Food for 3 month GSD

[Luna0331]

How's it goin? New to this forum. I recently got a GSD puppy from a breeder last week. The breeder had the puppies eating the same food as the mom, this grain free food from costco. So the day I got her, I bought the same kind and fed it to her for the last week, but it's for full grown dog and I wanted to get her on a puppy food. I did my research and found that a lot of websites recommended blue buffalo wilderness line for puppies(which is also grain free), so I bought a bag tonight and will mix it in with the costco food for a few days then eventually only give her the puppy food.

My questions:

Has anyone else used either of these foods? Are they okay as far as the BB wilderness as a puppy food and the costco grain free when she's full grown?

How long should I mix the two together before only giving her the puppy food?

What are good amount portions to feed her each day? So far I'm doing about 1.5 cups 2x/daily.

How long should I keep her on the puppy food for? One year or until full grown?

Last question is, she eats really fast, to the point where she won't even chew her food since she's used to fighting for it with the other siblings, any suggestions how to make her drop that habit so she doesn't choke anymore and sometimes throw it up?

Thanks for any input. Pictures will be posted soon.

[Grizzpup]

I'd say you should put 25% of the new food mixed with the old food for about a week, then 50%, 75%,100%, so that should probably take a month to switch her over to the new food. I would feed her three times a day until she is 6 months then switch to two times. Depending on her weight is how much you should feed her. My pup at three months was between 30-40 pounds, so i fed him 2 cups in the morning, 1 cup at noon, and another 2 cups for supper. It all depends on her weight. I am only keeping my dog on puppy food till he is 80-90% of his anticipated adult weight, because you don't want them to big. Hope this helps!

[Luna0331]

Okay sounds good, Shes only about 23lbs at 13 weeks now so I'll start feeding her 3x daily now. I didn't know about that transition ratio on the foods, I just went 50/50 so I'll change that as well. Thanks for your advice.

[Jager_the_GSD]

Does it matter if I just put the food I'm the bowl filled... and he eats as he wants? I never measuree. Just fill it up when the bottom is near

[doggiedad]

i've never fed puppy food to my dogs. i fed my pup 3 cups a day,
1 cup in the am, 1 cup noonish and 1 cup in the pm. he had a snack
throughout the day. the amount of food to feed probably depends
on the dog.

[Jag]

There are bowls to slow them down on eating. You can also do this by using a pan and putting a bowl upside down in the middle. Look on Petsmart's website for slow feed bowls so you know what they look like. You can also put a ball or something in there, but if they get distracted by the ball... not so good. With my Pug, I just kept covering the bowl with my hand every few seconds each time she ate. She eventually got it and stopped scarfing like that. You want to watch protein content as well as calcium and phosphorus. You don't want your pup growing too fast. Check the nutrition section here for what to look for. I don't like BB foods only because some pups have issues with the 'richness' of it. Does the pup have a grain allergy or something? I don't get all these grain free foods. There's nothing inherently bad about grains...

[AngieW]

Our vet recommended Royal Canin large breed puppy.

[Luna0331]

Update:
I have completely transitioned her to the BB and it seemed like she was doing fine throughout the month, but now that she's completely on the BB she has had constant diarrhea for about a week now, sometimes even waking me up in the middle of the night to go, which never happened during the month I was transitioning her. I'm thinking its not agreeing with her now. Either that, or she is sick from a cooked bone knuckle I got from the feed store, I gave her last week, but I took that away from her after the first day. So what so you guys recommend, transition her back to the old food before looking for another brand to give her or just get another puppy food and slowly start mixing it in with the BB and see how she reacts to it?

As far as the grain allergy.. She doesn't have one that I know of, she was just raised on grain-free food from the breeder so I figured I would keep her on it.

She still does eat too fast, so I will look into getting one of those bowls or try putting a big rock or something in with the food.

[AngieW]

You can slow her way down by mixing her kibble with canned pumpkin, putting it in a Kong, and then freezing it. It's impossible to eat that too quickly if it's frozen solid. You have to work up to the solid freeze though. Start with the kibble/pumpkin mix without freezing at all and then try leaving it in the freezer for various lengths of time until she is able to handle it completely frozen.

[WVGSD]

When my GSD puppy just had a week of diarrhea, I gave her nothing but chicken breasts and rice (both boiled) and then run through the blender with a little bit of warm water until it resembles a very thick porridge. I gave her this for about 24-36 hours until her stool firmed up again and then gradually added new venison kibble a little bit at a time. She had been on a grain free fish based kibble and it was not agreeing with her after several months.

As of today, she has solid stool again and the transition took about four days. I did a faster transition than mentioned earlier since I had already been fighting liquid stool and, once the chicken breasts and rice porridge got her firmed back up, I added a little bit more venison kibble with each meal until she is now getting a full portion of the new kibble.