LBlack14
Landon, fortunately my Yorkie took to the prescription canned food pretty well. Initially it was the Hill's Science Diet i/d low-fat in cans, which he was on for the better part of a year. But this summer, due to the pandemic, the company started having issues with their drop shipments and we were starting to run into issues getting the food on time. So we switched to Royal Canine, same i/d low-fat based canned food. The Hills brand we were using before the switch was chicken flavored with more of a gravy consistency. The Royal Canine is chicken flavored also, but it's more traditional paste-consistency.... almost like a mousse texture. He went to that without much of a bother also. He's been off the kibble food for nearly a year and a half now and he seems to like it. Perhaps it's also helping that it's soft and doesn't require him to chew with his teeth like traditional kibble dog food would require? Whatever the case, we're happy that he seems to like it. We were adding a couple of tablespoons of cooked rice to the mix to help with the transition, to help keep his bowel movements consistent. The past couple of weeks we stopped adding rice and he's been eating the canned Royal Canine without any difference, he still licks his bowl clean.
As dogs get older they become less active, so it's not unusual for some breeds to eat less as they get older.
Regarding the boiled chicken and rice option... we did that with Bandit the last 18 months he was with us, as he got to where he wouldn't eat anything else. So when Duke came down with that bout of pancreatitis, we did the chicken and rice thing with him, too. After a couple of months, our vet told us that while chicken and rice are good options as far as treating his digestive issues, long-term he wasn't getting sufficient vitamins and nutrients that would help stave off inflammation, keep his immune system charged, etc. So she encouraged us to gradually ween him off of the chicken and rice with adding the prescription canned food bit by bit until he was eating only the canned food.
You might talk to your vet just to get a sample can or two to see if this is something that might help him, and something he might take to liking. Every two weeks I get a drop shipment direct from the company. 12 cans per case, 2 cases every two weeks. It breaks down to $3.58/can, or $43/week.
Might be worth looking into. It's not inexpensive though. That said, he's worth the investment. I'd love to have a couple more years with my little buddy. That's why I'm hoping we can get his bad teeth extracted. He doesn't seem any different, he's generally playful and all that. But I would guess that the 2-3 teeth that are bad do cause him some moderate discomfort, and it needs to get taken care of. Thankfully we can afford to have it done, just hoping that another issue isn't developing with his elevated liver enzymes. Who knows, perhaps that has something to do with the impacted teeth, too.