Since my massive kitty is getting a little TOO massive and his sister can do with some shrinking as well, I’ve been trying to put them both on a diet. Between that and all the mess that’s been happening with pet foods this past year, I’ve been looking up info on different cat foods to check out our options.

When I was little my first cat was exceptionally finicky and was on an ~exclusively canned food diet which eventually led to dental problems in her old old age (~20). So we fed all successive kitties a varying mix of wet and dry. My current brood were weaned on dry and are never interested in people food, so I’ve been feeding them primarily dry, with an occasional can of cat food or people tuna thrown in as a treat.  In my whirlwind of web searching I’ve seen a lot of controversy on dry food, from how it’s way too fattening, to calling it bad and shouldn’t be given to cats. Colour me confused.

Whoops! Hadn’t meant to send that yet!

I’ve been using what I’d call premium to semi-premium cat food: I get the best food you can find in regular stores (WalMart, Target, Publix, etc), typically Purina One (they don’t like Iams). With my erratic hours I can only rarely make it to pet stores and while my cats aren’t too picky, I don’t want to change their food supply with every bag.  I know it’s not the super-dooper premium stuff, but it still has real meat listed as the first few ingredients and their food was never involved in the tainted chinese wheat fiasco. I did find a cache of Dr Fosters & Smith wet and dry food at Target a few months back, I guess they were trying out a new sales venue. My cats liked it, so when it wound up on clearance I cleaned them out. I’ve just run out and had to go back to P1, which like everything else now, the $$ has gone up and it’s now on par with ordering the F&S;from the catalog, minus the shipping.

As for the actual feeding, wherever possible I get “weight control” formulas for their dry food, and I portion control with a measuring cup. But since we’re gone most of the day I can’t tell who’s eating what. We rarely use treats, mostly because I can’t find one they both like. I’ve even tried the freeze-dried chicken and shrimp! *sigh* Tried treat-umms this last time and they won’t touch it. So “kitty twinkies” are not part of the weight-gain equation.  After reading various cons of dry food, I’ve been substituing in more canned. They seem to like Naturalife, except for this last can of lamb, won’t do that one again. I like that the can is FULL, like the F&S;ones, not half filled with water. A week ago I gave canned food only a try… they loved it the first few days, then they REALLY wanted their kibble back. So now it’s back to a mix.

I guess my questions here are, what exactly is the deal with dry food: is it really bad for your cats or just fattening? If it’s still a decent food source, which kind do you recommend… especially for overweight, sedentary, indoor-only house kitties in need of a weight loss program. Preferably something I can find regularly and won’t completely break the bank. Same recommendation question for wet food as well. And when mixing the two, is there a preferred ratio of wet to dry? Daily or weekly blending? Any suggestions greatly appreciated! :D

I would also really appreciate answers to this! Although the kittens that I am getting (in June, very excited) are obviously not overweight yet, I would like to plan ahead. I have read a lot about what kinds of foods are best for cats and kittens, dry food versus wet food, commercial food versus raw food, etc. I don’t have a particularly large budget, but I would like to keep them as healthy as possible!

*pokes thread*

Hellooooooo… *waves aimlessly*

*sigh* No one’s been talkative lately. : (

I’m with you Monica, not a large budget, but wanting the best I can get! Ive read up a little on raw diets, and I just don’t know if I’m ready for that yet. I don’t like touching raw meat… just a weird little tic of mine. I pick up raw chicken with a fork carrying it in and out of the marinade to the grill pan, and don’t even get me started on burgers or meatloaf! EEEEW!*shudders* Thats hubbys job! If I won’t do it for my OWN food, I don’t think I’m quite ready to deal with raw stuff for the kitties… ‘specially since my weirdo cats probably won’t eat it anyway…

Anyone else feel free to jump on it...!!

I’m always happy to help cat guardians with nutritional advice for their kitties, because the feeding the right foods is central to cat health and well-being.

Check out the Cat Chat column that I wrote :"Do You Want to Super-Size That Mouse?” which gives general tips for feeding cats.

However, to reiterate a few points :

(1.) Our cats are descended from desert dwellers who lived in North Africa and the Middle East.  Their diets consisted of birds, rodents/rabbits and lizards.  These prey species are less than seven percent carbohydrate.  Of course, there is no beef, fish, lamb, corn, soy or wheat gluten in the desert.  Those first cats did, of course, eat the carbohydrates (seeds, grasses, etc.) that were in the crops or stomachs of the prety animals.

(2.) Our cats are obligate carnivores, meaning that they must eat meat.  They have some very peculiar dietary requirements (taurine, for example; can’t convert beta carotene to Vitamin A, etc.), so a balanced homemade diet is difficult to achieve.

(3.) As desert dwellers, cats are not “designed” to drink water.  They were made to get their moisture from their food.

Fast forwad to mid-20th century America when people thought they were “modern” when they ate off of aluminum trays in front of their black and white televisions.  At about the same time as human convenience foods appeared, so too did cat food in bags and boxes.  These diets are overwhelmingly high in carbohydrates, so we’ve been carbo-loading our cats ever since.  As a result, our cats eating dry, high-carb rations are ballooning in weight are are prone to diabetes and urinary tract crystals and blockages.

Unfortunately, there’s been much to-do about dental disease and dry diets.  The fact is that any cat over time will develop plaque and tartar (unless we brush their teeth).  Those cats who eat canned diets will build up plaque a little faster, but there’s no magic in feeding dry foods and as a feline specialist, I work hard to get cats onto a canned predominant or exclusive diet from the get-go.

I advise feeding the best canned foods possible that are low-carb.  Some to try are : Evo canned, Wellness chicken or turkey, Fancy Feast Chunky Turkey Feast or Chunky Chicken Feast.  Avoid beef, lamb, seafood, corn, soy and wheat gluten, as possible.  If your kitty needs to munch dry food, I recommend Evo by Naturapet.  However, this low-carb dry food packs in the kcals (612 kcal/cup), so must be fed sparingly (a 10-pound cat would eat 1/3 cup/day).

Avoid foods that are marketed for “indoor only”, “weight control,” “hairball control”, etc.—these foods have too many carbs for our cats.

I do recommend treats of cooked chicken breast.  I also recommend Nature’s Variety Organic Raw Frozen diet that is served as a cooked diet (three medallions cooked for 45 seconds on HI in the microwave).  Our cats developed eating warmed food that was body temperature and as a veterinarian who also practices Traditional Chinese Medicine and acupuncture, I think feeding raw diets is very hard on the digestive system.

Remember that cats need to eat well everyday and enjoy their food.  They can and will starve themselves. With patience, most cats can be transitioned to canned food.

I hope this post helps.  I’ll be happy to answer any questions.

Michele Gaspar, DVM, DABVP (Feline)

I really appreciate your recommendations! I looked up the websites for Naturapet (EVO) and Wellness, and it turns out that Pet Supplies Plus in my own little town sells both of those products! And so does a smaller shop not far from my town! I am going to visit the stores and price those foods in the next few weeks, before my kittens come home. That way I can properly plan and decide whether or not I want to do this!

I had already decided to feed my kitties wet food, and leave a small amount of dry food out for them to munch if they need it. I hope that this works out and that my kitties are healthy and happy! But I don’t want them to end up fat and diabetic, or to have health problems that I could have avoided by feeding them something that may only be a few more dollars a month.

Thanks again! I will check these out.

Wow! Now THAT was an informative post! Thanks!! : D

First off the bat for us, no more weight control food! Easy enough to fix. Since you can’t find any of the other options you listed at your friendly neighborhood superstore, I’ve been looking up where I can find them around here. Unfortunately they’re not too specific online, I’ll have to go calling around to see what I can drum up.

As for your meat source recommendations, while I find it very hard to find beef-flavoured cat food and we definitely won’t be going near lamb again since they hated it, is there a big problem with fish/seafood for cats or are chicken/turkey just lower fat? I know you wouldn’t find a lot of fish out in the desert (ha!), but lets face it, no one’s out there making a mouse and lizard formula either. Ick! My cats don’t care for chicken much, especially the non cat food variety. I’ve tried giving them canned people chicken (won’t touch it), cooked ground chicken (little or no seasonings, still no go), even bits of freshly cooked chicken breast off my own plate. Even with the still-warm (not hot) last option, my curious kitty will try a tiny bit before she slinks off and massive kitty just sniffs it and walks away. Neither cat will eat freeze dried chicken treats. But they DO like people tuna. I hate fish, so we rarely have other fish options in the house. I did give them canned salmon once and they liked it, but I grossed the heck out of myself when I saw that the salmon was still whole! *shudders*

Also, my cats LOVE the dairy (hey! They had cows in egypt… : P ) I know I talked about it in another thread, but you should see them jump to attention whenever hubby has a bowl of cereal or ice cream! I’m lactose intolerant myself, so I usually have some dairy-ease or other lactose-free milk around, is it ok to give them the occasional l-f milk treat? I’ve bought them Cat-Sip before, and other than the added taurine, I didn’t see what the difference was other than size and price.

Just looked at the labels of the Naturallife cans I have at home. All meat ingredients till the one grain (ground rice) ~6th or 7th in line. I guess that should be ok until I find an outlet for Evo, etc around here…

The problem with fish is that some fish (tuna and salmon) can be very high in histamine.  This may, in turn, cause problems with vomiting and/diarrhea.  Some cats DO well with fish foods, although I see more than my share of patients eating a fish-based diet who have signs of food allergies (itchiness and scratching around the face, ears, neck and upper third of the body).

It’s important that cats eat well everyday and if it’s fish-based, so be it (but do try to move them gradually over to other protein sources).

As far as milk and dairy products, most mammals lose the ability to break down lactose ("milk sugar") after then are weaned.  Again, if your kitties do like a sip of milk and they don’t have vomiting or diarrhea afterwards, there’s no harm in giving them a bit of milk or cream to enjoy now and then.

Remember to always change diets slowly over 7-10 days, to avoid intestinal upsets.

Michele Gaspar, DVM, DABVP (Feline)

Alright, I have visited my Pet Supplies Plus, and what a selection, holy cow! They do carry EVO in both dry and canned. In fact, they carry the large 13oz cans - Score! It is only 40 cents more for a 13oz can instead of a 5.5 oz can. So, I know I am going to try the EVO canned. They also carried about 15 different varieties of Wellness canned foods, and several varieties of Wellness dried foods. It looks like Wellness dried foods have some grains in them, but they seem very high quality when compared to Meow Mix (blech!). I have spoken with some other folks, who did mention that some kitties cannot eat EVO foods because they are too rich. If this is the case, what is your opinion of the Wellness dry foods? I plan to stick to predominantly wet foods anyway, but I want to cover all my bases before I bring them home.

They also carried the Innova foods by EVO. Innova, Eagle Pack, and Nutro were their other high quality foods. What are your opinions of these foods? They had large and small canned foods and dry foods by these companies.

Quite a selection though, I was impressed! I would have gone right for the IAMS or something before I started researching and learning more about this sort of thing.

I don’t think the Evo foods are necessarily “richer” than others.  Any of the low-carb diets will be higher in fat and protein, but that’s what our cats are designed to eat.  I feed Evo, Wellness chicken and turkey, and Nature’s Variety Instincts (as well as Nature’s Variety raw, organic frozen diet) to my personal clowder of cats on a rotating basis.

I do not recommend raw diets, but serve the Nature’s Variety cooked : Three medallions (thawed) placed in a microwave for 45 seconds on HI.

I don’t recommend Nutro, have had some kitties do well on Eagle Pack.

Again, it’s important to remember that there’s not ONE diet that works for all cats.  If you decide to use a rotational feeding plan, it’s important to do so gradually over weeks/months.  Abrupt dietary changes can cause havoc with our kitties’ GIT.

Michele Gaspar, DVM, DABVP (Feline)

I didn’t see a place where I could get Nature’s Variety around here, but I will keep Eagle Pack in mind as a potential back up.

I plan to try to find a few flavors of wet food and keep the same dried food, provided that the kittens enjoy it.

Thank you!

Hey, can the fish be harmful to my kitty, if it is in dry food?  If it is, i may have a problem.  Friskies Ocean Fish has been my cat’s favorite FOREVER.  But about four monthes ago, it was discontinued.  So, one day we got a special package in the mail that contained Ourina Healthful Life Balance.  Is this a good cat food? Is it truly good for her, and could she have developed any problems from the Friskies?

also, what about 9 Lives, is their wet food, bad??  Recentally I have been giving my cat about a tsp of it a day, and she loves it.  Should I take that out of her diet, or leave it in?  Also, what brand is good for cats getting higher in yrs, for she is 7. help please--- ** large pleading smile** ----- ps. im the one with the cat with a calcium deposite---- thanks so much

Holly—I try to avoid beef, fish/seafood, corn, soy, milk and wheat gluten in cat diets.  If you’ve read some of my previous Vet Chat columns, you’ll remember that our cats are desert dwellers who were “designed’ to eat birds, small mammals and lizards.

Try to feed Emily a premium cat food and feed more canned food than dry food.  Especially as they grow older (and seven isn’t very old), our cats really benefit from extra moisture in their diets.  The important point is that cats need to eat well everyday and enjoy their food.  They can and will starve themselves. So, if she’s not eating well for you on a new diet, we need to find something that she will eat consistently and eagerly.

Some canned foods I recommend to my clients for their kitties are : Wellness canned chicken and turkey; Nature’s Variety Instincts canned turkey or chicken or rabbit; Evo canned; and a few Fancy Feast Flavors (Chunky Chicken Feast and Chunky Turkey Feast).  The only dry food I recommend is Evo by Naturapet.  You can find local Naturapet distributors at http://www.naturesvariety.com

Whenever you change diets do so gradually, over 7-10 days.  It’s not incorrect to give a little fish now and then (maybe only once a week).  I generally recommend daily feeding of six ounces of canned food per kitty per day and a small (1/8 cup) serving of dry food.

I don’t recommend the over-the-counter dry brands, such as Friskies and Purina.  They are generally very high in carbohydrates, which our kitties just don’t require.

Let me know if I can help you further,

Michele Gaspar,DVM, DABVP (Feline)