Virbac Veterinary HPM Adult Neutered Dog Small & Toy review

This one comes out in the Good band, and the middle of the adult dry category sits there as well, so the headline alone will not separate the two. Look underneath and the picture sharpens. Protein is high and starch is light for a kibble, both of which count in this food's favour, while the shared species names and the purified fibre stop it climbing further. Judged against the job it was built for, keeping a neutered little dog trim, it reads well.

Ingredients, as declared: Dehydrated pork and poultry proteins; Rice; Lignocellulose; Hydrolysed pork and poultry proteins; Peas; Poultry Fats; Pea fiber; Linseed; Minerals; Dried (sugar) beet pulp; Fructo-oligosaccharides; Psyllium fibre (Plantago (L.) spp.); Inactivated brewer's yeast; Seaweed meal (Ascophyllum nodosum); Inactivated Lactobacillus helveticus.

The list opens with dehydrated pork and poultry proteins. Dehydrated meat gave up its water before it was ever weighed, so its declaration comes through the oven in better shape than a fresh meat figure. The analysis follows: 34% protein as fed, 37.4% once the moisture is taken out. Pork remains a rarity in British dog food, and that is part of what makes this range interesting for a dog raised on poultry.

Rice is the single cereal, and the starch it leaves behind is modest. Carbohydrate is estimated at 25.5% as fed and 28.1% of dry matter, against 46.2% typical for adult dry food. This is a kibble leaning on its meat.

Fibre is doing deliberate work. Lignocellulose, pea fibre, psyllium husk and dried sugar beet pulp between them take crude fibre to 10.5%, which is how a reduced ration still fills a small stomach. Fructo-oligosaccharides sit alongside them as food for gut bacteria. Worth clearing up as you read: dried sugar beet pulp is what remains after the sugar has been extracted, so despite how the entry looks there is no sweetener on this label at all.

The small print earns its place. Seaweed meal, the ground form of Ascophyllum nodosum, brings iodine and other trace minerals. Omega 3 comes in its plant form from linseed, inactivated brewer's yeast provides B vitamins, and the Lactobacillus has been heat treated. Taurine is added at 1500 mg/kg, which is generous for a food carrying no heart claim on the front.

The limitation to keep in view is that pork and poultry are declared together, in both the dehydrated protein and the hydrolysed protein that makes the kibble palatable. The fat carries the same open family label. Poultry can be chicken, turkey, duck or goose. For most little dogs that hardly matters, though for one going through a food trial the label simply does not go into that detail.

£7.71 a kilo, in 1.5kg, 3kg and 7kg bags.

The standard comparison we use, a 15kg adult in moderate condition, sits above this bag's own table, which stops at 10kg. On that basis feeding comes to about 267 grams a day, assuming around 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate), or £2.06 a day. For a real small dog the label is the better guide: 105 grams a day at 5kg and 165 grams at 10kg.