Please talk to me about cat food

[ThereMustAndShallBeTea]

We have two male cats, aged 3 and 10. At the moment they have some dry food in the morning (Purina stuff) and a pouch of wet food in the evening.

The older one has started not eating his wet food - he just licks the jelly off the top and leaves the rest. Tonight I gave him dry and the other cat wet food and the other cat - who is overweight and usually bolts his food - has left some of the wet food.

Do I just switch them both to dry food? Would make life easier, though seems like an incredibly dull diet to me! And can anyone recommend a good dry food, please, that isn't made by Nestle?

Thanks :)

Not sure what you want to change... them to enthusiastically & quickly eat whatever you put out?

Just wondering if it's okay just to give them dry food and if so what's a good one to give them.

But yes, it would be nice if someone in my house enthusiastically ate the food I provided

Applaws dry is what I feed my boys.

I thought dry only was bad for cats as caused crystals in bladder?

what about trying a different wet food like a pate one? I only got my cat recently so don't have much experience. She only licked the chunks of meat but eats the pate really quickly she loves it.

Oh, and for wet I give Animonda Carny (rough pate type food) and Cosma.

My cat does this from time to time. She is a "chunk licker" she knows it's naughty, but she still does it. Apparently the jelly or gravy is just too delicious to eat with the chunks.

I brand switch from time to time and supplement with dry food. Cats are so entitled.

I am a big meanie & don't put down any more food until they eat what's there.
That said I now accept that they just don't like venison (Bozita).
Applaws is the dry I buy, too.

I dunno what's best, dry is supposed to be better for teeth. So we do a mix of dry & wet.

I wouldn't feed dry only, I do a mix like you, but I do think it's a bit of a fashion thing - for years the advice was to only feed dry, for the teeth, and now it's wet, for the kidneys. I suspect that a good quality dry like Applaws probably would be fine, but then I also have this silly feeling like wet is more 'fun' for them.

There are a bunch of good dry foods, zooplus is a good place to order online. You want cereal free, ideally, or at least that's the current thinking. Applaws does seem to be popular, and mine are very happy with it.

I think sometimes they just get a bit fussy - possibly because it's winter they don't need as much, so can afford to get a bit picky. Both my two have spent the past month taking two bites of their lovely Grau dinner then wandering off. I switched to Carny, made no difference. They love James Wellbeloved but it makes the madcat loose and the lamb is a gravy-licker and throwing out bowls full of licked nuggets drives me nuts so that's out. I've gone back to Grau and figure they can like it or lump it, and they seem to be coming around.

If they're not losing weight, toileting is normal, and seem well in themselves then I wouldn't worry too much, basically!

My cat has become more fussy as he gets older, and is a devil for licking off all the gravy! He is very picky. The only thing I've found works is to buy about 8 kinds of cat food so he never has the same thing two days running. It might sound like a lot, but I actually waste less food this way so it is more economical in the long run.

You could switch to a type of wet food that is more stringy and less gravy-based - like some of the high life cans or Applaws (not the cans, the stuff that comes in plastic with card sleeves).

The only food my cats don't do this with is Gourmet Perle. They cost me a flaming fortune.

Mine have just decided Royal Canin is the best thing ever. I wouldn't mind, but when I bought a huge sack of it, they turned their noses up. I ran out of Applaws, their usual food, and bought a little bag of Canin to tide them over, which they've been non-stop gobbling. I bet they refuse the Applaws now! All 7.5 kilos of the stuff.

Never buy a bag weighing over 2kg, just don't do it.

I'd use amionda carny if I could afford it. It looks really good food.

Thanks! I had a feeling that dry was bad for kidneys and wet was bad for teeth Might just leave them to source their own food ...

Unfortunately I can't just leave food down until it's gone as the younger, greedier cat will eat it.

The Animonda Carny is reasonable value if you bulk buy from Zooplus (not that I've done this yet!) so might give them mainly biscuits with bit of meat for fun :)

Ah, what I do is only put down food for trim-weight cat when he presents asking for food (light appetite & doesn't eat much at all). Fat cats get shoved out the door when they pester for food. What food trim-cat leaves the fat cats get to scavenge. Also some down when they pester me before bed coz they stop me sleeping otherwise. But otherwise I rarely put down food for the fat cats. They're still overweight but not as bad as they would be otherwise (argh).