Pedigree Vitality+ Pouches review

This range lands in our Good band, a step below the Excellent band the typical adult wet food reaches. Nothing here is neglected and nothing is exceptional. The itemised chunk percentages lift it clear of a plainer label, and the unnamed cereals and vegetable protein extracts stop it climbing any further.

The analysis is doing its job even where the ingredient list holds back. Protein converts to 42.4% of dry matter and fat to 24.2%, both solid figures for a wet food, and the added panel is fuller than most tins at this level bother with. If you have been feeding these and wondering whether they are good enough, the honest answer is that they are a fair everyday pouch that could tell you more about itself.

Ingredients, as declared: With Beef and Liver Mix and Carrots and Peas: Meat and Animal Derivatives* (including Mix of Beef 6% and Pork Liver 9.6% in the Chunk), Cereals, Vegetables (including Dried Carrot and Pea Mix 1%, equivalent to Carrot and Pea Mix 5%), Derivatives of Vegetable Origin (Dried Beet Pulp 0.7%), Vegetable Protein Extracts, Minerals, Yeast (Mannan-Oligosaccharides 0.12%) *94% Natural Chunk typically 42% of the product, With Chicken and Potatoes: Meat and Animal Derivatives* (including Chicken 14% and Pork Liver 9.6% in the Chunk), Cereals, Vegetables (including Dried Potatoes 1%, equivalent to Potatoes 4%), Vegetable Protein Extracts, Derivatives of Vegetable Origin (Dried Beet Pulp 0.7%), Minerals *94% Natural Chunk typically 42% of the product, With Fish and Carrots: Meat and Animal Derivatives* (including Pork Liver 9.6% in the Chunk), Cereals, Fish and Fish Derivatives (including White Fish 6% in the Chunk), Vegetables (including Dried Carrots 1%, equivalent to Carrots 7%), Derivatives of Vegetable Origin (including Dried Beet Pulp 0.7%, Glucosamine 0.02%), Vegetable Protein Extracts, Minerals *96% Natural Chunk typically 42% of the product, With Poultry and Carrots and Peas: Meat and Animal Derivatives* (including Poultry 14% and Pork Liver 9.6% in the Chunk), Cereals, Vegetables (including Dried Carrot and Pea Mix 1%, equivalent to Carrot and Pea Mix 5%), Derivatives of Vegetable Origin (Dried Beet Pulp 0.7%), Vegetable Protein Extracts, Minerals *94% Natural Chunk typically 42% of the product, With Beef and Liver Mix and Vegetables: Meat and Animal Derivatives* (including Mix of Beef 6% and Pork Liver 9.6% in the Chunk), Cereals, Vegetables (including Dried Carrot and Pea Mix 1%, equivalent to Carrot and Pea Mix 5%), Derivatives of Vegetable origin (Dried Beet Pulp 0.7%), Vegetable Protein Extracts, Minerals, Yeast (Mannan-Oligosaccharides 0.12%), With Chicken and Potatoes: Meat and Animal Derivatives* (including Chicken 14% and Pork Liver 9.6% in the Chunk), Cereals, Vegetables (including Dried Potatoes 1%, equivalent to Potatoes 4%), Vegetable Protein Extracts, Derivatives of Vegetable origin (Dried Beet Pulp 0.7%), Minerals, With Fish and Carrots: Meat and Animal Derivatives* (including Pork Liver 9.6% in the Chunk), Cereals, Fish and Fish Derivatives* (including White Fish 6% in the Chunk), Vegetables (including Dried Carrots 1%, equivalent to Carrots 7%), Derivatives of Vegetable origin (including Dried Beet Pulp 0.7%, Glucosamine 0.02%), Vegetable Protein Extracts, Minerals, With Poultry and Vegetables: Meat and Animal Derivatives* (including Poultry 14% and Pork Liver 9.6% in the Chunk), Cereals, Vegetables (including Dried Carrot and Pea Mix 1%, equivalent to Carrot and Pea Mix 5%), Derivatives of Vegetable origin (Dried Beet Pulp 0.7%), Vegetable Protein Extracts, Minerals, *94% Natural, Chunk typically 42% of the product

The chunk is where this label does its best work. It is declared as typically 42% of the pouch, and inside it the maker prints real numbers. Pork liver is at 9.6% on all four recipes and chicken or poultry at 14% on two of them. A beef mix takes 6% on another and white fish 6% on the last. Read those against the whole pouch rather than against the chunk and they come down proportionally, which is the one piece of arithmetic the label leaves for you to do.

Around the chunk sits the rest of the recipe, and here the writing turns to category terms. Meat and animal derivatives leads, covering any warm blooded land animal, with cereals, vegetable protein extracts and derivatives of vegetable origin behind it and dried beet pulp declared at 0.7%. The vegetables are handled more helpfully. Dried carrot and pea mix at 1% stands in for 5% fresh, dried potatoes at 1% for 4% fresh, or dried carrots at 1% for 7% fresh, depending on which recipe you have.

Two small additions are worth a mention. On the beef and liver recipe there is yeast with mannan-oligosaccharides declared at 0.12%. It is a prebiotic, and what it feeds are the helpful bacteria of the large intestine. The fish recipe carries glucosamine at 0.02%. Beside the doses a joint supplement would use that is a token. A dog with diagnosed joint trouble keeps to the vet's prescription and takes this as the dinner underneath it.

The analysis holds up well. Protein reads 7.0% as fed, converting to 42.4% of dry matter, fat 4.0% and 24.2%, and estimated carbohydrate 23.1% against 15.8% for the typical adult wet food. Energy is 76 kcal per 100g against 97 for the typical adult wet food, and that makes these pouches light. A day's feeding is a decent pile of them. The added panel runs longer than the brand's tins manage. Three B vitamins sit alongside vitamin D3 at 187 IU and vitamin E at 56.0 mg, with copper, iodine, iron, manganese and zinc each dosed per kilo.

Sold as 85g pouches, in cases of 12 and 40.

As a guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition needs about 1105 grams a day, which is thirteen pouches, assuming around 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). For that same dog the label asks 935 grams, or eleven pouches.