Puppies are ready to be gradually transitioned to adult food once they reach about 80% of their expected mature (adult) body weight.
Small dogs grow faster than larger dogs, so small dogs will reach 80% of their mature weight and be ready to be weaned onto adult dog food at a younger age than large dogs. The following is a guide to the approximate age at which different types of dogs should be gradually transitioned to adult dog food (this is best done gradually over a period of about a month by blending increasing quantities of adult food with the puppy food).
Expected Adult Body Weight | Age of Transition to Adult Food |
Less than 5kg | 7 months + |
5kg to 25kg | 12 months + |
25kg to 50kg | 18 months + |
The above is intended as a rough guide. Please contact us if you need more specific information regarding your puppy.
At 4Legs we believe in creating and feeding food made from natural ingredients. So none of our recipes include preservatives, colours or flavours.
Our food is packed in modified atmosphere packaging and should not go off before its use-by date as long as the packaging is intact and the product has been handled correctly.
Unfortunately,there are rare occasions where packaging is compromised or product is improperly refridgerated. This can occur during transport or in the supermarket.
When a packet’s tight vacuum seal is compromised (blows up) it is an indication that to food inside is going off.
We always recommend checking your pack is slightly sucked in before purchase.
We encourage you to contact us if you are concerned with the quality of one of our products. We take great care to ensure the quality of our products and stand by it with a 100% money back guarantee.
Yes! All our products can be frozen.
Because our food is 100% preservative free, please follow the following storage and handling guidelines to ensure your 4Legs remains fresh and tasty.
Freezing 4Legs
If you don’t think you will use a pack of 4Legs within 3 days, freezing in portion sizes is a great option. This helps to cut down on waste and defrosting time.
To defrost
Move portion into your fridge the night before serving; or
Defrost in your microwave using the appropriate setting.
Please note
While frozen foods can remain safe indefinitely when the temperature of a freezer is set at -18ºC or lower, we recommend 3-4 months as the maximum freezing time to maintain the quality of 4Legs products in a household freezer.
Don’t forget
Keep your 4Legs frozen
Once open, please use within three days
Use your feels good lid to help maintain freshness
Follow our tips above for freezing
We are currently in the process of making some exciting upgrades to our 4Legs Natural range!
Our updated range will be rolling out into supermarkets during September. During this rollover period it may be difficult to find your 4Legs products in store.
Please be assured 4Legs products are still available and contact our helpdesk for ranging updates in your local area.
Our 4Legs Natural range has been updated and is now the 4Legs Natural +Wellness range. Our new and improved range has been created to help your dog live a longer, healthier and happier life.
Our updated range is the same price and quality, but with the added benefit of ProAge Wellness Boost – a natural blend of botanicals clinically proven to support wellbeing and vitality at every life stage. Find out more about the 4Legs Natural +Wellness range
4Legs Wellness Boosts are clinically proven, naturally derived wellness supplements to boost your dog’s health and vitality.
Modern lifestyles can be hard on dogs too! Small spaces, daily separation from owners, pollution and environment can all affect wellbeing. Our NEW Wellness Boosts combine a blend of natural botanicals clinically proven to support wellbeing at all life stages.
Along with a balanced diet full of natural fresh ingredients, regular health checks, physical exercise and human interaction, quality supplementation can support vitality and assist in the prevention of age-related disease.
We’ve got two powerful Wellness Boosts in our current range that have been created to support your dog’s wellbeing. Find out more here
We want to assure our customers that the amount of garlic used in our products is minimal and that in the 20 years our food has been available we have never had a case of dog becoming seriously ill due to the garlic in our food.
Vets become concerned when dogs become exposed to excessive amounts of garlic, especially when fed human table scraps or if they get into the pantry and help themselves!
Our food has been developed in conjunction with vets and animal nutritionists. Here’s what they have to say about dogs and garlic.
Our Vet, Dr Felicity says…
“The level of garlic used in 4Legs is so low that a dog would have to eat twice its own body weight of 4Legs in one sitting before the level of garlic consumed would be considered a concern!
“At our recommended feeding rate of 200g for a 5kg dog, the dose of garlic would be no more than 80mg per dog per day. This level of garlic is considered to be very low. It would be impossible for a dog to consume enough of our food daily to receive a toxic dose of garlic. It would be highly unlikely that even a small dog could get a toxic dose of garlic just from eating a few meatballs.
“The toxic dose of garlic is generally considered to be one clove per 5kg dog per day. It should be noted that experimentally, dogs given the equivalent of 20 cloves per 20kg for seven days straight did not develop clinical signs of poisoning or anaemia (some subclinical oxidative damage to red blood cells was reported).
“We believe there are benefits to adding garlic to our food. For example, garlic contains a natural chemical called Allacin which acts as an antibiotic to which bacteria do not develop resistance. Allicin has positive effects on the gastrointestinal system and is beneficial for the immune system.
“In addition, over the 20 years that our product has been available, we have never had a health issue brought to us by a consumer that has turned out to be related to the garlic content of our food.”*
Our Animal Nutritionist, Jonathan Woodroofe says…
“Dogs have been consuming small quantities of garlic as a component of table scraps since they first started associating with humans.
“In fact, a committee established by the US National Research Council to examine the safety of dietary supplementation of dogs, cats and horses with garlic and other supplements noted that garlic has a long history of safe use with dogs when consumed in small amounts.
“Garlic has been associated with a variety of health benefits, including boosting the immune system, acting as an antihypersensitive and also having anti-infective properties.
“In addition, garlic contains a number of valuable nutritional compounds such as B vitamins and organic trace minerals.
“A small carefully controlled amount of garlic is used in 4Legs products. It is important to recognise that many foodstuffs which are beneficial in reasonable amounts can be harmful if consumed in excessive quantities.
“For example, there have been cases of toxicity in humans caused by the over-consumption of carrot juice (due to vitamin A poisoning). It is true that excessive quantities of garlic consumed on a regular basis can be harmful to dogs.
“Much of the present concern about garlic stems from a research trial conducted in Japan involving eight dogs. Four of these dogs were fed garlic at a rate equivalent to feeding 20kg dog 100g of garlic a day (i.e. the equivalent of 15-20 cloves of garlic per dog per day). Feeding this amount of garlic led to the appearance of damaged red blood cells but even with this very large dose, none of those dogs actually developed haemolytic anemia.”
References
*
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2984110/
Some food toxic for pets – PubMed Central (PMC)
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Chocolate, caffeine and other methylxanthines. Chocolate is derived from the roasted seeds of Theobroma cacao and its toxic principles are the methylxanthines theobromine (3,7-dimethylxanthine) and caffeine (1,3,7-trimethylxanthine). Theobromine is also found in tea, cola beverages, and some other foods.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1286457999800033
Antimicrobial properties of allicin from garlic …
www.sciencedirect.com
Allicin, one of the active principles of freshly crushed garlic homogenates, has a variety of antimicrobial activities. Allicin in its pure form was found to exhibit i) antibacterial activity against a wide range of Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria, including multidrug-resistant enterotoxicogenic strains of Escherichia coli; ii) antifungal
**
American Journal of Veterinary Research
November 2000, Vol. 61, No. 11, Pages 1446-1450
doi: 10.2460/ajvr.2000.61.1446
Hematologic changes associated with the appearance of eccentrocytes after intragastric administration of garlic extract to dogs
Keun-Woo Lee, DVM, PhD Osamu Yamato, DVM, PhD Motoshi Tajima, DVM, PhD Minako Kuraoka, DVM Shogo Omae, DVM Yoshimitsu Maede, DVM, PhD
Laboratory of Internal Medicine, Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences, Graduate School of Veterinary Medicine, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, 060-0818, Japan. (Lee, Yamato, Tajima, Kuraoka, Omae, Maede); Present address is Department of Veterinary Internal Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, Kyungpook National University, Taegu, 702-701, Korea. (Lee)
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