Raw feeding a Flat-Coated Retriever puppy

A 9-month-old Flat-Coated Retriever on raw — that's a great time to get this right, but portion sizing for a still-growing large breed is genuinely where people trip up most. Raw feeding done well can be excellent, but done badly it creates nutritional gaps that cause real harm over time, and the difference is balance and sourcing. To point you in the right direction: roughly how heavy is your dog right now, have you started raw feeding yet or are you switching from something else, and are you looking for a ready-made complete raw meal or thinking about preparing it yourself?

Six weeks in with butcher mince is a common starting point, but here's the honest issue: plain mince plus veg is almost certainly short on bone, organ meat, and key minerals like calcium and phosphorus — which for a large breed puppy still developing his skeleton is genuinely risky over time. Flat-Coated Retrievers typically finish growing around 18 months, so he's got months of bone development ahead. For a 24kg puppy still growing, a good rule of thumb is around 5–6% of body weight daily in complete raw food — so roughly 1.2 to 1.45kg per day split across two meals. The critical thing is switching to a complete formulation rather than DIY mince, so you know the calcium-to-phosphorus ratio is correct. Can I ask — are you open to ready-made complete raw, or is the DIY route important to you?

For your situation I'd go with Nutriment Complete Puppy Formula. It's a properly balanced raw complete — the right bone-to-meat-to-organ ratios, with added kelp and salmon oil for the micronutrients that DIY mince misses entirely. It's formulated for puppies specifically, which matters here because adult complete raws don't have the elevated calcium and phosphorus levels a growing large breed needs. At 24kg, you'd be feeding roughly 1.2–1.4kg per day in two meals, and Nutriment comes in 500g tubs so that's easy to portion. It's widely available on Amazon UK in multipacks, which keeps the cost down. The other thing I'd say: weigh him monthly. Flat Coats this age can go through growth spurts where they need a portion bump, and you want to stay ahead of that rather than realise he's been underfed for a few weeks.

It's genuinely complete as sold — you don't need to add anything for it to do its job. The temptation to add extras is real but resist it unless you know what you're doing, because adding calcium on top of an already-balanced formula can cause as much harm as a deficiency in a growing dog. The one exception I'd mention: if he's going through a heavy growth phase and his coat looks dull or he's scratching without an obvious cause, a small amount of additional salmon oil is low-risk and supports skin and joint development in large breeds. But start with the food as-is, give it six to eight weeks, and see how he looks and feels — that's the honest answer.

That's exactly the right move. Monthly weigh-ins, adjust the portion as he grows, and you'll be in a good place by the time he's fully developed. Nutriment's puppy formula has done right by a lot of large breed owners in your position — the guesswork is mostly gone once you're on a properly balanced complete.