Hill's Science Plan Sensitive Stomach & Skin Small & Mini Adult Dry Dog Food with Chicken - 1.5kg

Sensitive Stomach & Skin Small & Mini Adult Dry Dog Food with Chicken is a complete dry food for adult dogs of small and mini breeds, up to about 10kg, made with chicken. It is the everyday Science Plan recipe for this life stage, sold without a prescription.

Key Features

• Digestion: High digestibility with prebiotic fibre to feed the gut's own bacteria.
• Skin: Vitamin E and omega-6 fatty acids.
• Lean Muscle: High-quality protein.
• Age Range: Adult dogs.
• Pack Size: A single 1.5kg bag.

Sensitive Stomach And Skin, Realistically

• This is a highly digestible everyday recipe with prebiotic fibre and added vitamin E and omega-6. For a pet that is simply a bit delicate on ordinary food, that is often enough and it is a sensible first thing to try.
• It is not a diagnosis. Sensitive stomach is a description, not a condition, and the causes range from eating too fast to inflammatory bowel disease, parasites and food allergy.
• Skin is the same. Itching, licking paws, recurring ear infections, scurf or bald patches point to fleas, mites, infection or allergy far more often than to the food, and in this climate skin disease is the commonest reason pets end up at the vet. More than a couple of weeks of itching is a vet visit.

Why Breed Size Changes The Recipe

• A small dog has a far higher metabolic rate per kilo than a large one, so small-breed foods are more energy-dense and the kibble is made small enough to chew comfortably. Large-breed foods go the other way, with controlled energy and added joint support.
• Kibble size is not a detail. A dog that cannot comfortably pick up and chew its food either bolts it whole or eats less than it needs, and both cause problems.
• If your dog sits on a boundary between sizes, go by adult bodyweight rather than by how it looks: small and mini is up to about 10kg, medium about 11 to 25kg, and large breed 25kg and up.

Feeding, Storage And The Range

• How much: start from the chart on the pack by weight, then adjust to what you can feel. You should find the ribs easily under a thin layer of cover. Weigh the food rather than using a cup, and count treats towards the day's total.
• Changing over: move across gradually over about seven days. A sudden switch is the usual cause of a loose stool that then gets blamed on the food.
• Storage here: keep the bag sealed, cool and out of sunlight and use it within about six weeks of opening. UAE heat turns the fats in kibble stale faster than the packaging assumes, and that is the usual reason a pet goes off a food it used to like. Keep it in its own bag rather than tipping it into a bin.
• Who makes it: Hill's was founded by an American vet, Mark Morris Senior, who formulated a kidney diet for a guide dog in the 1940s. They run feeding trials on their recipes, which is why they can say clinically proven where most brands cannot, and the main reason the range costs what it does.
• Science Plan is not Prescription Diet: this is the everyday range for healthy pets. Prescription Diet is the separate therapeutic range for diagnosed conditions, sold on a vet's recommendation. The names overlap confusingly and they are not interchangeable, so if your vet has set a diet, ask them before changing it.

Good To Know

• This listing is the 1.5kg pack.
• Complete dry food. Nothing needs adding to a complete diet.
• Keep fresh water available at all times.
• Store sealed, cool and out of sunlight. Use an opened bag within about six weeks.
• Science Plan is a non-prescription everyday food, not a veterinary therapeutic diet.
• Made by Hill's Pet Nutrition, part of Colgate-Palmolive.