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Skinner's: Introducing your new puppy to a Skinner's dietSkinner's: Introducing your new puppy to a Skinner's diet

Skinner's: Introducing your new puppy to a Skinner's diet

Written by Zoe Russel, BSc (Hons) ANutr Nutrition Officer, Skinner's

Getting a new puppy can be an exciting and rewarding experience. Puppies require lots of looking after and need lots of appropriate training, care and mental stimulation.

It’s also important to provide the right food to your new puppy, to promote healthy growth and development and to ensure they are fed a balanced and complete diet. 

Bringing your puppy home

When your new puppy arrives home, it’s important to make them feel safe and comfortable. To help them settle in, your breeder should have provided a small bag of the food they were weaned onto. If you were then looking to move them onto a different diet we would suggest waiting a few weeks for them to settle in before making any changes.

This is because it can be quite a stressful time moving to a new home, as they have been separated from the litter and have a new environment to adjust to. Then when they have settled into their new home, you may consider a dietary change.  

Bringing your puppy homeBringing your puppy home
Choosing the right dietChoosing the right diet

Choosing the right diet

At Skinner’s, we have a range of balanced and complete puppy diets. These diets provide all the nutrients a healthy dog needs, without necessarily needing any additional supplementation. For most young dogs, the Field & Trial Puppy Chicken is a great choice as it’s one of our longest-established puppy diets which has been tried and tested by hundreds of happy dogs.

Alternatively, for puppies who may have sensitive stomachs or can’t tolerate chicken protein, you may consider the Field & Trial Puppy & Junior Duck & Rice or the Field & Trial Puppy & Junior Lamb & Rice. The Puppy & Junior Lamb & Rice can also be suited to larger breeds as it’s less energy-dense, so can support slower, steadier growth and development.

Making changes

When making dietary changes, we would recommend that you transition your dog onto the new diet gradually over a period of ten – fourteen days; we typically recommend doing this in 10% increments.

During the transition, it is quite normal for dogs to experience flatulence and/or loose stools but these should diminish as the digestive tract adjusts to the change, which can take up to six weeks. 

Making changesMaking changes
How many meals per day should I feed?How many meals per day should I feed?

How many meals per day should I feed?

When it comes to daily meals, we normally suggest following your breeder’s advice in the first instance. However, if they have not provided any guidance, then the general advice is 4 meals per day until 4 months of age.

At this stage they can drop down to 3 meals per day until 6 months of age, then 2 meals per day from then on. However, that is just a guide and may need adjustment to suit their individual needs. 

Feeding treats

It can be beneficial to provide your puppy with a rewarding treat during training sessions. Treats such as the Field & Trial Training Treats provide a delicious reward and are perfect for little mouths.

However, when providing additional treats, it’s important to make sure we are not over-feeding as this could unbalance their diet or contribute towards unwanted weight gain. Therefore, if you are providing treats, it’s important to make sure they don’t take up any more than 10% of your dog’s daily intake. 

Feeding treatsFeeding treats