bowl!
Our recommendation would be either the Turquoise Fun Feeder Bowl if you have just one dog or get both the Turquoise and Lime versions if you have a multi-pet household to swap them around every few days.
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