Is he eating less?

[Slanted]

DS is 16.5 weeks, and very suddenly (overnight, really) has cut down on his feeding time. He is ebf, and has gone from taking 20-30 minutes per feed to 10 minutes (sometimes not even that long). He's still producing plenty of wet nappies, but only 1-2 dirty nappies a day (used to be 3-4).

He's also going a lot longer between feeds, even though I offer him feeds regularly. He seems to only want to eat every 3-4 hours.

The last time he was weighed (last Monday) he had actually moved up a centile, and had gained a lot more weight than he usually does, but this was before the 'drop' in feeds began.

Is this normal? Or should I be doing more to encourage more feeding?

This sounds normal. As they grow bigger and stronger, babies become much more efficient at extracting your milk, so they take more volume in less time.

Thanks bushy. I thought as much but was just concerned at how suddenly it seemed to happen!

Just keep watching the wet nappies as your best gauge to him taking enough milk. And 1-2 dirty nappies is quite a lot - my ebf daughter sometimes went for a week without a dirty nappy (also normal, as I discovered at the time from the good people of mumsnet )