Wainwright's Sensitive Puppy Cans review

Wet food for puppies is judged against strong company, since the category as a whole reaches our Excellent band. This can sits there too and finishes comfortably ahead of the middle of that field, which takes some doing.

Transparency is the pillar carrying it, reading Outstanding, with protein and processing, nutritional balance and value all Excellent behind it. What earns that is specificity: the meat share is high and named, the plant entries come with their fresh equivalents, and even the yucca extract has a percentage against it.

Ingredients, as declared: Salmon (70%), Dehydrated Sweet Potato (3%)(equivalent to 15% Sweet Potato), Dehydrated Peas (1.3%)(equivalent to 4% Peas), Krill Meal (1%), Minerals, Salmon Oil (0.3%), Dried Seaweed (0.1%), Green Lipped Mussel (0.05%), Chicory Root Extract (0.05% as a source of Prebiotic Fructo-oligosaccharide), Yucca Extract (0.01%)

Salmon at 70% is doing nearly all the work, and it is oily fish at that, which is why the fat figure sits where it does. Declared fat of 12.5% as fed converts to 45.5% of dry matter, a rich profile that suits a busy pup and needs a measured hand with a placid one. Protein comes in at 9.0% as fed, or 32.7% of dry matter.

The plant side is small and honestly described. Dehydrated sweet potato at 3% is given as the equivalent of 15% sweet potato, and dehydrated peas at 1.3% as the equivalent of 4% peas, so the label does the reader's arithmetic for them. Carbohydrate lands at an estimated 3.0% as fed, or 10.9% of dry matter, under the 13.6% typical of a wet puppy food, and no cereal appears anywhere.

Green lipped mussel at 0.05% and krill meal at 1% are the two entries doing something beyond nutrition. Green lipped mussel is a well-regarded natural source of the compounds behind joint supplements, and krill brings marine omega 3 with it. Both are worth knowing about for a different reason too: they are animals, so a pup on a genuine exclusion trial is not on a one-ingredient diet here even though salmon is the only fish.

Salmon oil at 0.3% tops up the fatty acids the fish already supplies, and dried seaweed at 0.1% brings natural minerals and iodine. The prebiotic FOS is credited to chicory root extract at 0.05%. Last on the list is yucca extract at 0.01%. It is a short tail, and every entry on it has a purpose.

The added panel is dosed in print, with vitamins A and E declared alongside zinc at 24mg, iron at 12.5mg, copper at 2.5mg, manganese at 2mg, iodine at 0.45mg and selenium at 0.04mg. Ash is declared at 2.5%, or 9.1% of dry matter, but calcium is never separated out. This can is sold for pups from toy right up to giant, so calcium is the figure most worth asking the maker for. No energy figure is printed, so the 148 kcal per 100g is our own working.

£6.05 a kilo, in 395g cans.

No fixed daily amount fits a growing dog for long. What a pup needs is set by their age and by the adult size they are working towards. Read the can's chart as a bracket and let their condition place them inside it. That chart runs from 98.8g a day at the smallest end to 1580g a day at the largest.