Calibra Verve Senior Small Breed review

On our scale this recipe earns a Good reading, which is where the typical adult dry food lands too. What lifts it within that band is construction. Two named animal sources fill the top of the list, the carbohydrate estimate converts to 40.0% of dry matter against a typical 46.2%, and the supplement deck is dosed in print.

Ingredients, as declared: fresh deboned chicken (30 %), duck protein (26 %), potatoes (16 %), poultry fat, pumpkin (4 %), peas (4 %), apple pulp dried (3 %), hydrolysed poultry protein (3 %), yeasts, hydrolysed chicken liver (2 %), salmon oil (2 %), milk thistle seed (0.1 %), pineapple dried (0.1 %), prebiotics (mannan-oligosaccharides 150 mg/kg, β-glucans 120 mg/kg, fructo-oligosaccharides 100 mg/kg), glucosamine (260 mg/kg), chondroitine sulphate (160 mg/kg), Mojave yucca (100 mg/kg), Boswellia serrata dried (80 mg/kg), green-lipped mussels extract (Perna canaliculus, 50 mg/kg).

Fresh deboned chicken leads at 30%, but most of the weight in fresh meat is water and the oven takes it away. The duck protein at 26% is the concentrated dried entry, and it quietly does a large share of the finished kibble's work. The declared analysis lands at 28% protein as fed, or 31.1% of dry matter, a solid level for an older small dog.

There is no grain on the list at all. Potatoes at 16% carry the starch, with pumpkin and peas at 4% each in support. The carbohydrate estimate comes out at 36.0% as fed.

The senior thinking is easy to spot. Glucosamine at 260 mg/kg, chondroitin at 160 mg/kg, green-lipped mussel extract at 50 mg/kg, Boswellia serrata at 80 mg/kg and Mojave yucca at 100 mg/kg make a genuinely dosed joint and comfort set. The three prebiotics carry printed figures too. Milk thistle appears at 0.1%, a token amount that reads as a flourish rather than a working dose.

An ageing appetite is exactly what the hydrolysed chicken liver at 2% is for. Marine omega 3s arrive with the salmon oil at 2%. That also means the recipe is not fish free. The two family-level entries, poultry fat and hydrolysed poultry protein at 3%, are the only places the label goes vague; everything else is named to species.

Every added trace mineral is printed with its dose, zinc at 90 mg and iron at 75 mg per kilo among them. They come in organic, chelated forms, the format usually chosen for better uptake.

£6.22 a kilo, sold in 1.2kg and 6kg bags.

As a rough guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition would eat about 226 grams a day, which comes to £1.41. That assumes a daily need of around 840 kcal (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). In practice this food is for much smaller dogs, and the label's own table asks 130 grams a day at 10kg and just 35 grams at 1kg.