I feel bloody awful with regards to cat food

[StuckInLimbo]

My cats are 7 months and 18 months. I've been feeding them whiskers dry and wet food but I feel bloody awful because I've read it's really bad for them?

As they've been on it since I've had them is there a way I can wean them on to another brand without causing upset? Also what brand would you suggest is a decent one to buy?

Our cat was always given Whiskas. She lived until she was 21 with no health issues. I'd never heard anything against it before this thread.

MrsSchadenfreude - yes Purina is fine. And yes, try her on the Butchers. It's a shame for her not to have wet food if she likes it. You just need to find one that doesn't give her the squits.

Eurochick - it's cheap dried food that is the real danger (including Whiskas dried) and male cats are more at risk from blocked bladders than females. And no, Whiskas tins aren't great, but not the worst thing in the world. However an example of one cat without issues is not proof of anything. Everyone knows someone who smoked 20 a day for years and was never ill and lived to a ripe old age. It doesn't mean that smoking isn't bad for health generally.

I found our old cats used to eat much more of the Felix/Whiskers/Tesco etc own brand - now realise this is down to the cereal fillers, they weren't getting enough protein.

On the info read on here our current cats have been on Butchers Classic wet and Applaws dry as adults. They only have one tin of Butchers and approx 80g -100g Applaws a day between the three of them but they are all healthy weights (3.9kg, 4.3kg and 4.6kg for the ginger ninja, recently jabbed/weighed at vets).

As kittens the ninja and his sister were on Royal Canin biscuits but didn't adapt to the adult Royal Canin food at all, despite slow changeover. Gave them the shits. Thought RC was cereal free but it isn't. We tried gradual switch to Orijen but they didn't like this. Applaws goes down well though and is cost-effective in 10kg bulk. We tried a couple of smaller bags first though.

catneuterer, our vet told dh to put our cat on dry only because cat has bad teeth. We were feeding him both - not at the same time, but dry in the morning and wet in the evening.

No idea why he's got bad teeth, he's only four. But I was suspicious of this advice because I know dry only can be bad for cats. I wasn't there at the consultation so wasn't able to query this.

Poor boy (cat, not dh) is fed up of only having dry and really misses the pouches. Been on dry only a couple of months now. Do you think we need to go back to the vet to clarify? Dh took him back once and vet said to carry on. (I can't go without taking a day off work.)

Oh, and also influencing my views is experience of my childhood cats, who both lived to such grand old ages that their teeth did fall out. Didn't stop them killing and eviscerating mice.

We were told that cats' teeth are prone to tartare build up. To avoid this you should feed them dry food apparently as this reduces the risk.

Unless your cat has health problems, I don't think it is worth stressing about what food you feed them as they all have pros and cons.

The worst diet one of out cat's has been on was a very expensive urinary health prescription dry food. He ended up hospitalised, very ill with severe constipation.

edam. This is something vets seem to disagree on. Although they are all agreed that cheap dried food should be avoided. Personally, if my cat liked wet food, I would feed it regardless of the tooth issue, and just have the teeth cleaned/removed as necessary (which to be fair you will probably have to do even if you only feed dried).

And only feeding dried doesn't avoid tooth problems anyway. One of my cats refuses to eat wet food and she has just had to have her final tooth removed. She now crunches it with her gums.

thanks thecat. So supermarket own brand is definitely not good?

Wonder how anyone manages to clean a cat's teeth? I'm not going to volunteer!

Edam: yes, supermarket own brand dried is definitely not good. I don't mean clean the teeth yourself (I was able to do it once, but that was with the most laid back cat in the world - generally I wouldn't even consider it), I mean full on scale and polish under sedation.

My last cat who was generally known as The World's Most Vicious Cat had her teeth cleaned under sedation. The vet told me to maintain it myself and gave me some cat toothpaste and a brush. I did ask if he was having a laugh, as he bore the scars from giving the cat a jab. He said that if she "wouldn't tolerate having her teeth brushed" I should just smear some toothpaste around her chops as she would lick it off, and this would help. I managed to get close enough once, when she was feeling particularly mellow, to smear some of the gritty pink stuff on. She refused to lick it off, and it just stayed there, all over her face, until it flaked off. I didn't try again.

That made me giggle mrsSchadenfreude :)

We also had a brush with an extra long handle to brush her with!

I'm worried now too -my cat has Purina dried food so is this ok or should I start switching brands?
My old cat died from liver and kidney problems would this be associated with the blocked bladder problems as she ate a lot of Go Cat?

My cat has a very sensitive stomach, but has eaten Hills Science Plan since he was a kitten. Treats make him vomit as does drinking from the fish bowl yuck!

My cats were fed on Felix by the breeder so that's what I fed them on when they were young. It's been changed over the years and through trial and error I have settled on Whiskers pouches for my now 19 and half year old female, anything else makes her vomit or gives her diarrhea.

Joey99: Purina is fine. And I also think it's very unlikely that the food you gave her contributed to your old cat's death. The organs that generally fail in old cats are the liver and the kidneys - that's just what happens to old cats. I'm sure the food had nothing whatsoever to do with it.

Reading this thread has given me a wake up call, one off my cats has grown dangerously fat due to being hooked on quality dry food, we are switching her over to wet food and will only feed her a small amount of high animal protein dry stuff, going to try Applaws. It's not cheap but less expensive than vet bills! It's hard not to over feed her, she is very good at manipulating us to feed her eg. Scratching our bedroom door at 3am! I will be strong.

Thank you the cat neuterer. Such a lot of useful knowledge really appreciate it

The top range foods aren't really all that either! Certainly not the best as you would be lead to believe by the price. Most contain milk which is bad for them. .. In short there isn't a perfect solution, some cats thrive on one type/brand some on another. My cat suffered from urinary tract issues, severe allergies and also being a picky bleeder. Eventually we have come down to one flavour of one brand that he tolerates and it is go cat. The posh brands were just as bad as the cheap ones. He has been on this for 5 years now and has not had a single recurrence of the bladder problem.

Iams etc are also considered a licence to print money from people who believe high price = good by the dog world too.

Crazy nanna, my cat used to live only on go kat until the vet warned me. He didn't like anything else I tried him on so now he has a mix of go kat, purine and vet science oral care. He loves it as it's a nice mix up.

Thanks overmydeadbody will start a new mix from tomorrow. She is so snotty about her food, but that's probably me being soft.

QODdy..twat predictor

You calling me a twat?

I am one

loving this thread im old enough to remember when all cats ate kit e cat or went without as that was the only tinned brand and dont remember ever feeding our cats dried food when i was young as i dont think they existed our cats used to love the giblets from the turkey, they got scraps from the sunday roast complete wiv bisto gravy (the powder one not granules) and they were healthy and never seemed to go to the vets or get urinary problems or bad teeth