Hi Tracey,

I can't say much about our breeder in all honesty. He's a very nice lad who clearly loves his dogs and aims to breed good scoring dogs with even temperements which he then mainly trains as protection dogs. And as far as that is conserned he's doing a good job.

He's policy on feeding is along these lines "oh i just let them eat what they want!" But we had a good long look at different sites about raw diet and worked out a good diet for him. I have no issues/questions about the nutritional matters.

It is very hard (or impossible) to find out info in the net about what is normal growth for these guys. they all seem to be invidual about it. Growing at different rates, different times, with different growth spurts etc. a nightmare really lol. So far from week 10 onwards he's put on...
1.6kg, 1.8kg, 2.2kg, 2.2kg, 2.6kg, 2 kg, 2kg and 2.7kg is that normal or not i have no idea

You mentioned that your dogs grew like crazy in the first few months. is our little caps growing along crazy lines do you think?

I dropped his food intake a wee bit and should start to see him a bit leaner in few days actually.

Just go by the body composition of your dog not by weight gain. Keep him lean and he will grow normally...fat and will grow too fast.

I remember initially, around 2-4lb a week was Sugar's average weight gain, but by the time she was 6 months, she had dropped the puppy fat, was more active, and I was monitoring her by eye, I just knew I was not to let her get too big too quickly to protect her joints.

Didn't realize you were UK based too, where abouts are you?

In Wales

Oh right,Wales is lovely, is Riley a Celtic Connection pup?

I would also stay on the lean side to ease the stress on growing joints and bones. Slow steady growth is what your looking for to avoid any health concerns that could be caused by being overweight. I've owned Great Danes, and they're alot of the same, just taller and weigh less. They grow like weeds though in the first 9-10 months.

Connie could explain it better then I can, but what your looking for isn't the amount of protein he's eating per se, it's the calcium and phosphorus levels he's taking in on a daily basis. Lower calcium and phosphorus levels will slow his bone growth.
Excess carbs (energy) is what is stored as fat, so cutting down the carb intake also would help.

Tracey:

No, he's a Topguard pup.

Ben:

He's carb intake is fairly low as it is, we have reduced his food intake a bit and its allready showing results.Last week his weight gain went down to 1.8kg - much happier with that. And yes, I have indeed noticed that he's growth rate is leaving the dandelions in shade!! lol