Nature's Variety Healthy Grains Adult Mini: Chicken review

All three sit in our Good band, the same band an average adult dry food occupies, with the two birds a shade ahead of the fish. The gap between them sits in the second line of the ingredients. The chicken and turkey each get a dried chicken protein at 19% where the fish recipe gets dried tuna protein at 11%, which changes how much of the finished kibble is animal. Protein is declared at 29% on all three, converting to 31.5% of dry matter on an assumed 8% moisture. Estimated carbohydrate comes to 38.5%, under the 46.2% typical of adult dry food.

Ingredients, as declared: Deboned chicken meat* (20%), dried chicken protein (19%), dried peas* (13%), oats* (12%), brown rice* (7%), whole barley*, poultry fat* (6%), hydrolysed animal proteins (poultry, pork, fish) (4%), maize protein, beet pulp*, minerals, dried carrot* (0.5% equivalent to 4% of fresh carrot), dried apple* (0.3% equivalent to 2% fresh apple), dried seaweed (kelp)* (0.01%), dried rosemary* (0.01%). *Natural ingredients

Each label opens on a deboned meat at 20%. Deboned means fresh, so a good part of that weight leaves in the oven as water. The dried protein behind it is the entry that comes through cooking more or less intact, at 19% in the chicken and turkey and 11% of dried tuna protein in the white fish.

The grain side is named, not bundled. Oats and brown rice are handled easily by most dogs once cooked, whole barley keeps more of its micronutrients than a refined grain would while bringing gluten along, and dried peas sit with them. Maize protein appears further down all three lists as a protein topper.

Hydrolysed animal proteins at 4% are in for flavour, pre-broken so that they read stronger on a small dog's palate. All three sources are named on the label, poultry, pork and fish, which is more openness than the category usually manages. It does mean no recipe in this range will work as a single protein diet.

The tail carries a precision rare on a kibble. Dried carrot is at 0.5% and dried apple at 0.3%, with dried kelp and dried rosemary at 0.01% each. Kelp is an iodine source and rosemary acts as a natural antioxidant on the fats. Beet pulp sits above them as the fibre entry, at 3.3% of dry matter.

The mineral panel is dosed in print but comes in sulphate form, not chelated, with 370 mg of zinc sulphate monohydrate delivering 135 mg of zinc. Selenium is sodium selenite. Not one of the three labels prints a moisture figure. So the dry matter numbers here work from an assumed 8%, which is what a dry food normally holds.

Deboned chicken at 20% and dried chicken protein at 19%, with dried peas at 13% and oats at 12%. It offers the widest choice of bag sizes in the range and is the most straightforward starting point for a small dog with no poultry history behind them.

£9.73 a kilo. The chicken is sold in 0.6kg, 1.5kg, 3kg and 7kg bags, the turkey and the white fish in 1.5kg and 3kg.

On our standard basis, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition needs about 227 grams a day, working from around 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75), which is £2.21 a day. A small breed dog will eat far less than that: the label's own table asks 80 grams for a 5kg dog and 140 grams for a 10kg one. The energy figure behind our estimate is calculated, not declared.