Calibra Life Senior Small Breed review

Our scoring reads this as Good, level with the middle of the adult dry market. The pillar split tells the story plainly: Outstanding for transparency, Good for protein and processing and for value, Average for nutritional balance. The label is honest and the analysis is fairly rich and starch-forward.

Ingredients, as declared: lamb protein (40 %), rice (30 %), brewer's rice (10 %), apple pulp dried (5 %), poultry fat (5 %, preserved with tocopherols), yeasts, hydrolysed chicken liver (2 %), salmon oil (2 %), dried beet pulp, prebiotics (mannan-oligosaccharides 120 mg/kg, β-glucans 100 mg/kg, fructo-oligosaccharides 70 mg/kg), glucosamine (260 mg/kg), dried rosemary & thyme (200 mg/kg), chondroitine sulphate (160 mg/kg), Mojave yucca (80 mg/kg), Lactobacillus acidophilus HA - 122 inactivated (15 × 109 cells/kg).

Lamb protein at 40% is a dried, concentrated meat, so the headline holds up in the finished kibble; protein converts to 26.4% of dry matter. Lamb is an easily digested, strongly flavoured meat that many older dogs take to readily, and it is not a common lead in a food like this.

Two fifths of the declared list is rice in some form, at 30% plus brewer's rice at 10%. Estimated carbohydrate lands at 48.0% of dry matter, a little over the 46.2% typical for adult dry food.

Fat is the richer side of the analysis at 15.4% of dry matter, led by poultry fat at 5% with salmon oil at 2% supplying omega 3s. Together they push energy to 375 kcal per 100g, which suits small mouths eating small volumes.

The senior extras come with their doses declared: glucosamine at 260 mg/kg, chondroitin sulphate at 160 mg/kg, prebiotic MOS at 120 mg/kg, beta glucans at 100 mg/kg and FOS at 70 mg/kg. Mojave yucca and an inactivated Lactobacillus acidophilus culture go in as well. Dried apple pulp and beet pulp look after fibre.

The compromises are the poultry entries. The fat names no bird, and the palatant is hydrolysed chicken liver at 2%, so chicken is present even though lamb fronts the recipe. For most dogs that is trivia; for a chicken-sensitive one it is the deciding line on the label.

£5.46 a kilo, available as 100g, 1.5kg and 6kg packs.

Fed to a 15kg adult in moderate condition, expect about 224 grams and £1.22 a day, derived from the usual maintenance estimate of roughly 840 kcal (110 × bodyweight^0.75). More realistically for this food's audience, the label asks 75 grams a day of a 5kg dog and 130 grams at 10kg.