Cats groom themselves constantly, and all that swallowed hair has to go somewhere - usually either back up as a hairball or through the gut, which is where a paste like this is meant to help rather than just mask the problem.

This tube combines two pastes in one: a dark brown stripe containing malt extract at 12%, which encapsulates ingested hair to help it pass through naturally, and a lighter stripe containing the prebiotic mannan-oligosaccharide (MOS) at 1.0%, aimed at supporting healthy gut flora and digestion. Beaphar's dosage is by coat length - 4cm daily for a short-haired cat, 6cm for a long-haired cat, given directly or mixed into food, doubled if necessary. It contains 0% added sugar.

• 100G tube, two pastes in one
• Malt extract 12% (hairball passage) and MOS 1.0% (prebiotic, gut flora)
• Short-haired cats: 4cm daily. Long-haired cats: 6cm daily
• Can be given directly or mixed into food
• 0% added sugar
• For cats from 6 weeks old

On what it's not. This is a daily maintenance paste for hairballs generally, not a treatment for a cat that's currently choking on or unable to pass a hairball - a cat in that state needs a vet, not a tube of paste.

Who it's for: owners of cats - especially long-haired ones - who get regular hairballs and want an everyday routine to reduce them, rather than a one-off remedy.