Whistler's Whistlers Hypoallergenic Dog Food: Irish Beef with Veg & Oats review

All three recipes settle in our Good band, alongside the typical adult dry food, with the Irish Beef bag the strongest read of the set. What separates them is the size of the animal share: the beef declares 37% dehydrated meat where the chicken recipes declare 26%, and it puts a little less starch behind it. Protein converts to 26.4% of dry matter in the two full size bags and 29.3% in the Small Breeds kibble, which is a fair working level for a kibble of this shape. Carbohydrate lands close to the 46.2% of dry matter typical for adult dry food, a shade over in the Chicken with Rice and Veg at 47.8% and a shade under in the beef at 46.6%.

Ingredients, as declared: Dehydrated Beef (37%), Sweet Potato, Potato, Peas, Dehulled Oats, Chicken Fat, Beet Pulp, Whole Linseed, Minerals and Vitamins, Seaweed Meal, Hydrolysed Liver Protein, Yeast Extract, Chicory Inulin, Yucca schidigera

All three recipes open with a dried meat, not a fresh one, and that is a good thing once you see why. By the time dried meat is weighed, its water has already gone. A declared 26% or 37% of dehydrated chicken or beef therefore arrives in the finished kibble close to the figure on the label, where a fresh meat percentage would shrink in the oven.

The starch side is old fashioned and unhidden. White and brown rice at 20% each sit under the chicken in the full size bag, and dehulled oats and two potatoes sit under the beef. In the Small Breeds kibble, rice, oats and barley share the work. None of it is fancy, all of it is named, and for a dog whose trouble is with meats rather than cereals that is a reasonable way round.

The supportive tail is the part that sets this range apart from its neighbours. Milk thistle, seaweed, nettle, kale, beetroot and blackcurrant appear across the recipes. Green lipped mussel is dosed in print in the chicken bags as the joint entry, and glucosamine and chondroitin are dosed in the additive panel of the beef. Most of the botanicals sit at seasoning level, but the joint entries are declared properly and not just waved at.

Two entries deserve a plain word. Salt is listed in both chicken recipes as a flavour enhancer, and while a dog needs sodium, the raw ingredients usually supply plenty, so it is worth a second look on a label. The Small Breeds list also carries an entry called Prairie Meal, which is not a term that tells a reader what animal or plant is involved.

The additive panels are unusually detailed. Zinc appears twice in the chicken recipes: once a sulphate, once an amino acid chelate. A dog absorbs the second form more readily. Carnitine is dosed on all three. Selenium is sodium selenite here, not the selenised yeast form that dogs take up better, so that is one place the panel takes the ordinary road.

No declared meat share in the range is larger than the dehydrated beef at 37%, which sits on sweet potato, potato, peas and dehulled oats. Only this recipe of the three declares a moisture figure, and only here does ash reach 10.4% of dry matter, which reflects a mineral-rich meat meal. Glucosamine and chondroitin both appear in the additive panel, chicory inulin does the prebiotic work, and hydrolysed liver protein is there to keep the bowl interesting.

Chicken with Rice and Veg and Irish Beef with Veg and Oats are £2.92 a kilo, and the Small Breeds kibble is £5.00 a kilo. The two full size recipes come in 2kg and 12kg bags, the Small Breeds in 2kg.

Assuming around 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate), a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition eats about 236 grams a day of the chicken recipe. The beef comes to 245 grams and the Small Breeds kibble to 221 grams. In the same order that works out at £0.69, £0.72 and £1.10 a day. The energy figures behind those portions are our estimates, not label declarations. Whistlers asks 165 to 330 grams for a dog between 10kg and 25kg, and the waistline can settle the difference.