Wainwright's Small Breed Adult Dry Food: Salmon & Rice with Vegetables review

All three varieties sit in our Good band, level with the typical adult dry food. Little separates them, so let your dog's preferred meat decide. Transparency reads Outstanding across the range, with value Good. Protein and processing reads Average, which is broadly the cereal share talking.

Ingredients, as declared: Salmon (35%) (Dried Salmon 30%, Freshly Prepared Salmon 5%), Rice (26%), Whole Grain Barley (19%), Rapeseed Oil, Whole Ground Oats (4.5%), Beet Pulp (4%), Dried Peas (3% equivalent to 12.5% Peas), Linseed (2%), Dried Carrots (1% equivalent to 8% Carrots), Seaweed (0.2%), Yucca Extract (0.02%)

Each recipe leads with one animal at 33 to 36%, and most of it arrives dried rather than fresh, 28 to 31% against a 5% freshly prepared share. Dried meat comes with its water gone, so it carries more protein per gram and keeps its place in the finished kibble. The fresh share here is a garnish. The label is straightforward enough to show you the split, not one folded number.

Rice at 26% is the constant behind the meat, with whole grain barley next at 13 to 19% depending on the variety and whole ground oats at 4.5% behind that. Carbohydrate converts to between 45.4% and 48.6% of dry matter across the range, close to the 46.2% typical for adult dry food. This is a cereal-carried kibble in the traditional mould, built on the gentler grains and open about it.

The supporting cast is sensible. Beet pulp brings measured fibre for firm stools, and linseed at 2% adds plant omega fats for skin and coat. The vegetables are declared with their fresh equivalents alongside: dried peas at 3% standing in for 12.5% of peas, dried carrots at 1% for 8% of carrots.

Seaweed at 0.2% and yucca extract at 0.02% close each list. Seaweed is a natural source of trace minerals, iodine in particular. Yucca is what makers use to soften stool odour. At these levels both are seasoning rather than substance, but they are declared to two decimal places, which sets the tone of the whole label.

One quiet difference inside the range: the lamb recipe includes maize protein, a concentrated plant protein that the salmon and turkey lists do without. The protein figure gets a top-up from a plant, not an animal, and this is the entry a maize-avoiding household should notice.

The added vitamin and trace element panel is short and fully dosed in print, from vitamin E at 150mg down to selenium at 0.1mg. Nothing in the supplement tail is left as a vague name.

Salmon at 35%, with 30% dried and 5% freshly prepared. It is the only variety whose animal content is fish, so a small dog kept off land meats has an obvious pick here. Barley rises to 19% here, and carbohydrate converts to 48.6% of dry matter, the highest of the three.

£4.75 a kilo, sold in a 2kg bag on every flavour.

As a guide, our standard estimate works out at £1.09 to £1.11 a day depending on the variety. That assumes a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition needing about 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). A 15kg dog sits above this food's own feeding guide, which stops at 12kg. A dog this range is actually aimed at will eat less than that estimate assumes. The label's own portions start at 25g a day for the smallest weights and reach 170g at the guide's top end, varying slightly by variety.