Hill's Science Plan Adult 1-5 Light Large review

Two halves of this label pull in opposite directions, and the Average band is where they settle, a step under the Good band a typical adult dry food reaches. Nutritionally it does something unusual for a kibble: carbohydrate converts to 45.6% of dry matter, just under the 46.2% typical, and the energy is deliberately kept down.

The recipe side is where it loses ground, with a purified fibre and two unnamed fats doing a fair amount of the work. Transparency still reads Good, because the poultry percentages are printed. For a large dog who needs to come down a size, this is a recipe doing precisely the job it was designed for.

Ingredients, as declared: Pea bran meal, chicken and turkey meal (chicken 9%; total poultry 14%), maize, wheat, broken rice, maize protein meal, digest, cellulose, dried beet pulp, vegetable oil, animal fat, minerals, flaxseed, oat bran, fructo-oligosaccharides, pork cartilage (source of chondroitin sulphate), crustacean shell hydrolysate (source of glucosamine). ActivBiome+ Multi Benefit prebiotic blend (0.6%): Oat bran, fructo-oligosaccharides.

Pea bran meal heads the list. It is the fibrous outer coat of the pea, not the whole pea. It brings bulk and very little energy, which is exactly what a light diet is after, though it should not be read as a whole pea and everything a whole pea contains.

The other fibre is cellulose, and it deserves a straight word. It is purified plant fibre, effectively indigestible, and it is in a recipe like this to fill a dog up while contributing almost nothing in calories. It is a functional ingredient, not a nourishing one. Between the two, crude fibre reaches 13.4% of dry matter, several times what a standard adult kibble carries.

Maize, wheat and broken rice do the starch work behind the fibre, with maize protein meal adding plant protein. Wheat is the entry most likely to matter to an owner. No other grain is blamed so often when a dog stops agreeing with its dinner.

The poultry is quantified where a lot of labels would leave it vague: chicken at 9% and total poultry at 14%, supplied as a dried meal that concentrates protein rather than water. Protein finishes at 25.0% of dry matter. The fats are the weaker half, with vegetable oil and animal fat both listed without a source, and total fat kept to 10.3% of dry matter as a light recipe should.

Pork cartilage supplies chondroitin and a crustacean shell hydrolysate supplies glucosamine, the standard joint pairing for a large breed food, though neither comes with a printed dose. The crustacean entry means the recipe is not shellfish free. Flaxseed brings plant omega 3. The 0.6% ActivBiome+ blend pairs oat bran with fructo-oligosaccharides, both prebiotic fibres, with dried beet pulp just behind.

The mineral panel is dosed in print at zinc 132 mg, iron 75.2 mg, copper 7.4 mg, manganese 7.8 mg, iodine 1.9 mg and selenium 0.2 mg per kilo. A natural antioxidant is the preservative. Calcium works out at 0.95% of dry matter, a settled adult level.

Sold in 14 kg and 18 kg bags.

Feeding a 15kg adult in moderate condition would take about 269 grams a day on the standard maintenance estimate of roughly 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75). The dogs this recipe is built for are larger again, and the label's guidance is written at that end, with an 80kg dog on 640 grams a day.