I have a ten month old staff. i gave him nature diet puppy food up until he was about 7 1/2months, then i moved onto nature diet adult food. I thought this was ok but after reading other stuff on this forum peope are saying i should have kept him on puppy food until he was 12 months old. does anyone know when would be a good time. My boy seems ok with adult food, his digestion appears normal and he is of good size and development for his age.

I put my Lab puppies onto adult food certainly by six months old. Don't forget, only a few years ago there was no such thing ap puppy food and our dogs did not drop dead before reaching adulthood. In fact I firmly believe they were healthier for the slower growing which allowed time for the puppy to grow at a more natural pace. These days it's all rush to get into the ring at six months to get points for JW's!

Regards, John

I agree John, everything these days seems to be about protein percentages.  Im only 27 (I still like to slip in the "only" ) and I remember my parents feeding the Afghan pups on tripe and mixer (ok and wheetabix ) the only difference between the puppy and Adult food was the puppies had small bite mixer.  All the Afghans grew up with no problems and lived until ripe old ages one of them even hit 15 !!  The Bichon lived longest at 17 :p

My pups breeder is also quite obssessed with the puppy food thing -  I feed raw (sshhh ;) ) but the thing is you cant get better protein than in raw food - it just doesnt have the percentage on the label and the same food is fed thoughout hopefully stopping fast growth, im thinking of changing to puppy food though if it will help him get his JW quicker  ;)

But back to the OP question I would say adult Naturediet is fine for you pup, I feed this when I am away :)

We did the same with our Staff up until about the same time. Reading all the ingredients in the two types the only difference I could see was the % of protein, it differed by about 7 % - more in puppy food. But as we still give ours scrambled eggs every morning we felt she was having enough extra protein. Also the food we give her is as a supplement to her main diet of meat and fruit and veg. If we had more time I'd like to put her on totally natural and raw foodstuffs but we do our best

my boy has either scrambled eggs or weetabix for breakfast, he loves weetabix a sits by the cupboard waiting for it even if he has scrambled eggs. In his weetabix i give him full fat milk, the breeder gives all his dogs milk but a mate of mine thinks milk is bad for dogs any idea?

Mine both have goats milk and they love it, I think some dogs can have an adverse reaction to milk giving them an upset tummy but if yours is fine on it then there is no need to stop - IMO :)

I think the puppy Naturediet has 11% protein and the adult has 10% protein - hardly worth worrying about. Both Naturediet puppy and original have ground bone in, I think.  Can't really remember sitting here at work!! 

As many posters have said, we never used to have puppy foods and junior foods, they all went onto meat and biscuit - the only difference was the size of the biscuit meal.  I used terrier meal for both puppies and adults as it was small enough.  OK we added calcium or bonemeal to the growing pup's food, but milk will give calcium.  We used to give scrambled eggs etc to pups as well, but otherwise they had exactly the same as adults.  Don't remember things like OCD being around then either.

About 20 or so years ago (showing my age here) manufacturers brought in very high protein foods for in-whelp and nursing bitches, but after a few years these were withdrawn.  Now puppy foods are only recommended in big breeds for about 8 weeks, originally they were intended up to 12 months.  Seems to me a bit like trial and error, with our dogs being the guinea pigs.

we could never get ours to like weetabix so we stuck to eggs even now she's 10mths. I have read that some dogs cant tolerate milk so perhaps its an individual problem but we give ours full fat milk as well.

Milk intolerance is a very individual thing. Some dogs just cannot take it, others are quite happy with it. All of mine have been brought up on a milk meal as puppies.

Regards, John

Hi,
My puppy was on Naturediet Puppy food as well, but in the literature they sent me, it actually said to change to Naturediet Adult at 6 months.
  Hilda

I have 2 staffs and changed them both from naturediet puppy to adult at 6 months, they are both doing really well and have filled out lovely. If you are still unsure just give naturediet a call and they will be able to help you.

I changed my two onto the adult at six months with no adverse reaction whatsoever.  I was advised to start on the chicken adult first as this is the closest to the puppy version and then gradually introduce the other flavours.