McAdams Puppy: Free Range Chicken review

This kibble lands in our Good band, level with the middle of the puppy dry field. The reason is mostly the meat: half the bag is whole chicken, named to its country and its farming method, and no other animal is in the recipe. Transparency reads Outstanding, while protein and processing and nutritional balance each read Average and value keeps step with the overall Good band, so the naming is what carries the position. Holding it back are a starch load above the field's middle and a label that leaves both moisture and calcium unprinted.

Ingredients, as declared: Whole British Free Range Chicken (50%), Sweet Potato (17%), Pea Protein, Tapioca, Chicken Fat, Yeast, Vitamins and Minerals, Chicken Stock, Vegetable Fibre, Lentils, Salmon Oil, Cellulose, Prebiotics (FOS (0.15%), MOS (0.15%)), Marigold, Yucca Extract, Hand Cut Irish Seaweed (0.03%), Dried Orange, New Zealand Green Lipped Mussel (0.02%), Camomile, Carrot (0.01%), Cranberries (0.01%), Rosemary, Spinach, Tomatoes, Lavender.

Whole British free range chicken at 50% is the headline and a strong one, for the share and for the specificity alike. Chicken fat and chicken stock further down come from the same bird. No other animal appears in the bag at all.

Whole chicken is weighed fresh with its water in, so the 50% shrinks in the oven. That is the usual trade for fresh meat over a meal. It shows in the declared protein of 27.0%, which becomes 29.3% of dry matter on the assumed moisture basis set out below.

Sweet potato at 17% does the carbohydrate work, and it is a good pick, with more fibre and vitamin A than an ordinary potato. Tapioca sits behind it and is close to pure starch with little else to offer, while pea protein and lentils add plant protein and bulk. Between them, carbohydrate reaches an estimated 42.4% of dry matter, a little above the 39.0% typical for a puppy kibble.

Some of the smaller entries are worth pointing out. Vegetable fibre and cellulose both add bulk fibre. Cellulose is the purified sort, taken out of the whole vegetable, and it works the gut without bringing nutrients along with it. The prebiotic pair of fructo-oligosaccharides and mannan-oligosaccharides at 0.15% each is the more interesting inclusion for a young digestion.

The long botanical tail is where the recipe has its fun: marigold, yucca extract, hand cut Irish seaweed at 0.03%, dried orange and New Zealand green lipped mussel at 0.02%. Then camomile, carrot and cranberries at 0.01% apiece, with rosemary, spinach, tomatoes and lavender. Green lipped mussel is a genuine joint ingredient, though at that inclusion it is a gesture and no more. It does put shellfish in the bag alongside the salmon oil.

The added minerals are printed: zinc at 83 mg, iron at 50 mg, manganese at 35 mg, copper at 15 mg, iodine at 1.7 mg and selenium at 0.29 mg. Mixed tocopherols preserve the food naturally. Calcium is not among them, and neither is moisture, which is why the dry matter column here uses the standard 8% assumption for kibble. The missing calcium line matters little in practice for a small or medium pup. A large breed rearing plan genuinely wants that number, and the maker will tell you if you ask.

£13.00 a kilo, sold in 2kg and 5kg bags.

Puppy feeding moves as the pup grows, so there is no one fixed measure. Match the amount to the age band on the pack and the adult size you are expecting, then trim or add as their shape tells you.