Wellness people

[Bird]

I am in the process of switching over to Wellness puppy from Nutro large breed puppy. My girl is 9.5 months old. My ? is when have you switched to adult Wellness. I will when she is 1 year old.

[AngelBunny]

Our oldest girl joined our house at 5 mo old as a private rescue. She ate adult Wellness from the first day in our house. (Well--it really wasn't the first day. Tula didn't like Wellness & didn't eat for three days til she got hungry enuff to take a few bites to find Wellness wasn't as bad as she thought it smelled! Tula ate a diet of supermarket kibble in her first family & I stopped that cold turkey.)

Our youngest girl started out as a foster at about 6-7 months. She too was given adult Wellness from the first day.

I'm very careful to not overfeed; this would be very easy to do because our girls are total hoovers and suck down their food in no time flat.

I also rotate between the three meat formulas to vary the amino acids.

[Bruce Lanthier]

I will be switching my pup from puppy wellness to adult when the current bag runs out. she will be about 6 months. maybe less.

[Bird]

AngelBunny and Bruce why feed them adult when they are so young. Are you worried that they will grow to fast.

[Bruce Lanthier]

The main difference between the pup food and adult is the amount of protein and fat. Pup food contains more of each (pup Protein 28% Fat 17% - adult Protein 22% Fat 12%) because of the rapid growth in the young animals life. I switch over to adult around 5/6 months because I do want a slower weight gain and growth. I actually keep the pup kinda skinny looking for the first couple of years. Then they fill in at a slow pace. Large dogs should reach their max weight at a slow pace, so that their young joints (elbows, hips, etc.) don't take on the stress of to much weight to soon. Rottweilers are slow to mature physically, as well as emotionally and I wouldn't expect them to reach their adult weight until after the 3 year mark. If I am going to err with my dog's weight it would be on the light side. Unfortunately I see to many dogs with owners that err on the obese side . To bad for those dogs.

[AngelBunny]

Bird:

It's hard for me to add anything to what Bruce said.

I'm not worried about them growing too fast--I've never had this problems in any of the Rotties I've owned (& I've had them since 1984). I feed very conservatively.

All my dogs--even the fosters--are on the lean side. Rotties are working dogs and it's hard for a fat working dog to work.