Need advice on feeding my kitten

I have a 6 month old kitten now that I have had since he was 6 weeks old. Since about 10 weeks of age I have been feeding him either RC kitten dry or Nutro NC kitten dry along with Nutro NC kitten wet pouches. I used to feed about 50% wet but have dwindled it down to about 25% simply based on cost. My question is... Would it be a better idea to perhaps feed him a little bit cheaper wet food, but increase it back up to 50%? Say something like Iams or Friskies or even Nutro Max Cat. It's easy enough to handle $20 on a bag of dry food a month but 1.50 - 2.00 on wet food a day on top of the dry really adds up over time. He is very healthy and seems to like his diet, but I know wet food is much better than dry.

Any thoughts?

Yes if Nutro max agrees with your kitty do it ... increaseing the wet is very benificial ... another to look at is chicken soup ...

also look at mixing in wets that are cheaper but still are good quality

Chicken soup
Pro pac
meow mix(pouches )
authority
pet gold

My only concern is I remember reading on this forum that meat by-products are something you really want to stay away from... But most of the cheap and mid grade wet foods have them. Even with them, it's better to feed wet than dry?

Can you get to a Pet Supply Plus or Pet Supply Outlet? I've found 13 oz cans of Felidae and Innova there, which are all-stage formulas, for only $1.29. That's only 33 cents per 3 oz serving, as opposed to 50 cents for Nutro. Also, Chicken Soup 5.5 oz cans range from 60-70 cents in my area, which is also 30-35 cents per typical 3 oz meal. Or if you can find the 5.5 oz cans of Nutro kitten formulas, those are less expensive per ounce. They're just harder to find.

I would also recommend checking out Chicken Soup dry. It's about the same price and Nutro and is one of those "fancy" premium foods. I don't think there's anything wrong with Nutro, but it's another quality option to look at.

What about the by-products? I hear those are not something you want as an ingredient but it seems any wet food pouches (I much prefer pouches to cans) have by-products unless they are Nutro or something else higher - end. I obviously don't want to sacrifice Bailey's health to save a few dollars on food, but if I can have the best of both worlds, that is ideal. If I have to use cans to do this, I will.

Byproducts aren't good for cats because it's a lower quality protein source and not as digestible as muscle meat. Meow Mix makes some pouches with no byproducts but I don't know if they're appropriate for kittens. I do know that they have huge amounts of fish, even the non-fish flavors, which isn't always the best thing either.

Is there something wrong with canned? Does your cat not like them? Eve won't touch pouch foods unless I mash them into itty bitty pieces for her. Pate is definately the wet food of choice here.

Meow mix is all life stage ////

Well, thank you everyone for your suggestions. I stopped by the local PetSmart after work today and I think I found my new wet food. I had a lot of trouble finding any kitten food that came in the larger (6 oz) cans. I didn't realize that pouches were only the size of the small 3 oz cans, so I pretty much decided to go with cans at that point.

Anyway, Science Diet and Authority both had 6oz kitten cans and weren't super cheap like Whiskas. I remember reading here that SD is no good and Authority is decent. After reading the ingredients I compared the Authority to the Nutro I have been feeding and the ingredients are quite similar. The Authority contains no by-products and a 6oz can is $.05 less than a 3oz Nutro pouch. Sounds good to me! I picked up a dozen of both flavors they had for kittens.

Now... one more question. The Authority has 2% more protein than the Nutro, (11 vs 9) fibre and ash is the same, it has less moiture than Nutro (82 vs 76) but it has almost double the fat (7.5 vs 4). With an active kitten, will this be an issue?

Thanks!!!

Keep an eye on kitty ... glad you found a budget minded food