Are fancy cat foods worth the money?

[RainyDaze4]

My kitten is nearly old enough to start eating ‘Adult’ food so am thinking about which brand/type to start feeding her as there’s obviously so much choice.

I’m not interested in raw food etc. I’m talking about your normal cat food you can buy in pet shops and supermarkets but even so, I’m bombarded with all the usual Whiskas, Felix, then you’ve got Sheba, Gourmet, Lily’s Kitchen and on to the fanciest looking ones like Royal Canin, Hills, James something etc.

I’m sure there’ll be some people waxing lyrical about how rubbish Whiskas and Felix is but my kitten has thrived on these normal brands!

Does buying a fancy cat food brand make a difference or are they all the same really?

What do you feed your cat?

Perfect fit,dry and wet,is a huge favourite for my cat. There are others which he'll devour for the first few pouches and then go off.Perfect fit had been consistently liked by him much better than any other. I'd love to be able to drop the plastic pouches completely but can't find a tinned food he likes. In desperate times he'll always eat tinned tuna.
Home bargains have perfect fit at a good price at present and pets at home always stock it.When he doesn't like just food he runs at me and trips me so we have to try and keep him happy.

Following with interest so thank you for all the information and brands

Our cat has had Royal Canin Sensible all her life. She is now 17 and just starting to look a bit frail. She recently needed some medication and the vet told us to give it to her in her treats...felt awful saying she had never had treats! Anyway, gave the medication in a little tuna and she vomited it back every time, so guess its what they are used to!
We definitely preferred to feed the dry kibbles as she can just graze all day.

Betty is not feeling Whiskas lately and is currently loving Felix soup. However, we buy in bulk and she’s got 84 Whiskas pouches to go before she sees the back of them,

No, it’s a cat, not a fucking Masterchef judge.

My cat enjoys many food types, until the very point when I buy them in bulk and then she won’t even look at them.

Agent

I refer you to what I said upthread - One thing that they categorically will not eat is what you think is their favourite food and have just bought a lot of because it was on special offer. Your Betty is just reminding you that she will always hold the upper hand in this battle because at some point you will be so desperate for her to eat, that you'll give her your Sunday roast or more of the Felix soup and your threats to not buy any new cat food until she's finished the Whiskas will be empty promises .

What's this 'Royal Canin Sensible' that people keep mentioning?

The 'twinset and pearls and a nice pair of brogues' version of catfood?

A brand name that's been lost in translation from foreign?

Food that's guaranteed to calm your cat down and stop it running up the curtains?

I have two cats, a disease riddled 6 year old who will eat anything, and a new kitten. I've just started them on a Blink cat food subscription and they seem to really like it.

Over the years I have discovered that rotation of things they like works best. I prefer to feed high meat content such as Natures Menu and the better quality Zooplus ones. Or the low sugar German foods.

Low grain or grain free, because cats are carnivores and do not need soya which can cause issues, some behavioural. Low sugar, there will be naturally occurring sugars but certainly no added sugar. If you have had a diabetic cat you will know what to look for.

Carageenan is used as a thickener and for colour in many foods, even the 'better' ones and is a carcinogen. Hard to avoid though.

The 'fancy' foods, many made of shredded soya shite and fake meat lumps with terrible ingredients lists and weird combinations are made to be appealing to cats because they make money for the companies, they don't give a shiny shite whether they kill your pet or not.I am thinking of the Gourmet/Felix/Whiskas/Sheba and cheap supermarket versions, not Hi Life and Natures Menu type food. Shredded stuff is better but not the complimentary stuff, and beware of tapioca in those.

Dry food is sprayed with an appetising spray, when you touch it you can feel the layer of grease. if you feel the need to use dry, do get the highest meat content you can find and don't go by the healthy looking brown packaging like I did once. Bought something that was promoted as natural and healthy and found drips of blood all over the house, poor little sod had only had it as treats and it made his bladder bleed. I no longer trust PAH own brand anything.

At the end of the day they will decide what they like, and you have to decide whether to wait it out because they tend not to starve themselves but if you give in you are making a rod for your own back, just like I do, every damn time.

Mine like Tesco's pouches fish in jelly (although one just licks off the jelly as she prefers biscuits). I change the biscuits brand all the time as they get bored. They also eat the off cuts of the chicken.

Ours has Encore, Applaws and mostly Greenwoods wet foods, all grain free and high meat content. Dry food is Hill's Science Oral Care (I did try others but this is the one she ate consistently and she did have tartar on her teeth, so vet recommended it) supplemented with other kibble to make it more interesting.

When she goes to the cattery, we take a bag of her food with her as the cattery will just feed her Felix otherwise. Felix and other low quality brands upset her stomach (probably partially an abrupt change in diet?) and she does the stinkiest, runniest crap after it. So grim. I've tried lots of foods on the fussy madam and she's honestly worse than DS who has autism. She has a way of craning her neck to see what's in the bowl, then lashing her tail and turning away with a disappointed look that's just devastating...

I bulk buy the Greenwoods from Zooplus, and buy the occasional cat tree and bowls from there too, seems like good value. We also give her treats from them, usually freeze-dried chicken or fish. She looks very healthy and hasn't had any hair balls yakked up either (I put a malt tablet in her dry food, malt's supposed to help with that).

We use royal canin intense beauty 😂 it makes ours sooooooo soft and shiny and the vet always comments on it. After a few days on something else his fur starts to dull and he is less intensely beautiful 😂

Victoriabun
Our cat ( female aged 7 ) will only way the gourmet brand wet food. So prefers the savoury cake tin , but will sometimes eat the pouches. Never jelly , has to be gravy.
With her dried food it's Royal Canin , always savior exigente, as it has different shapes and apparently some cats prefer

Almost identical to my fussy fussy 11 year old. High end expensive pouches or tins. Bloody ENCORE have reduced their pouch sizes for same price ! No jelly and tastes never never settle on one brand. Won't eat them if she gets one brand too much . Its a nightmare🙃

It’s this one: www.zooplus.co.uk/shop/cats/canned_cat_food_pouches/royal_canin_cat_food/royal_canin_adult/133237

Sometimes I’m tempted to eat it myself he looks so fabulous.

He does go off it on occasion so we also buy Cosma and a few others but the downside is it isn’t complete food and smells god awful.

We also use Sanabelle dry cat food - you can buy enormous bags of it if you have the space so lasts forever. We just decant some into a smaller tub. The bag smells rancid when open. www.zooplus.co.uk/shop/cats/dry_cat_food/sanabelle

My cat is Never jelly , has to be gravy. He'll eat dry food.

He eats what he feels like eating. I just open the packet and put it n his dish. If he wants extras like those tiny dreamies he'll pester me for them.

Whether or not he will eat food depends on his whim.

He's fit and healthy and in his mid-teens.

@Dafspunk spent about £50 once and the shite did this after months and months and months of eating it. They had a variety of flavours too and refused every f-ing one. Gave it all away on nextdoor and they brought us a bottle of wine in return so wasn’t a total lost cause.

Ours get Whiskas pouches. Although they are both 12+, they won't eat the 11+ varieties. It is very strong smelling. One got fed a posh variety (Sheba) last year in the cattery as he refused the usual Whiskas. Took ages to get him back to normal food. They would eat biscuits all day, given half a chance. But the Vet warned us away from them, as our cats don't know when to stop eating them, and one has periodic IBS which biscuits make worse.

My cat is 17 and has no teeth. She will only eat Gourmet pate, no other brand.

Mine eats felix at the moment but tbh, she’s a bit of a pig and I imagine would happily eat pretty much anything as long as it’s wet.

She’s happy to eat dry as treats but not at all impressed if it’s served as a stand alone meal.

If budget allowed though, I would go back to feeding raw as I do think it’s preferable to processed food.

No, it’s a cat, not a fucking Masterchef judge.

Not a cat owner, clearly.

I was looking for something to tempt my grieving cat to eat again after the death of her furry companion.

I visited an old fashioned pet shop and the owner gave me various free samples of different textures like pate, mouses etc to try.
One of them was country hunter duck and pheasant wet food - the moment I put the dish down the grieving cat made a beeline for the dish and ate it all.

The pet shop has now closed down so I buy in bulk from viovet.

It is 96% meat.

not Hi Life and Natures Menu type food
Never been able to bring myself to buy Hi Life after discovering splintered chicken bones in it years ago.
Natures menu I’ve found good.
Lily’s kitchen is another ‘premium’ brand I don’t trust, a bad tray made my cat very ill once and I was less than impressed with their response when contacted

I have three cats who pretty much eat whatever I put down as long as some buscuits are mixed in.
I have gone back to tins as you can’t recycle those foil packets. Not as much choice as foils but mine seem quite happy with classic meat in jelly which I can get 48 tins of from pets at home for £22

Well i have just been down the biggest rabbit hole googling the best dry foods and ended up buying a 'trial size' (400g) bag of chicken and duck Applaws dry food from amazon. £4 something.

If her highness likes it i will buy a big bag. It seems to have rave reviews and is 80% protein. No cereal.

We have a new ragdoll kitten coming in a few weeks (squeeeeee!) and i imagine i'll be buying royal canin kitten as per breeders instructions (for a while at least) :)

Ours will only eat Felix in gravy, and even then she goes through fads where she refuses one colour. She gets Iams biscuits, and the odd bit of cooked chicken, or ham.

She is very greedy. I caught her licking a slice of chocolate cake the other day, and she has been known to try and steal a chicken that’s “resting” out of the oven.