diff --git a/crates/clawhdf5/tests/shared_message_v1.rs b/crates/clawhdf5/tests/shared_message_v1.rs
index 0873d03..80da855 100644
--- a/crates/clawhdf5/tests/shared_message_v1.rs
+++ b/crates/clawhdf5/tests/shared_message_v1.rs
@@ -107,8 +107,12 @@ with h5py.File("{path}", "r") as f:
     );
     let stdout = String::from_utf8_lossy(&out.stdout);
     let theirs: Vec<&str> = stdout.lines().collect();
+    // Read the types through clawhdf5, not from `expected()`, so this checks
+    // our reader against libhdf5 rather than the table against h5py.
+    let file = File::from_bytes(FIXTURE.to_vec()).unwrap();
     let ours: Vec<String> = expected()
         .into_iter()
+        .map(|(p, _)| (p, file.dataset(p).unwrap().dtype().unwrap()))
         .map(|(p, t)| match t {
             DType::Compound(fields) => {
                 let names: Vec<String> = fields.into_iter().map(|(n, _)| n).collect();