K9 Optimum Senior Can review

This tin comes out in our Good band, one rung under the Excellent band where the typical adult wet food finishes. A pair of readings hold it there. Minerals are the second ingredient and the analysis shows the effect, with ash at 16.0% of dry matter and calcium at 3.0%, a heavier mineral load than an older dog strictly needs. Protein converts to 40.0% of dry matter, a perfectly respectable level for a senior and enough to hold muscle, though not at the top of the wet category. Pushing the other way, the label is far more forthcoming than most tins of its kind and the calories are declared. Carbohydrate stays at 13.5% of dry matter where the typical adult wet food runs at 15.8%.

Ingredients, as declared: Chicken (50%), Minerals, Potato Starch, Poultry Plasma (1%), Dried Carrot, Dried Potato, Flaxseed Oil, Salmon Oil, Dried Seaweed, Chicory Root Powder, Glucosamine Hcl, Chondroitin

The recipe reads the same as the brand's adult tin, which is quietly useful: a dog crossing into its later years is not being asked to change food, only the label on the shelf. The extras an older dog gains from, the joint pair and the L-carnitine, are built into the base rather than bolted on for the senior version.

Chicken at 50% carries the recipe, named and quantified at the head of the list. No everyday meat is easier for a dog to digest, and few are eaten as reliably. That counts for a great deal once appetite starts to wander.

Poultry plasma at 1% is the one vague entry. It is dried from the liquid part of poultry blood and goes in at small levels, for palatability and for the proteins it brings. Poultry is a group and not a species, and nothing on the label settles whether the bird is chicken, turkey, duck or goose.

The mineral question is worth facing squarely. Minerals come second in the list, calcium converts to 3.0% of dry matter and ash to 16.0%, which is more mineral than most tins put in front of an adult dog. In a well older dog this is not a problem. Kidney and urinary conditions do become more common with the years, though, so if your vet is monitoring either, mention the tin at the next check-up.

What is left on the list is small and purposeful. Potato starch and dried potato bind the tin without adding much starch, leaving carbohydrate at 13.5% of dry matter. Flaxseed and salmon oils bring the omega-3 fats, dried seaweed the natural iodine, and chicory root powder the prebiotic inulin.

Glucosamine and chondroitin sit at the foot of the list with no figures attached to them. They are better understood as a helpful background presence in the daily bowl than as a treatment, and anything your vet has prescribed should carry on alongside.

Every line of the added panel does carry a dose: vitamin A at 1500IU, vitamin D3 at 250IU and vitamin E at 40mg. Per kilo it also holds L-carnitine at 25mg, zinc at 20mg, iron at 15mg, manganese at 5mg, copper at 1.2mg and iodine at 0.5mg. For an older dog the L-carnitine is the interesting one, helping turn fat into usable energy while lean muscle stays where it belongs.

£5.13 a kilo, in a 390g tin.

As a guide, a 15kg dog in moderate condition comes to around £4.51 a day, which is roughly 880 grams, assuming about 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). The maker's own table sits close to that, asking for 878 to 1040 grams a day for a dog of 15 to 20kg.