I have a wonderful 6 month girl but she has a eating disorder. I need help with an intervention plan.
She had wonderful table manners until we tried a recommendation from our trainer. She told use to try one of the kong feeders(make her work for her food - problem solving). It made sense to me. It also keep her busy for about 15 minutes and i felt she working the brain in the process. Now to my problem we had been using it for about 2 weeks for every meal and then the threads got striped and I had to feed her in a bowl. Her table manners are now gone. She now thinks its a race to finish. Any suggestions?

First i do not think she has an eating disoder she is a normal labrador :) notorious to inhale down their food. You may want to try to use a "slow down feed bowl" I have the one by durapet it is in stainless steel. It will slow her down some :).

Isn't that part of the breed standard?

Labs LOVE to eat! Don't complain, they're easier to train {LOL}.

Are you sure you are feeding her enough? I find that behavior more common in pups that are just not getting enough. Especially pups that did not get enough when being raised with their littermates. Some breeders have been so scared off by "fat" puppies, that they don't fed their pups enough when they are very young. That encourages puppies to eat really fast, because the food is going to disappear before they have had their fill.

I like a little fat on my pups and this is not the normal eating fast not enjoying it. It is extreme eating to the point 2 times this week she throws it back up within 2 minutes of finishing. She is about 48 pounds and I feed her 2.5 cups in the morning and 2 cups in the evening plus treats during training sessions in the evenings. She is very healthy and content other then that.

Use a "slow down" feed bowl (they have many type). Another idea would be to feed her 3 times per day, less food at one sitting and less air she takes in as she eats that will help her not throwing up but will not help the speed eating. Of course a good quality food. I understand your concern...it is shocking to see how fast some of them eat. Sadly enough that is how I know when one of them is not feeling good.

I have a mother and daughter who do this. The daughter learned this on her own. Or Instinct, whatever. This happened after she was weaned. Had nothing to do with imitating her dam. I use the metal slow feeder, good quality food, it takes them about 60 seconds to wolf down their food, shocking to watch, but thankfully neither has gotten a stomach upset or bloat. The feeder slows them down. Good luck, and don't be too upset. I wish I could say they outgrow this, but, I don't think so, and it's not the worst habit they could have.

Thank you I will look into the bowls. What bothers me is prior to using the kong we didn't have this problem. I feel like I have taught her this bad habit by making her work for it. Not what I was hoping for.

Puppy Owner - you did teach a bad habit. As the others have said, Labs eat at a speed that only a Lab owner understands. Let her eat like a normal dog, from her bowl. If she throws up her meal it's not awful, she'll probably just eat what she threw up. I recently had a very bad experience with the slow down feeder - mine was a stoneware bowl from Drs. F&S. In the center of the bowl was a raised bone. My girl must have thought it was an "extra special surprise" that she just couldn't wait to get to that she flung the bowl in the air and it nearly landed on my glass top stove. It went "BANG", right into the kitchen cabinet and, of course, broke in a few places. I watched the entire episode and couldn't believe it. Thankfully, no one got hurt - well, maybe my cabinet. The awesome customer service rep at Drs. F&S refunded me for the bowl.

Another idea - overfill the bowl for a few days so there has to be some left when she's full. Who cares if she eats extra, if it's good, balanced, quality food, it won't hurt. She'll realize it's no rush, there's plenty and slow down.

Tonight I just got down on the floor and hand feed her. She didn't go crazy but I guess it was more like getting training treats. I feed my dogs the Diamonds extreme athlete. They all love it and I love their coats. Thanks to everyone for the help.

I had a bitch that did this until I started adding water to her bowl with a large smooth rock, the same idea as the slow down bowls, but it was the water that stopped the regurgitation as I was using the rock before.

This sounds like a case of typical resource guarding behavior. They don't have to grumble and growl to be guarders. Eating fast (an I refer to the speed described by the OP) is something tested for when temperament testing. The pup wants to be sure it gets all of its food. If you overfill the bowl, it will still eat it all. I have one of three like that. She is done first and is darn sure no one can get her food before her. I can take her bowl, no issues but she wants to be sure she gets all the food.

My suggestion would be to treat it as a resource guarding issue so it never goes beyond emptying her bowl fast. You don't want the grumbles to start, so be sure you always handle and can take away food and food bowl. Always add something special back to the bowl when you interrupt the meal. Even my crazed girl will back away when she sees me coming. I just may drop some Prime Rib in there!

I have dealed with this in two ways; first is to add a lot of water to the food/bowl ( helps to keep them from choking/regurgitating their meal ); or, I will scatter their food over the floor, so they can only pickup one or two kibbles at a time, takes them a lot longer to eat their meal, and no choking.