Llaso Apso behavior

Question
My dog scratches at the place mat where her food bowl sits on.  We feel that she's trying to tell us something, but we don't know what.  Have you ever heard of this behavior?  She'll proceed to eat and drink from the double-bowl.  Any ideas?  Thanks, Doug Meloni

Answer
Hey, Doug,

Thanks for the question. It's an interesting one.
If your dog is scratching at the place mat after you've put her food down, it sounds like she may be exhibiting a bit of anxiety related to eating (or drinking, though that's less likely). If she's doing it before you put the food down, it means she's just a little impatient about waiting to be fed.  And while I haven't seen your dog's behavior firsthand, I've seen other dogs do something similar.
Is she just gently pawing at the mat, or scratching really hard? If she's just pawing at it, it's probably related to a "solicitation" behavior, something dogs do when they want something from another dog or from their owner. If she's scratching harder, it could be related to digging. Either way it's not a normal eating behavior (obviously). It's like another circuit in the brain has been switched on unnecessarily.
If she were my dog what I'd do is try to soothe her with my voice, using soft, encouraging words of praise (not to reward the behavior, but to calm her nerves), and maybe stroke her topline (long strokes from the neck down to the tail). But as long as she's not being obsessive about it, and as long as the behavior isn't preventing her from actually eating (which I've seen happen, which is where the praise and the stroking approach usually work well), I wouldn't worry about it too much.
However, since it's probably a way for her to reduce some sort of internal tension, you might want to see if giving her more hard, vigorous playful exercise twice a day, every day helps.

Thanks again,
LCK