Husse Valp Mini review

Valp Mini sits in Good on our scale, keeping company with the typical puppy kibble. Nutritional balance reads Excellent and protein and processing Average. Transparency and value both come in at Good. What stands out most here is the analysis. Protein converts to 34.8% of dry matter, fat to 22.3% and carbohydrate to only 32.6%, against 39.0% for the typical puppy dry food. That is a genuinely meaty shape for a kibble and the lightest starch load anywhere in this range.

What holds the position down is the list rather than the numbers, with wheat sitting high on it and several entries offered without a species or a source. It still feeds a small pup well. The label simply tells you less than the analysis does.

Ingredients, as declared: chicken, rice, animal fat, wheat meal, wheat, linseed, vegetable fibres, hydrolysed animal protein, salmon, salmon oil, yeast, salt, dried whole eggs, fructo-oligosaccharides (0.5%), potassium chloride, vegetable oil, mannan-oligosaccharides, lecithin, fatty acid salt, sea algae, Tagetes.

Chicken leads in the plain form, so read it as fresh chicken, most of whose weight is water before cooking. What tells you more is the declared protein of 32.0% as fed, converting to 34.8% of dry matter, which is the highest in the Husse puppy line and a properly meaty figure for a kibble.

Rice comes first among the starches with wheat meal and wheat behind it. The load they carry is unusually light, converting to 32.6% of dry matter where the typical puppy food runs at 39.0%. A small pup taking small meals gets more nutrition and less filler in each one. Wheat is still the ingredient to weigh up if your pup has ever reacted to a grain, being the one most often implicated in skin and digestive upsets.

Fat is declared at 20.5% as fed, or 22.3% of dry matter, and that plus the protein is what carries the energy figure to 427 kcal per 100g. Animal fat and vegetable oil provide the bulk of it, and neither names its source. Salmon, salmon oil and linseed cover the omega 3 side properly, and that is where a growing coat and nervous system draw from.

Calcium is declared, and it converts to 1.3% of dry matter. That is inside the range growth calls for. It matters less for a small pup than it would for a giant one, since a small skeleton finishes sooner and under far less load. A printed figure is always better than an unprinted one, and this bag has it.

The functional tail is a busy one. Fructo-oligosaccharides at 0.5% and mannan-oligosaccharides work as a prebiotic pair on the gut, dried whole eggs bring high quality protein and micronutrients, and yeast, lecithin, fatty acid salt and sea algae follow. Tagetes closes the list, the marigold extract used for the natural pigments it carries.

The added panel is generous: vitamin A at 20853 IU/kg, vitamin D3 at 1895 IU/kg and vitamin E at 583 mg/kg. Iron is at 201 mg/kg, manganese at 63 mg/kg, zinc from two sources at 108 and 12 mg/kg and beta-carotene at 1 mg/kg. Clinoptilolite at 10 g/kg is a clay acting as a processing aid, and tocopherols preserve the fats naturally. Salt appears on the ingredient list too, added for palatability as it is in most of this range.

£4.78 a kilo, sold in a 7 kg bag.

Little pups leave very little room for error in the bowl, so measure against the growth chart on the bag using scales rather than by eye, and adjust as they fill out.