Need help choosing puppy food!!

[Caroline and Sammy]

This group has been of GREAT help to me as I research what type of food to feed my new doodle baby! I've finally narrowed down my search to the Wellness brand. It seems to be great quality while not breaking the bank too much and it's on Amazon and Chewy for quick and easy ordering (big plus!) I also like the options the brand offers.

With that being said......... I need help in deciding what specific Wellness food to choose. I'm interested to hear thoughts on grain free v. food with grain in it. What's the benefit of grain-free? Is it harmful to feed my puppy food with grain in it? What's the better route for his health in the long-run?

I'm also wondering whether or not to go with the large breed choice or not. My doodle should be a small standard between 50-60 lbs but could be bigger. He's the biggest puppy in the litter, but i'm not sure if that means anything for his adult weight.

I'm between:

Wellness CORE Large Breed (grain free)

Wellness CORE (grain free)

Wellness Complete Health Large Breed

Wellness Complete Health

Wellness Complete Health (grain free)

Any insight would be greatly appreciated!! 

[Caroline and Sammy]

I just wanted to add - right now he's on Purina Puppy Chow (yuck). I want to transition him off of this ASAP. How soon can I start that transition? I've read that you should keep them on old food for 1-2 weeks. :/ 

[J and Riley (and Luna)]

Stay on the old food for 2 weeks.  I would get a month supply because if he has any digestive issues like giardia or worms you will have to wait even longer to switch.  You can then do a gradual transition to your preferred food, so minimally you need a 3 week supply to have enough for the transition.

If he is doing well on the purina I would get the Wellness Complete Health (the one with grains and not the large breed, he isnt big enough).  It would be most similar to what he is eating now.  Large breed formulas aren't really terribly different they are just lower in calories so you end up feeding more.  We used a large breed puppy formula for Riley but she was expected to be over 65 lbs and she loves to eat lol.

I'm sure Karen will chime in with a more thorough response soon but those are my thoughts :)

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Yep. Everything you've said is correct. Even the part about the Wellness Complete Health formula with grains being most similar to the Puppy Chow. But for some reason, I just rarely see any dogs doing well on that particular food.

There's nothing about the food that appears to be a problem.
Maybe I have an unconscious bias against it, because it was the first food I tried for JD after I adopted him (he'd been eating Nutro) and it just didn't agree with him at all. And that was when he was young and healthy and had no digestive problems at all. 

[J and Riley (and Luna)]

Oh good :) I guess I have retained some of your advice over the years lol.

That's weird that the food seems fine but dogs don't tend to do well on it.  I think Luna may have been on that formula at some point as a puppy and didn't do well either.  We chalked it up to grains and eventually settled on Acana but maybe that wasn't it at all.  After puppyhood she was fine with eating stuff with grains in it (such as stolen bread or random treats from neighbors/family but her kibble remained grain free).

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

I agree, it wasn't the grains. JD's Nutro had grains, and he did fine on that; I just changed because...well, it was Nutro, lol. After the Complete Health I tried Fromm's Four Star Salmon a la Veg, which also contains grains, and he did just fine on that. 

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

It's really really really important that you not change his food for at least two weeks after he comes home, even though the breeder's food is crappy. 

Do not introduce any new treats or chews either. Keep his diet exactly the same as it was at the breeder's. 

Many, many doodle puppies come home with giardia and other parasites. Giardia has a 10-14 day incubation period, so it won;t show up in a fecal test right away. The excitement and stress of leaving the mother, the litter, and the only home the puppy has ever known can contribute to tummy troubles, too. And an 8 week old puppy has only been eating solid food of any kind for about 4 weeks, so the digestive system is very immature.

We have even had members whose brand new puppies had serious health issues resulting in digestive symptoms.

If you change the food before the dog has had a chance to settle in, and before any parasite issues have time to show up in a fecal test, and the dog has diarrhea, you will not know if it's caused by the food change, stress, parasites, or a digestive illness, and the breeder will blame it on the food change. Thus begins a journey of frustration trying to figure it out and an endless round of food changes. You also don't want to do anything to upset that delicate digestive system, as diarrhea can cause a young puppy to dehydrate very quickly, and is going to make housebreaking a whole lot tougher.

So you wait. If you leave the dog's diet exactly as is, and diarrhea develops, you have just eliminated any connection to food as the cause, and saved yourself a lot of aggravation. And of course, if the puppy comes home with diarrhea that doesn't resolve in a day, you know your breeder sent you a puppy with an intestinal parasite and you can probably recoup the cost of the fecal testing and the treatment, lol. (I personally would have fecal done on any new puppy I got, along with a general once-over at the vet's office, but parasites may not show up right away.)

So wait at least two weeks. If, after two weeks, the stool is firm and regular and everything seems fine with the pup's digestion, you can start changing him over. Make only one change at a time. 

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Now, as for the new food. 
While I'm a huge fan of the Wellness brand, I'm not crazy about their Complete Health line. I haven't seen many puppies do very well with it. 

(I do love the Limited Ingrediet formulas, though.)
CORE is a great line, and most pups do well with it, but it's very, very different from Puppy Chow, (it';s grain free and much higher in protein) and therefore, it's going to be a harder transition than it might be if your pup were coming home on a higher protein, better quality food.  However, most pups do very well with CORE puppy food.

I think it would be best to wait until you see how your puppy's digestion is on the Puppy Chow before making a decision on a new food. I hope he doesn't have any digestive issues, but it's pretty common, and that's going to affect the type of formula he needs.
I personally prefer grain free foods, but there are a lot of good foods on our list that contain grains, and lots of members' dogs doing well on them. As long as the food has no corn or wheat in it, foods that contain grains are not "harmful". It really depends on the individual pup and the macronutrient profile of the particular formula.
Your pup does not need a "large breed" formula. Although the labels say they are for dogs over 50 lbs as adults, they are really intended for the giant breeds, those dogs who are going to end up over 90 or 100 lbs and who take 18-24 months to reach full skeletal growth. The main difference between "large breed" formulas and regular formulas is that the lagre breed formulas usually have a lower fat and calorie content, which usually means you'll have to feed more.
You don't even really need to feed a formula designed only for puppies; lots and lots of puppies do great on ALS (all life stages) formulas. 
All that said, if you held a gun to my head and told me I had to pick one of the 4 formulas you listed, I'd have to go with #2, the Wellness CORE puppy. 
However, I'm going to go look at the Complete Health grain free formula, because that's new; previously, all the CH formulas had grains. 

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Okay, I just looked at the Complete Health Grain Free Puppy Food (#5 on your list) and that might also be a good choice.

[Caroline and Sammy]

Wow! Thank you so much for all of the incredibly helpful information. I'll be sure to keep him on his old food for at least 2 weeks. I'm so glad I found this community - I've learned so much. Thanks for your input with the food. I'll wait to order it, but I think I'll go with the Wellness CORE grain-free food. It has the most positive reviews & seems highly recommended.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Reviews really don't mean much when it comes to dog food. You can find rave reviews for Puppy Chow, too. 
But yes, CORE is a very good line. And all the foods in the CORE line are grain free, so you don't need to say "CORE grain free food", because every CORE food is grain free. :)

[Caroline and Sammy]

True! Thanks. :)

[Sue and Buddy]

My puppy is on Wellness Complete Puppy food. She is 8 months now. I really haven't had any problems except when I read the bag on food serving size, decided I wasn't feeding her enough, and over fed her. We got that straightened out. I think the hardest part of puppy food is trying to figure out how much to feed them.