Dogs and cats should be fed diets specifically designed for their breed, age, and activity level. These factors are also known as physiological state.
Dogs and cats should be fed according to their specific nutritional needs. Cats are not small dogs and have very different nutritional requirements than dogs, whereas dogs have nutritional needs more similar to people than cats.
As your pet ages from birth into adolescence and adulthood and finally becomes geriatric, their nutritional requirements change. These changing nutritional needs have been called “life stage nutrition” and are the logic behind diets designed for growth, maintenance, reproduction, and the geriatric stage of a pet's life. Life stage nutrition is feeding diets designed to meet the optimal nutritional requirements of animals at different ages or physiological states.Not all pet food manufacturers ascribed to the nutritional principle of lifestages and therefore have one nutrient profile that fits “all stages”. These products carry the AAFCO statement “for all lifestages”. We do not believe this is the best way to feed pets just as one shoe size does not fit all people.