Primal Spirit Iberian Complete Wet Canned Wild Forest review

Wild Forest lands in our Excellent band, level with the middle of the adult wet shelf. The meat is not what keeps it from going higher. Pork at 60% and turkey at 21% are both named and both weighed, and the analysis behind them stands up perfectly well. What holds it back is the short, unspecific tail of the list, where cereals and soy protein appear with nothing to identify them. The estimated carbohydrate share runs above what wet food normally carries. This is a good can that would read as a better one with two more words on it.

Ingredients, as declared: 60% fresh pork, 21% fresh turkey, water, cereals, soy protein, spices, yucca extract.

Fresh pork at 60% is the headline and an interesting one. Pork stays uncommon in dog food, so it arrives as a fresh protein for a great many dogs. For one that has reacted to chicken or beef in the past, it is a sensible route. Fresh turkey at 21% joins it, a lean and easily digested meat, and together they account for 81% of the can. Protein converts to 36.9% of dry matter with fat at 27.3%.

After that the detail runs out. Any grain at all can sit behind the word cereals, and the grain can change between batches while the label stays put. Soy protein is a plant concentrate, there to lend a hand to the protein figure. Neither belongs in a can for a dog who is meant to be off grain, and neither tells you enough to plan a diet around.

Estimated carbohydrate lands at 23.0% of dry matter, above the 15.8% typical of adult wet food. We work that figure out by difference, with no laboratory measurement behind it, so read it as a strong indication and not a precise number. The direction of travel is clear enough from what is on the list.

The ingredients close on spices and yucca extract. The additives are handled properly, with vitamin A at 7954 IU per kilo, vitamin D3 at 509 IU per kilo and vitamin E at 159 IU per kilo. Then come manganese at 13mg, iron at 29mg, copper at 2.7mg, zinc at 44mg and iodine at 0.6mg per kilo. The fats are kept fresh by tocopherol extracts of plant origin.

£7.50 a kilo, in 400g cans in packs of six.

As a guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition would eat around 695 grams a day, or about £5.22, assuming about 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). That works out at a little under two cans a day.