Bonacibo Puppy Dry: Lamb & Rice review

All three recipes settle into our Good band, the same band the middle of the puppy dry field occupies, and each finishes a little clear of that middle mark. Protein and processing and nutritional balance read Good on all three, with transparency Excellent and value tracking the overall at Good, which is what a range without a soft spot looks like. What keeps them from climbing further is a pair of blanks in the analysis, moisture and calcium, rather than anything in the composition itself.

Ingredients, as declared: Dehydrated Lamb Protein (29%), Hydrolized Lamb Protein (21%), Baldo Rice (18%), Maize, Refined Chicken Oil, Anchovy Meal, Brewers Dried Yeast, Anchovy Oil, Carob, Nucleotide Yeast Protein, Dried Beet Pulp, Minerals, Prebiotic Mannan Oligo Saccarides, Seaweed, Blueberry Powder, Yucca Extract, Psyllium, Marigold Powder.

Every recipe here leads on a dehydrated meat protein, and that form is worth decoding. Drying takes the water off first. Where a fresh meat headline shrinks in the oven, the declared share here lands in the kibble almost exactly as printed. It is why protein comes out at 30.0% or better on all three labels.

The starch in each version comes from Baldo rice at 18% and maize. Baldo is a short grain rice that cooks down softly, and rice is generally among the kinder grains for a young digestion. Maize is the more contentious of the two and sits high enough on every list to be worth noticing. Dried beet pulp adds a mild fibre behind them, and psyllium husk brings a soluble fibre that helps hold a stool together.

Anchovy appears in every recipe, first as meal and again as oil, and after the meat it is the most useful thing on these labels. A puppy's brain and eyes are built from long chain omega 3 fats, and small oily fish supply them directly where a plant oil cannot. It does mean fish is present throughout the range, the lamb version included.

The supporting cast is more thoughtful than the class of food usually manages. Brewer's dried yeast and nucleotide yeast protein cover B vitamins and gut support, mannan oligosaccharides act as a prebiotic, and seaweed brings trace minerals including iodine. Blueberry powder and marigold sit at the tail as natural antioxidant sources, with yucca extract there to soften stool odour.

Glucosamine and chondroitin are printed on every label, chondroitin at 800 mg/kg in the High Energy recipe and 700 mg/kg in the other two, with glucosamine dosed higher again in each. Starting joint support during growth is a sensible habit in a food that will be fed for a whole year. Vitamin E is generous at 400 mg/kg throughout and vitamin C is added at 200 mg/kg.

Where these labels run short is the analysis. None of the three declares moisture. The dry matter figures on this page therefore assume the 8% a kibble typically holds. Calcium is not printed either, and that is the first line a large breed owner reads. Energy is our estimate and not a declaration on all three as well.

Lamb & Rice is the odd one out on protein source, with dehydrated lamb protein at 29% joined by hydrolysed lamb protein at 21%, so half the label is lamb in one form or another. Hydrolysed protein has been broken into smaller fragments, which makes it easy to absorb. Refined chicken oil and anchovy are still present, so lamb leads this recipe without making it chicken free. Protein is declared at 30.0% and fat at 15.0%, with energy estimated at 361 kcal per 100g.

£3.73 a kilo across the range.

How much a puppy eats depends on the dog they are turning into, so set the daily amount from the growth chart against expected adult weight and revise it as the months pass.