Eukanuba Breed Specific West Highland Terrier Adult review

Set beside the wider adult dry shelf, this recipe finishes in the Good band and the shelf's own midpoint finishes there too. The meat share and the printed chicken figure are the parts pulling upwards, and the vitamin and mineral panel is dosed throughout. What holds it level is the cereal-led middle of the list, with carbohydrate at 47.9% of dry matter against 46.2% typical, and the fact that the joint compounds are not separately dosed.

Ingredients, as declared: dried chicken and turkey (29% including chicken 17%, a natural source of glucosamine, chondroitin sulphate and taurine), maize, wheat, sorghum, barley, pork fat, fresh chicken (4%), dried beet pulp (2.8%), chicken gravy, minerals (including sodium hexametaphosphate 0.38%), dried whole egg, fish oil (a natural source of omega-3 fatty acids), fructooligosaccharides (0.53%, a natural prebiotic), linseed.

At 29%, the dried chicken and turkey entry outweighs everything else on the list, and the label prints chicken at 17% of it. Almost all of that survives into the finished kibble, the water having gone out of the meat before it was mixed. The fresh chicken at 4% delivers a good deal less than it looks. Protein converts to 29.3% of dry matter, a genuinely useful level for a small adult dog.

Maize, wheat, sorghum and barley provide the starch, and carbohydrate settles at 47.9% of dry matter. Sorghum is gluten free, barley cooks down easily and carries fibre with a little selenium and copper, and wheat is the one worth knowing about on a breed with this much itchy history behind it.

Skin and coat are where a westie owner's attention naturally goes, and the recipe answers with fish oil for the marine omega 3s, linseed for the plant form behind it, and vitamin E at 250mg/kg. Natural tocopherol extracts at 43mg/kg and rosemary extract at 21mg/kg keep those oils from going stale in the bag, which matters more than it sounds when the oils are the point.

Fat at 12.0% and energy estimated at 350 kcal per 100g make this a gentle recipe by kibble standards, which suits a small dog whose exercise arrives in short bursts. Calcium works out at 1.53% of dry matter and ash at 7.5%, both comfortable adult figures, and the mineral panel is dosed rather than merely listed.

The supporting entries are modest and named. Fibre comes from dried beet pulp at 2.8%, and the prebiotic is fructooligosaccharides at 0.53%. A little quality protein arrives as dried whole egg, and sodium hexametaphosphate at 0.38% keeps tartar off a small and crowded set of teeth. Pork fat provides the added energy, and naming the animal beats a generic animal fat entry.

Two and a half kilos, and that is the only bag size.

As a guide to portions, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition would eat around 240 grams a day, assuming about 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). A westie is a far smaller dog than that. Scale the amount down, and the waistline will tell you when it is right.