So what do you feed your cat?

[GandolfBold]

Picked up our rescue cat today. Haven't had a cat as an adult. She is beautiful and we are in love. We thought really hard about this and have done loads of prep work, got all the things she will need, but I hadn't even thought about what to feed her. Friends have given conflicting advice, one says yes to cat meat and one says no. As a child we had cats who were fed on tins and biscuits mixed together, but there now seems an alarming selection of brands and types of food!

My cat is an indoor cat,and very fussy with food,so I have to chop and change the flavours/brands from time to time,as she 'goes off' things after a few weeks. She is 6 years old,and weighs just over 9 pounds,she is very slim. (Vet says she is 'just right').
She gets 2 - 3 pouches of wet food per day. If they are only 50 - 80 grams weight,she gets 3,if they are the bigger ones (100 grams) she gets 2. She also has about a handful of dry cat biscuits a day (plus a few Dreamies,or similar treat).

I have two Maine Coons and a Moggy.
One MC prefers dry (Royal Canin ) but she drinks well so I don't worry . She probably eats half a pouch or little ca of Gourmet a day.

Other MC is a big boy .and greedy and eats anything. Males are proned to bladder crystals so I make sure most of his food is wet... he likes everything but I try go give stuff with higher meat and few fillers.

Moggy is nearly 19, few teeth left and VERY picky. She also has kidney disease , drinks gallons. Today she has had some canned tuna, a little cheese, a a bit of tomato-ey pasta!! Really. At her age the vet says let her eat whatever she likes so she does!

I did try raw with my MC cats but both looked at it in horror and refused point blank!

Mine likes Applaws tinned food but only the tuna or sardine flavours, one time in the morning and one at night. He also has the Applaws dry food available all day.

My Ebony is a rescue cat, she weighs 5kg.

I give her 3 pouches of Gourmet wet food split into 2 portions a day. Morning & evening.
She likes Gourmet Seaside Duo & Ocean Delicacies!
It costs £8 for 2 boxes of 12 pouches in Tesco.

I also put a spoonful of dry Purina biscuits down in the evening in case I'm up late in the morning.

As a treat she enjoys 3 or 4 Whiskas Salmon Temptations.

She was very fat initially as she'd been abandoned & was fed by several people.
With me she's slowly losing weight & looks more in proportion.

Oh yes & she always likes fresh water.

10 year old domestic moggy.

Fed once daily - a bowl of Go Cat crunchy and tender biscuits, and around 2/3 a pouch of Felix AGAIL (the dog gets the other 1/3 on agreement that she'll leave the cats portion alone 😂)

Make your life easy and feed dry complete food only. Advantages are: doesn't smell or go off if left out, cat smells better, it's better for the cat's oral health, you can put out a couple of bowls of food or use an autofeeder if you are away for a night, and it is better value. Our vets also recommend dry food over wet for quality and health. Ensure plenty of fresh water is available and you'll be fine.

I wouldn't feed just dry as cats aren't good at drinking which is especially bad for male cats. A mix of wet and dry is good

You need a good quality dry food, cats are grazers so need food and fresh water down all day. Supermarket dry food is rubbish & can cause bladder probs. I use Royal Canin young adult and treat them to a crappy pouch every evening. Dry is good for teeth and will give balance & nourishment and more cost effective. Kittens do benefit from kitten specialised food as it is well adapted to growth. Wild kittens have shorter lives for good reason and why not use the best that’s out there. Ask your friendly Vet nurse but yes small changes gradually to avoid squits.

Good diet is scientifically proven to prolong cats lives.

Royal canin is not a good food despite its price tag. It's not grain free and hasn't got a high meat content

Go cat crunchy and tender (she prefers the fish flavoured one but we alternate) and gourmet in gravy pouches.

It took us a while to get to here, trying different brands for her to turn her nose up at most. Cats can be incredibly fussy!

Go cat is terrible too - does it not have cereals as the first ingredient?

Mice and sparrows seem to be dcat’s diet of choice, judging by the beaks, tails and feet left on the kitchen floor after a hard night’s hunting and murdering!
Oh, and she also gets a couple of pouches of Felix and a few Dreamies a day, plus a bowl of dry Whiskas always available with fresh water. She keeps a sleek profile and a healthy weight.

Nothing wrong with royal canin high good quality protein and yes it has wheat but this is not a problem for most cats.

Have you read the ingredients? It doesn't even say how much meat is in it

Dehydrated poultry protein, maize, wheat gluten*, rice, maize gluten, hydrolysed animal proteins, vegetable fibres, animal fats, minerals, chicory pulp, fish oil, soya oil, Fructo-Oligo-Saccharides (FOS), psyllium husks and seeds, marigold extract (source of lutein).

(Typical royal canin ingredients - hardly any meat and lots of cereals)

I feed my two a sachet each every morning and every evening. Biscuit bowl always full for grazing. They also have any left over meat, fish etc. Yes they can be fussy little things at times so maybe try one small box og cat food first. My 2 year old male also kills and eats things.

My boy loves Gourmet pouches and tinned, twice a day but wants a rotation of flavours. I keep a small bit of dry for him at night. And fresh water twice a day.

Ours has a mix of wet and dry Thrive. He has one tin of wet a day and the rest dry. Once a week or fortnight he has some boiled chunks of turkey or chicken breast.
As someone else mentioned cats are obligate carnivores so food needs to have a high meat content with low carb content. Avoid wet food in jelly or gravy as that is what is bad for the teeth. Ensure food is a complete food rather than complimentary as complete contains the necessary nutrients for cats.
Some pet food really is crap. Zooplus is an excellent website for food and litter.
For now feed him what he is used to and change gradually to reduce any chances of the squire.

*squits not squire!

What WAS she eating?
Mine are on Iams. They don't waste any of it. Are not over weight. It doesn't go all fly blown in the summer. You can buy it in Sainsbos.
Works for us,

For a treat I give him roast chicken every so often.

Congratulations on your new kitty op!
There are some really good foods about now but also still a hell of a lot of crap ,some are marketed well with high price tags.
Whatever you decide,read ingredients,check meat content& try to stay away from added sugars & grains .

I buy mine from zooplus,they've a bigger variety of good quality foods than most other places.
Mine have a mixture of wet & dry ,all high meat content.

Favourite wet foods are cosima,mr stuzzy & animonda vom Feinstein .
Dry is Nutro wild frontier or wild freedom.

There are other high meat content that I get but those seem to go down the best with mine .

Lily's kitchen kitten dry (he needs the calories)
Natures menu kitten wet

Sometimes almo nature wet from zooplus, and the wild freedom dry from there is like crack to him