My little Jilly and certainly Tibbe were scared of their bowls when I first got each but both eventually gave in to eating from it, at first dashing up to it, snatching a bite and retreating away until time to dash up for another bite! Few weeks later, each finally realized it wouldn't get them or hurt them and they relaxed and ate from it like any dog.
My first Yorkie, Scotty, wouldn't eat anything for his first 3 days here but he ate from the bowl from the start, once he got hungry enough. He was so tiny I thought he'd die but the vet and the breeder kept telling me he'd eventually eat. That was back B4 I or I guess even the vet or hobby breeder knew much about tinies tending to hypoglycemia!
Dogs don't have these kind of fear responses in the wild or when living feral I've read, it's just when you add in humans that some dogs show any number of weird behaviors - behaviors that show weakness/instability according to pack-think and that could get them attacked, even potentially killed, supposedly to weed out the weakest among their gene pool. So I guess they just don't show that kind of fear or pain living with just other dogs, even when scared of things for fear of looking weak. Sounds credible according to many other things I've read about pack rules and behaviors.
__________________  Jeanie and Tibbe One must do the best one can. You may get some marks for a very imperfect answer: you will certainly get none for leaving the question alone. C. S. Lewis |