Wilko Natures Best Dry Adult review

Our banding puts this in Average, a step under the Good band the typical adult dry food occupies. Two things pull it down and neither is dramatic. The first is composition. Protein converts to 23.9% of dry matter and estimated carbohydrate to 56.0%. The cereals carry most of this bowl. The second is naming. Even though this label names its grains, a good deal of the recipe still sits inside meat and animal derivatives, oils and fats and fish and fish derivatives. What is declared is what we score, and we do not assume the best of a category. For an ordinary dog with nothing special to manage, it is a complete food and it is dosed and balanced as it should be.

Ingredients, as declared: Cereals (Wholegrain Barley 36%*, Wholegrain Wheat 15%*), Meat and Animal Derivatives (Chicken 14%), Derivatives of Vegetable Origin (Chicory Extract 0.1%*), Vegetables (Peas 5%*), Minerals, Oils and Fats (Poultry Fat 2.5%*), Fish and Fish Derivatives, Yeasts (Brewers Yeast 0.5%*). *Natural ingredients.

The interesting thing about this label is what it puts in brackets. Cereals is the leading entry, but it is broken out into wholegrain barley at 36%, then wholegrain wheat at 15%, which is far more than the category alone would give you. Barley is a workmanlike grain. Once cooked it digests easily and gives fibre along with selenium and copper. Wholegrain is the better form of it, since the grain keeps more of what it started with.

Wheat at 15% is the entry to think about. It binds a kibble beautifully and is a common staple in dry foods, and most dogs eat it without a flicker. Wheat is also the grain most often tangled up in dietary intolerance, showing up in the skin, the coat or the digestion. If your dog has never had a problem, it is a non-issue. If you are already suspicious about grain, this is not the bag to test the theory with.

Chicken at 14% is named inside the meat and animal derivatives, and it is the only animal entry that is. Poultry fat at 2.5% narrows the oils and fats down to a family, though not to a species, and fish and fish derivatives is left entirely open, with no species and no percentage. For a household avoiding fish, that last one is the entry that matters.

The plant side beyond the cereals is short. Peas at 5% sit inside the vegetables, chicory extract at 0.1% is the prebiotic, chosen for the inulin it carries and its effect on gut bacteria, and brewers yeast at 0.5% closes things off. Small entries, but named ones, which is more than the category headings manage.

The mineral panel is dosed properly and in the plainest forms: zinc as an oxide at 100mg, iron, copper and the rest as sulphates, iodine at 2.5mg and selenium as sodium selenite at 0.1mg. Sodium selenite is the ordinary choice rather than the selenised yeast a dog absorbs more readily, and it is the choice most of this shelf makes. Vitamin E is dosed at 70mg.

£1.25 a kilo, sold in a 2kg bag.

As a guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition eats about 245 grams a day, assuming around 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). That works out at £0.31 a day. The label's own guide asks 210 to 360 grams for a dog between 12kg and 25kg, so let your dog's waistline settle where in that range they belong.