Hill's Prescription Diet k/d Early Stage Dog Food review

Ingredients, as declared: Cereals, eggs and egg derivatives, oils and fats (fish oil 1.8%), vegetable protein extracts, derivatives of vegetable origin, meat and animal derivatives, minerals, seeds. Protein sources: Dried whole eggs, pea protein. ActivBiome+ Kidney Defense prebiotic blend (1.1%): Betaine, oat bran, fructo-oligosaccharides.

Cereals lead, and the second entry is eggs and egg derivatives, which is unusual placing that high in a kibble. Oils and fats follow with fish oil printed at 1.8%, then vegetable protein extracts and derivatives of vegetable origin. Meat and animal derivatives sits well down the order with nothing named inside it, so no land animal is identified anywhere on this label.

Hill's names the protein sources separately as dried whole eggs and pea protein, which puts the working protein in the bowl on egg and a plant isolate rather than on meat. For anyone running an exclusion plan, the fish oil counts too: it is drawn from fish even though an oil brings across essentially none of the protein an intolerance would react to.

The blend Hill's calls ActivBiome+ Kidney Defense is declared at 1.1% and itemised as betaine, oat bran and fructo-oligosaccharides. Betaine turns up a second time in the additive panel with a figure beside it, 5.0g, so that inclusion is measured rather than incidental.

Protein is declared at 17.4% and converts to 18.9% of dry matter. Fat lands on exactly the same pair of numbers. A diet of this kind is meant to be assembled with protein down and fat carrying the energy. The protein figure is the design speaking, not a gap in it. The carbohydrate estimate reaches 55.7% of dry matter, crude fibre is 1.6% once dried out, and energy is 387 kcal per 100g.

The rest of the trace element panel is printed with doses attached: iron at 88.3mg, zinc at 155mg, copper at 8.7mg, manganese at 9.1mg, iodine at 2.2mg and selenium at 0.2mg. A natural antioxidant finishes it.

Feeding starts at 30 grams a day for a 1kg dog, gives 275 grams at 20kg and reaches 545 grams at 50kg. Early stage means the practice is watching results you cannot read off a bag, so the decision to start this food, stay on it or move off it rests with the vet holding those results.

It comes in 1.5 kg and 12 kg bags, at £5.96 a kilo. On the label's own portions a 15kg dog eats around 217 grams a day, putting the daily figure at £1.29 by that per kilo rate.