Umm, is this true?

I was looking at a breeder's site and I came across something that says puppies (of any age) don't need puppy food as long as it's high protein adult dog food. I thought this was kind of strange just because I've never heard this. Is it really ok not to provide puppy food for growing puppies?

I feed my puppy Canidae--an all life stages food.

They claim it's formulated for PAWS: Pupppies, Adults, Working, Seniors. They even say that it can be fed to lactating dams.

http://www.canidae.com/ingredients/whyalllife.html

My pups are eating a high protein/high fat (30/20) adult food. Its an all life stage food- puppies are eating it, when Snowy was nursing she ate it, my 2 senior dogs are eating it (11 & 8 yrs old), the inside non working dog is eating it and everyone is healthy, strong, and doing great!

You can feed an adult food to puppies as long as it has an AAFCO designation "for all lifestages".

There is no real need for puppy foods and in some cases feeding adult food is actually the better choice since you want puppies to grow slowly and evenly instead of too fast and in spurts. Many puppy foods are too high in fat and provide too many calories for this.

I'd say it depends on the breed. With large/giant breed dogs, it's important that they don't develop their bones too quickly as it causes hip problems and all sorts of things later on. You need something that's specifically for large breeds, such as the Eagle Pack, Solid Gold, etc.

I feed my pup junior large puppy food

is it better to feed her adult food?

but when i fed her adult food before she got sick

All Life stage dog food is best. The breeder of my ACD fed biljac which isn't the greatest food but the pups grew well on it. My boy weighed 12 lbs when I picked him up at 8 weeks. Big for an ACD pup. Now he is 65 lbs and I have been feeding him Innova and Natural Balance since he was 12 weeks old. I think those large breed foods are a gimmick Springer spaniel, Springers aren't even a large breed, Great danes, mastiffs, Irish wolfhounds etc. are LARGE. I would put your pup on something better and for all life stages .

It really depends on who makes them. Eagle Pack for example has done very specific feeding trials with breeders of large and giant breeds, so they have solid research to base their formulations on. That's not something to dismiss easily.

I did not feed my last dog, Odin, puppy food. It was actually too rich for him and made him sick. He did so much better on adult food.

Some large breed foods are great, but it is important to remember that there is a difference between large breeds and giant breeds. Giant breeds should not be fed puppy food. Pup food only makes a giant breed grow way to fast causing lots of potential problems. When searching for a good food for a giant breed puppy it is important to feed them a low protein diet, high protein can contribute to that jet fuel type growth big pups want to avoid. But like anything that goes along with dogs, research, research, research the type of food you want to use!

Actually it's not the protein itself that causes problems in giant breed puppies, it's caloric density. Since most foods high in protein are also high in fat, and fat supplies 2 1/4 times the amount of calories per weight unit as protein or carbs, the body receives too much energy, which then causes rapid growth.

This is the exact reason why some manufacturers are now producing large and giant breed puppy formulas (which are generally restricted in fat while still containing a good protein percentage) as opposed to regular puppy foods, which are high in protein and fat.

That would be correct.
Rapid growth has been known to cause many different problems in large breed dogs. Two of my pups from a litter last year were on growth inhibators from the vets office. Im not sure if thats the route I would go but they both grew and developed nice.