Fish4Dogs Working Dog: Sardine review

Across the three recipes the scoring settles in our Good band, level with the typical adult dry food. The sardine version leads, helped by the largest dried fish share in the range and the leanest carbohydrate figure of the three. The fish and salmon versions finish level with the typical. Nothing separates them dramatically, so the flavour your dog actually looks forward to is the better tiebreaker.

Ingredients, as declared: Sardine (26%), Salmon Meal (21.5%), Sweet Potato (20%), Pea Starch, Beet Pulp, Salmon Oil (5.5%), Brewers Yeast, Sunflower Oil, Minerals.

All three recipes are built the same way. A named fish sits at the top in its fresh form, so much of the declared weight is water that cooks away. Salmon meal is the dried partner in every version, and it is what delivers the bulk of the finished protein into the kibble.

Pea starch and a potato of one kind or another form the base, with no cereal grain in any of the three, and beet pulp follows as the fibre. Beet pulp is a well behaved fermentable fibre that firms up stools without asking much of the gut, which matters on a food designed to be eaten in quantity.

Salmon oil is the fat in every version, poured in at levels that would look generous on any dry food, and it is the main reason these kibbles carry the energy they do. Sunflower oil supports it with a lighter fat and a natural helping of vitamin E.

Brewers yeast appears throughout as a palatant and a source of B vitamins, which keeps a tired dog interested in a bowl at the end of a long day. Taurine is dosed at 1 g, sensible housekeeping on any fish based diet, and the range is preserved with tocopherol-rich extracts, the natural vitamin E route rather than a synthetic one.

The mineral declaration is the thin part of these labels. Minerals are listed as an ingredient, and iodine is the sole one quantified on any of the three. Nothing about a complete food suggests a shortfall, though a fully printed panel would let you check rather than assume.

Sardine at 26% with salmon meal lifted to 21.5%, the largest dried fish share in the range, and sweet potato at 20% standing in for white potato. Fat comes in higher at 15.7% and carbohydrate lower at 43.5% of dry matter, which is why this reads as the strongest of the three. Of the three, only this one reads Good on protein and processing.

All three recipes come in a 15kg bag.

Taking the standard maintenance estimate of about 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75) as the starting point, a 15kg adult in moderate condition eats between 221 and 229 grams a day. The exact figure depends on the recipe. The bag's own table asks 205 to 213 grams for a 16kg dog, close enough that the waistline can settle it.