Royal Canin Labrador Retriever Puppy review

Average is our band here, one step under the Good band the typical puppy dry food occupies. This is a label reading above all: category-named meats, maize high up and a vegetable protein isolate doing part of the protein work hold protein and processing to Average and transparency to Poor. Nutritional balance reads Excellent, and value comes in level with the overall band.

What that band does not capture is the care in the analysis. Fat held at 15.4% of dry matter with protein at 36.3% is a sensible balance for a breed that puts weight on easily. The printed calcium figure is exactly the detail a big-pup owner goes looking for.

Ingredients, as declared: dehydrated poultry protein, maize, vegetable protein isolate*, rice, maize flour, animal fats, maize gluten, hydrolysed animal proteins, wheat flour, beet pulp, fish oil, minerals, vegetable fibres, soya oil, fructo-oligo-saccharides (0.34%), psyllium husks and seeds, hydrolysed yeast (source of manno-oligo-saccharides), hydrolysed crustaceans (source of glucosamine), borage oil, yeasts extracts (source of betaglucans), marigold extract (source of lutein), hydrolysed cartilage (source of chondroitin).

Dehydrated poultry protein takes the lead and hydrolysed animal proteins sit further down, and between them they supply most of the animal content without naming a single animal. Since the meat goes in dried, the printed share is more or less what the kibble ends up with. The problem here is legibility, not quantity.

Maize takes second place. Maize flour and maize gluten appear later, and rice sits fourth. Carbohydrate converts to an estimated 38.8% of dry matter, just under the 39.0% typical of a puppy dry food. Even with maize doing so much of the lifting, the cereal load is ordinary for a kibble.

Calcium is printed here, and at 1.37% of dry matter it falls inside the band large breed growth works to. Labrador pups grow quickly and heavily. On a growth label there is little that matters more than the mineral side of that stretch, so having the figure there at all counts in the food's favour.

Fat is the deliberate choice on this recipe. At 14.0% as fed, converting to 15.4% of dry matter, it is restrained for a growth food, and energy works out at an estimated 358 kcal per 100g. That gives you a bowl you can fill generously by volume without the calories running away with you, which is a thoughtful fit for the breed.

The closing entries are the coat and joint set the brand uses across its breed range. Borage oil is there for gamma-linolenic acid, a marigold extract for lutein and yeast extracts for betaglucans, with hydrolysed crustaceans for glucosamine and hydrolysed cartilage for chondroitin. Digestion is looked after by fructo-oligo-saccharides at 0.34% and by a hydrolysed yeast that supplies manno-oligo-saccharides. Not one of these entries carries a printed dose.

The declared analysis is complete apart from energy, with protein at 33.0%, fat at 14.0%, fibre at 1.7%, ash at 6.9% and moisture at 9.0% all printed. The dry matter column therefore rests on real numbers. The kcal figure is our estimate. The added nutritional additives run to vitamin A at 26500 IU, vitamin E at 490 mg, iron at 56 mg and selenium at 0.17 mg per kg.

In 3kg and 12kg bags, at £5.73 a kilo.

There is no fixed daily scoop for a puppy, because the amount shifts as your pup gains and closes in on adult size. Begin from the bag's printed chart, then trim or add by what you can feel over the ribs.