Changing your dogs food

There are many different prices of dog food with many different qualities. You may diecide to change the food you feed your dog through medical reasons, personal preferance or for just wanting to give your dog a better quality food with all the benefits this can bring, whatever the reason, it is always best to change the food you feed your dog gradually unless advised by your vet. Ideally, do a change over a couple of weeks to avoid any problems like an upset tummy or diarrhoea. Doing a sudden food change may also mean you dog does not eat as much or even touch the food.

Like the PDSA, we recommend changing your dogs diet over a couple of weeks.

Day 1-3
Introduce a small amount of the small food

Place a small amount of the new food besides their usual bowl of food. About 1-3 teaspoons should be fine but do not mix the food at this stage. They will more than likely have a good sniff but do not worry if they do not eat it at this stage.

Day 4
Mix the food

Try mixing your a teaspoon of new food with the old food. If this goes well, great news, you can head to the next stage, if not, stick with this stage till the point your dog is eating as normal.

Day 5-10
Start increasing the amount of new food.

We do not want to overfeed our dogs as this can be bad for them so it is important to increase the amount of new food slowly whilst decreasing the amount of old food gradually. If your dog is picky and/or you are introducing a wet food, you may want to keep these seperate for the whole process rather than mixing them. Whilst decreasing the amount of old food whilst increasing the amount of new food slowly (a teaspoon a day extra for example), if however, your dogs showing signs of not enjoying or being “put off” their food, reduce the amount of new food you give for a few days before proceeding. Keep this process going till the point that you are no longer serving any of their old food. This gradual change will help avoid tummy upsets.

Day 10 onwards
Phase out the old food completely

You may have stopped serving old food at this stage already though it is important to keep an eye on your dog, if at any point they are showing signs of not eanting to eat, you may want to put a small amount of old food back into their diet for a few more days. After about 2 weeks total, you should be ok to remove their old food from their diet completley.

As with anything with your dog, if you notice anything troubling with your dog during this process, please seak professional help from your vet.

Now you know how to transistion your dog to a new diet, all you need to do is decide what food to give, navigating your way through a minefield of brands. We will write another guide for you soon to help you with this process or please feel free to ask in store for any help.