9 Year Old Staffy Changing Food.

Hi & welcome.

I'm afraid it isn't quite as simple as that. There needs to be a balance of roughly 80% meat, 10% bone & 10% offal (of which half should be liver).

Because of that, many people prefer to use a commercial, pre mixed complete food. There are loads out there, some better than others, but none of them terrible.

Does Lola have any intolerances?

From my own point of view, I prefer Nutriment and Paleo Ridge, but neither are the cheapest. Country Hunter is also good, as is Natural Instinct (although Natural Instinct tends to be a bit sloppy at times).

Some people do a straight swap, some introduce gradually. How many meals does she have per day?

No intolerances that I know of, she doesn't like some foods but other than that she seems to be fine with everything I've ever given her.

Currently she doesn't have set meal times, because she's always been on dry food, I just make sure I top up her biscuits every morning and they stay on the floor for her all day. Some days she will eat them all, others i'll make tea & she has some of that. If I give her a treat like sardines, she will eat all those in 1 go. She's 9 years old & weighs 2stone 4lbs if that helps any x

I'm not a fan of free grazing, and you wouldn't be able to do that with raw - who wants raw meat left down for up to 8 hours on a warm day?

Some dogs can transition immediately and have no stomach upsets, but some need to be switched over a couple of weeks, which you can't do with free grazing.

Can you introduce set mealtimes? It might be difficult with an older dog that's used to having food available whenever they want it.

She's had no problems free grazing up to yet, as she can eat if and when she wants to & when she's full she stops. Yes I can introduce meal times but I'm not sure whether to start with 2 times a day or 3? And if I start with 2 how do I know if its enough and she's not going hungry? Which is why I've always just left her biscuits down so she always has food when she needs it. What would you suggest?

Hello. Welcome to the forum.

I have a puppy on raw & he does very well on it. I wouldn't leave it down for lengthy periods, though - although it's usually all gone in about 30 seconds! I buy Nutriment Puppy and occasionally Country Hunter or Paleo Ridge. Not cheap, but worth every penny!

melcollier93 wrote:She's had no problems free grazing up to yet, as she can eat if and when she wants to & when she's full she stops. Yes I can introduce meal times but I'm not sure whether to start with 2 times a day or 3? And if I start with 2 how do I know if its enough and she's not going hungry? Which is why I've always just left her biscuits down so she always has food when she needs it. What would you suggest?

The pre-mixed completes are quite easy - you feed 2 to 3% of the dog's body weight per day & just decide that between the number of meals. So, at 2 stone 4ilbs, you'd need to feed approx. 365 grams a day to start, and then adjust it depending on whether she starts to put weight on, or starts to lose weight.

I tend to feed 3 meals a day, although I know a lot of people only feed 2.

Caryll2 wrote:

melcollier93 wrote:She's had no problems free grazing up to yet, as she can eat if and when she wants to & when she's full she stops. Yes I can introduce meal times but I'm not sure whether to start with 2 times a day or 3? And if I start with 2 how do I know if its enough and she's not going hungry? Which is why I've always just left her biscuits down so she always has food when she needs it. What would you suggest?

The pre-mixed completes are quite easy - you feed 2 to 3% of the dog's body weight per day & just decide that between the number of meals. So, at 2 stone 4ilbs, you'd need to feed approx. 365 grams a day to start, and then adjust it depending on whether she starts to put weight on, or starts to lose weight.

I tend to feed 3 meals a day, although I know a lot of people only feed 2.

Thank you! how do you work out your ordering, and how is the use by date on the raw food products?

I buy from my local Kennelgate store (purely because my daughter is the manager & I get 20% discount!), but you can buy online. As it's frozen, I tend to buy about 2 weeks worth at a time - at the moment my freezer can't take any more! Because I have a pup, the percentages are higher & they eat more! My boy weighs 14.8 kilos (he's a 5 month old bull terrier) & eats about 650 grams a day!

Nutriment do packs of 500gms and 'chubs' of 1.4 kilos. Paleo Ridge do 500gms & 1k tubs, and Country Hunter do bags (not sure of the weights!).

Being frozen, the use by dates are usually good, and once defrosted they keep in the fridge for about 3 or 4 days.

Caryll2 wrote:I buy from my local Kennelgate store (purely because my daughter is the manager & I get 20% discount!), but you can buy online. As it's frozen, I tend to buy about 2 weeks worth at a time - at the moment my freezer can't take any more! Because I have a pup, the percentages are higher & they eat more! My boy weighs 14.8 kilos (he's a 5 month old bull terrier) & eats about 650 grams a day!

Nutriment do packs of 500gms and 'chubs' of 1.4 kilos. Paleo Ridge do 500gms & 1k tubs, and Country Hunter do bags (not sure of the weights!).

Being frozen, the use by dates are usually good, and once defrosted they keep in the fridge for about 3 or 4 days.

perfect ill have a look into them all & make a decision on what brand to try her with. Thank you for all your help x