It’s natural for mistakes to happen, such as accidentally buying adult dog food for your puppy. But is it safe for puppies to consume adult dog food?
Let’s explore seven things to do if you find yourself in this situation:
- Prioritize understanding the nutritional needs of puppies and the ingredients in adult dog food.
- Check the ingredients on the adult dog food to determine if they are safe for puppies to consume.
- Consult with your veterinarian to determine the best course of action.
- Gradually transition your puppy to the adult dog food if it’s deemed safe.
- Consider supplementing your puppy’s diet with additional nutrients if necessary.
- Monitor your puppy’s health and behavior for any adverse effects.
- Learn from the mistake and be more cautious when purchasing dog food in the future.
It’s crucial to remember that puppies have different nutritional needs than adult dogs, and feeding them adult dog food can lead to health problems. By taking the appropriate steps and seeking guidance from your veterinarian, you can ensure that your puppy receives the proper nutrition for their growth and development.
Can puppies eat adult dog food?
Ensuring that your puppy gets all of the nutritional needs is the best thing you can do as a responsible dog parent to help him become a strong and healthy dog.
However, choosing the right and quality food is a significant factor when pursuing the above goal.
Of course, puppies and adults have different kinds of nutritional needs based on their age.
Usually, puppies cannot eat adult dog food. However, there are specific ways to prepare adult dog food for puppy-friendly meals, just like feeding our toddlers adult food.
This leads us to an important conclusion. Although puppies seldom can eat adult dog food, Exceeding this can cause a number of long-term health problems for your puppy.
Therefore, understanding what to do when you accidentally buy adult dog food for your puppy is extremely important, which we gonna discuss after this vital section.
Here are several important points to bear in your mind.
1. Nutritional need of puppies are different.
Puppies live solely on breast milk until three to four weeks after birth.
After that, dog parents can consider transitioning their puppy’s diet over to solid food. Usually, It takes a puppy another three weeks to fully get used to the puppy food.
Usually, puppies at this stage need to take copiousness of various nutrients that aren’t contained in adult dog food. Here are some of them.
- Fats
- Carbohydrates.
- Proteins.
- Water.
- Vitamins.
But, you know? Some dog foods contain large amounts of calcium and phosphorus, which are very bad for large breed puppies, and the high content of these ingredients can significantly increase the growth rate, leading to problems such as joint issues.
That is why you should choose large breed food or small breed food wisely without buying the wrong dog food.
2. The kibble size.
The kibble size is another primary concern as adult dog kibbles are much larger, making your puppy challenging to eat.
Moreover, Eating large kibbles can cause your puppy to suffocate.
3. Require high calorie content.
In general, puppy dog foods are inclined to have higher calorie content than regular dog food as it’s essential for your loving pooch’s reproduction and healthy growth.
Therefore, feeding a puppy adult dog food is a significantly wrong thing to do as it potentially depriving your puppy’s essential calorie requirements for healthy growth.
4. Some puppies have a sensitive stomach.
Many dogs tend to have sensitive stomachs during their puppy stage. Moreover, puppy foods are easily digestible.
When a puppy used to eat puppy food for months, and suddenly the diet is changed to adult dog food, it will often end up with sensitive stomachs.
What to do if you accidentally bought adult dog food for your puppy?
As I mentioned in the beginning, mistakes can happen to everyone, and we know whether puppies can eat adult dog food.
However, the worry is, what should you do when you accidentally buy adult dog food for your puppy? Lemme explain 7 things that are worth considering.
If you accidentally bought adult dog food for your puppy, consider saving it for later usage, mixing it with regular puppy food, exchanging it with someone who owns an adult dog and puppy, retuning it, donating it to a shelter, feeding at your own risk, and calling your vet and seeking advice.
Dog Breeds Experts
1. Start feeding at your own risk.
You should never feed the puppy adult dog food until she stops drinking milk from her mother and becomes accustomed to solid foods.
Most likely, feeding just one bag won’t hurt; just go back to regular puppy food next bag.
However, if a puppy is fed with adult dog food for an extended period of time, this puppy may experience various degrees of limited growth compared to other dogs in the same breed.
In fact, feeding a puppy adult dog food continuously for a handful of months can expose them to various diseases illnesses down the line.
If a puppy accustomed to solid foods, feeding one adult dog food bag won't be a problem if the puppy is completely healthy. However,sudden changes in diet may cause digestive disturbances.
2. Save the bag.
Even though feeding a puppy adult dog doesn’t adversely affect some puppies, it doesn’t have the ingredients that young dog needs.
Therefore, consider buying a new puppy food bag and saving this food bag for later use.
Usually, unopened dry dog foods tend to have a shelf life of 1 to 1.5 years. With regards, unopened canned dog foods last for about two years.
So prior to the expiration date, your loving pal will be eligible for adult dog food.
3. Mix with regular puppy food
If you accidentally bought adult dog food for your puppy, another possible thing to do is purchasing another couple of regular puppy food and mix adult dog food in.
However, I wouldn’t recommend mixing 1: 1 from both food bags. Consider mixing 3/4th of regular puppy food with 1/4 of adult dog food.
Doing so minimizes the likelihood of health issues.
4. Exchange it with someone.
Many people own more than a dog. I’m sure you also have a friend who owns more than one dog.
Consider exchanging his adult dog food bag for a puppy dog food bag with that friend. However, think twice prior to exchanging it for an opened food bag.
5. Return it.
If the above suggestions seem not gonna work for you, consider returning. If possible, ask for a refund.
6. Donate to a shelter.
If the money isn’t a problem for you, consider donating it to a shelter. What a pleasure it’s to fill the stomach of a hungry animal.
7. Call your vet.
If it’s possible, just give a call to your regular vet.
By the way, here is whether dry food or kibble make dogs thirsty.
Things to be aware of.
Take a look at these important points that are worth considering.
- Don’t feed your puppy adult dog food if she has a sensitive stomach.
- Be so attentive when buying food for your puppy.
- Talk with your vet about the possibilities of homemade dog food.
- Avoid table scraps.
- If you decide to keep that food bag for later usage, be sure to store it at the recommended favorable temperature.
- Please educate yourself about dog food and what ingredients it contains.
- Always buy quality dog food.
- Another factor to consider is the choice of dog food for the size of the breed. This means, you cannot feed a small dog large breed formulas and vice versa.
- If you decide to feed this food bag, be sure to check her stools for any abnormalities.
Conclusion.
Many dog parents are eager to know if puppies can eat adult dog food. In this article, we’ve discussed 7 possible things to do in a case where you accidentally bought adult dog food for your puppy. Hope you found this helpful.
Please consider leaving a comment down below in the comment section based on your experiences, as it’ll certainly be helpful for future readers.
