dog afraid of bowl?

[2tempe]

I have a 6 yr old chow mix and one other dog. For last three years both dogs have been eating out of stainless steel food bowls, on tile floor.

Two days ago, chow mix took one bite of food and jumped backwards. I looked to see if there was a bug in the bowl or something else weird; nothing. He took another bite, jumped back again. Moved bowl to rug from tile floor, he leaned way forward and finished his dinner.
Next day gave him a ceramic old dog dish, put it on the carpet. He ate just fine out of that. WTF???

Any theories?

[LauraKY]

Get his vision checked.

[Long_Spot]

Getting a shock?

[WalkinAfterMidnight]

May be case of what I like to call the “isolated squirrellies.” Try feeding in the bowl again and if behavior continues, I would consider, as LauraKY suggests, that it is vision related.

[wendy]

static shock? tooth problem/pain? minor mouth injury? ear problem (dangling ear with minor injury brushes bowl edge…)?

[tikihorse2]

I second having his teeth and mouth checked.

[Nauset]

Have his teeth checked. I’m a vet tech and when my dog started doing this a couple months ago I thought it was just the one particular bowl. I went to brush her teeth one day and noticed the tartar on one side had significantly got worse, i.e. she was only chewing on one side. Her carnassial (big molar) was cracked in half, the poor thing. No clue how she did it, but she was acting just like you describe, like she was terrified of eating out of a particular bowl. Good luck.

[SquishTheBunny]

Does he wear a collar? I had one who when she ate from a metal bowl woud occasionally hit her tag on the bowl…she would jump back from the noise? Otherwise, if he is eating just fine in any other location…its probably not a huge issue.

[MunchingonHay]

does the metal bowl slide onto the tile floor often? or is that a new thing? Because I would think that the metal bowl scraping across the floor while my head was in it would be noise and loud.

Like nails on a chalk board.

[SonnysMom]

@SquishTheBunny;6364596

Does he wear a collar? I had one who when she ate from a metal bowl woud occasionally hit her tag on the bowl…she would jump back from the noise? Otherwise, if he is eating just fine in any other location…its probably not a huge issue.

^^^^This

I had a dog I would housesit who I had to feed out of a plastic mixing bowl.
Maybe the tag got caught on the edge of the metal bowl and “attacked” him.