Changing from Puppy to Adult Food

Gael23

We are changing our 10 month old pup onto Adult food, do we need to mix some puppy food in to make the transition like as if we were switching his food out just change over straight away?

tedpan

Gael23 wrote:

We are changing our 10 month old pup onto Adult food, do we need to mix some puppy food in to make the transition like as if we were switching his food out just change over straight away?

I'd always mix over the course of a week or so. The pup will get used to it and lowers the risk of tummy upsets.

Gael23

tedpan wrote: »

I'd always mix over the course of a week or so. The pup will get used to it and lowers the risk of tummy upsets.

We will be sticking to the same feed, just the adult one. Would it be much different?

tedpan

Gael23 wrote:

We will be sticking to the same feed, just the adult one. Would it be much different?

It depends on the dog and the food..

I'd give half and half for a few days at least. Up to you..

jimf

always do it gradual


and stick to the recommended daily allowance

mvl

Gael23 wrote: »

We are changing our 10 month old pup onto Adult food, do we need to mix some puppy food in to make the transition like as if we were switching his food out just change over straight away?

may I ask why did you decide to do this ?
(- owner of a 9 month old pup)

tedpan

mvl wrote:

may I ask why did you decide to do this ? (- owner of a 9 month old pup)

It's better to gradually change food

Knine

Here I change puppies onto adult food at about 3 months old. I feel they grow slower & finish off nicer. Conformation is important to me. I have never gone by recommendations on a pack of dog food. All puppies vary so much. Feed young puppies until they are full. Puppies unlike adults tend not to over eat. At about 6 or 7 months old I regulate their intake to keep them well covered.

Gael23

Knine wrote: »

Here I change puppies onto adult food at about 3 months old. I feel they grow slower & finish off nicer. Conformation is important to me. I have never gone by recommendations on a pack of dog food. All puppies vary so much. Feed young puppies until they are full. Puppies unlike adults tend not to over eat. At about 6 or 7 months old I regulate their intake to keep them well covered.

He doesn't eat for the sake of it most of the time (Unless its sausage or roast chicken) so we just leave down his food for a while then take to up after an hour or so. Some days he will only eat one 50g feed and more days two, then the obvious few pieces of whatever we have for dinner.
In the pet shop where we get his food they told us to keep him on puppy food for a year because it contains extra things to help his bone growth. That makes sense but its just so much more expensive.

Knine

Gael23 wrote: »

He doesn't eat for the sake of it most of the time (Unless its sausage or roast chicken) so we just leave down his food for a while then take to up after an hour or so. Some days he will only eat one 50g feed and more days two, then the obvious few pieces of whatever we have for dinner.
In the pet shop where we get his food they told us to keep him on puppy food for a year because it contains extra things to help his bone growth. That makes sense but its just so much more expensive.

His bone growth will be just fine on adult food. Coming from someone who has large breeds with heavy bone as well as small dogs.

tedpan

Gael23 wrote:

He doesn't eat for the sake of it most of the time (Unless its sausage or roast chicken) so we just leave down his food for a while then take to up after an hour or so. Some days he will only eat one 50g feed and more days two, then the obvious few pieces of whatever we have for dinner. In the pet shop where we get his food they told us to keep him on puppy food for a year because it contains extra things to help his bone growth. That makes sense but its just so much more expensive.

I'd never feed my dogs human food. Not sure what you mean by expensive, the difference for a 12KG puppy food vs adult is 10euro. What food are you feeding him?

BArra

have a pug and with our guy changing food was a disaster, my advice is to integrate the new food very slowly, ie. 70g of old food and 10g of new and gradually bring up the amounts of new, slowly though

you don't want to wake up to explosions everywhere

Gael23

tedpan wrote: »

I'd never feed my dogs human food. Not sure what you mean by expensive, the difference for a 12KG puppy food vs adult is 10euro. What food are you feeding him?

He’s on Hills Small & Minature. We always give him a small bit of meat if there’s some left after our dinner, he loves carrots too!

maggiepip

Some adult dog foods are too high in calcium for a young pup. For example Burns adult chicken and rice has 2.06% calcium, whereas the burns puppy food has 1.45% calcium. So it depends on the nutritional analysis of the food. Too much calcium can cause rapid growth and bone issues.

Knine

maggiepip wrote: »

Some adult dog foods are too high in calcium for a young pup. For example Burns adult chicken and rice has 2.06% calcium, whereas the burns puppy food has 1.45% calcium. So it depends on the nutritional analysis of the food. Too much calcium can cause rapid growth and bone issues.

Never had such issues with adult food. Calcium is only an issue if you give it to a pregnant bitch before whelping. You often see recommendations to give puppy food during the last weeks of pregnancy when in fact it can actually cause issues.

maggiepip

Knine wrote: »

Never had such issues with adult food. Calcium is only an issue if you give it to a pregnant bitch before whelping. You often see recommendations to give puppy food during the last weeks of pregnancy when in fact it can actually cause issues.

What issues can giving puppy food cause during the last weeks of pregnancy?
I'm confused as I've read many warnings to be careful not to feed too much calcium to puppies, especially those under 6 months old as they can't regulate their uptake, and especially for large breed dogs. Puppy foods seem to keep the calcium under 1.5% in general, but some adult foods can have calcium levels as high as 3%. Is this advice wrong or just particularly alarmist?