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Merrick Lil' Plates Grain Free Real Lamb & Sweet Potato Recipe Review

Merrick Dry Dog Food Review

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Ingredient Analysis

When evaluating a dog food, the first five ingredients can tell you a lot about the quality of a product as they make up the bulk of the product. Ideally, you're looking for quality protein sources with a minimum of cheap starches, fillers or by-products. Continuing down the ingredient list, look for ingredients that resemble real food with a minimal number of unpronounceable chemicals - the same as you would for human food.

Merrick Lil' Plates Grain Free Real Lamb & Sweet Potato Recipe includes the following:

Note - a bolded ingredient in the above tables indicates it is one of the first five ingredients listed by the product manufacturer.

In this case, Merrick Lil' Plates Grain Free Real Lamb & Sweet Potato Recipe's most plentiful ingredient listed is deboned lamb, which is considered a quality protein source. It also contains lamb meal as additional quality protein sources.

Additionally, it's worth noting that this product does not list either by-products nor bulk-adding fillers within its top ingredients. By-products are considered inferior, lesser quality ingredients. Common fillers typically used to add bulk to the product are not required in your dog's diet. Together, their combined absence may be indicative of a higher quality product.

Allergen alert: This product contains deboned lamb, lamb meal, whitefish meal and salmon oil which may be problematic for dogs who suffer from lamb or seafood food allergies.

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Nutritional Analysis*

Compared to the other 1160 dog foods in our database, Merrick Lil' Plates Grain Free Real Lamb & Sweet Potato Recipe has:

• less protein than average
• significantly more carbohydrates than average
• less fat than average
• an average amount of fiber

In general, dogs have been shown to do better with a higher protein, medium fat, lower carb diet with sufficient moisture. However, specialty diets as recommended by your veterinarian may prioritize a different nutritional breakdown.

Calorie Breakdown

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All the product information on this page is based on data collected from the manufacturer's product website as retrieved on April 23, 2017.

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Ingredients

Ingredients as published by the dog food manufacturer:

Deboned Lamb, Lamb Meal, Sweet Potatoes, Peas, Potatoes, Chickpeas, Potato Protein, Natural Flavor, Pea Protein, Pork Fat (preserved with mixed tocopherols), Whitefish Meal, Salmon Oil, Apples, Flaxseed Oil, Blueberries, Inulin (from chicory root), Gelatin, Salt, Organic Dried Alfalfa Meal, Yucca Schidigera Extract, Minerals (Zinc Sulfate, Iron Amino Acid Complex, Zinc Amino Acid Complex, Manganese Amino Acid Complex, Copper Amino Acid Complex, Potassium Iodide, Cobalt Proteinate, Sodium Selenite, Cobalt Carbonate), Choline Chloride, Vitamins (Vitamin E Supplement, Vitamin A Acetate, Vitamin B12 Supplement, d-Calcium Pantothenate, Vitamin D3 Supplement, Niacin, Riboflavin Supplement, Biotin, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Folic Acid, Thiamine Mononitrate), Dried Bacillius coagulans Fermentation Product, Dried Lactobacillus plantarum Fermentation Product, Dried Lactobacillus casei Fermentation Product, Dried Enterococcus faecium Fermentation Product, Dried Lactobacillus acidophilus Fermentation Product.

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*Note that some nutritional percentages reported are only estimated values, and are indicated as such as (est). Each dog food manufacturer is required by law to publish a Guaranteed Analysis, which defines each product's maximum values of fiber, moisture and ash in addition to the minimum values of protein and fat contained within. Exact nutritional percentages are not available and hence all calculated values (including carbohydrate percentages and calorie amounts) are determined using these minimum and maximum published values and therefore may differ from actual values.

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