How I am dealing with the recall, you?

gailuvscats

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Fortunately, the food we eat was not recalled, but I have concerns about them because 1)Purina one has wheat gluten in the chicken with rice dry.
2) science diet turkey (no wheat gluten) is made by menu
3) trader Joes has voluntarily recalled their food(made at menu) until their testing says it is ok.

Soo, after checking sell by dates (two years on my brands) I determine which food is made months before the tainted wheat gluten hit the usa, and stock up.

If something is good till 12/08, that means it was made in 12/06. I figure I am ok. We are stocked and ready to eat, and will get Traders when they restock, which I was told this morning will be in a couple days. I have 4 bags of dry and three cases of wet. That should tyed us over until this nightmare is over I hope.

I cannot start introducing a bunch of new foods. I have thrown away too much stuff. They like what they get now, I feel comfortable with the dates it was made, so that is our plan.
 

zissou'smom

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I am freaking out a little bit, mainly because it is hard to find a food Zissou will eat and I will feed her that hasn't been recalled (see my thread in H&N). Also, she was eating *questionable* food for an unknown length of time, Iam's Turkey in Gravy Slices and Chicken in Gravy Slices, both of which were recalled, and her food was made at the Emporia Kansas plant. Before the recall. Maybe. And she threw up once.

Hopefully this is the end of the train now. But probably not.

I personally will not feed anything with wheat gluten in it for a very long time.


Menufood's website now says: "as the result of adulterated wheat gluten"... To me, adulterated means somebody did this on purpose. Is that a poor choice of words by whoever wrote that? Or do they mean it the way I read it?
 

jcat

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I'm one of the lucky ones, because Europe hasn't been impacted much, though some imported food was affected by the recall. Fortunately, nothing that I've fed recently has been recalled, and I have a lot of exclusively European canned brands containing no grain I can stick to.

My mom's dogs were eating Alpo Prime cuts, which have been recalled. For the time being, they are being free fed dry food, and getting homecooked food in the evening (chicken or ground beef, rice or noodles, and vegetables).

I am going to make sure that absolutely no food I buy has wheat gluten in it.
 

momofmany

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I have been very fortunate that I haven't fed anything off the recall list, but am a little unnerved that more foods will hit that list and mine will be on that list.

A part of me wants to switch them (gradually) over to products without wheat gluten and I would do that only if the food was better nutricionally. But I won't switch foods simply to get away from an ingredient that happened to be infected with a toxin. If it's wheat gluten today, what ingredient will be infected tomorrow? I'm not switching for the sake of switching at this time.

Once the scare is over, I will spend a lot more time looking at nutrician. But no changes right now.
 

abigail

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I am thankful that I switched to wellness (no wheat gluten) long before the recall. It's unimaginably horrible to think that anyone's little sweetheart could have been at risk.

Yesterday she escaped for all of four minutes before we found her in the side yard snarling at a free roaming cat who attempted to approach her - the yowl she let out was unreal- and in that four minutes I was ready to have a heart attack.

One thing it has made me fully aware of is the need to READ labels.
 

jcat

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Originally Posted by Abigail

One thing it has made me fully aware of is the need to READ labels.
That's very important, but who would've thought wheat gluten could be dangerous?
I always check ingredients online before even considering buying a cat food, but that's a habit formed due to Jamie's soy/beet pulp allergy.
 

jenniferd

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My cats used to eat nutro pouches before the recall. Right now I am not sure what to feed them. They like cuts in gravy style foods and those are the foods that have been affected by the recall or have wheat gluten in them even if they have not been affected by the recall. I bought some fancy feast for now.
The flavors that don't have wheat gluten in them. I've also tried premium brands but cats don't like felidae, wellness, or sheba in the tub, or other premium foods. The cats are not happy.
 

misty8723

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I'm only feeding them food not made by Menu and not containing wheat gluten. Right now that's Evangers and Natural Balance (which fortunately they seem to like). I just got some Spa Select at to try. Fortunately, I was transitioning them to California Natural dry before this happened, so now they're on that totally, and I'm starting to mix in a bit of Natural Balance. Also, I buy food known to be manufactured in the US.

I know they ate at least one package of the same brand that was recalled, although it wasn't in the original recall. I had blood tests, which came back okay, but I'm still a nervous wreck over the whole thing. Because now I just don't trust anybody totally anymore.
 

sharky

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Right now it is the cans made at the Nutro plant not the recalled Menu ones...

Solid gold is the other... This made me begin to push my youngest to eat raw with the other two ... I only use about three cans a week... I picked up wellness thinking like Natura they were made by menu at t different plant...NO they are made IN THAT plant ... so I wont feed them on the off chance of cross contamination
 

katachtig

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Since we're on the Purina UR, I'm going with that even though the wheat gluten on the label is of course worrisome. Their wet food is still Wellness and doesn't have wheat gluten. Wellness states that they don't use the affected plant. So I watch the cats constantly but everyone is still doing fine.
 

duchess15

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We are also lucky that the purina indoor formula has not been effected, however, in learning more about nutrition from some very knowledgable posters, and realizing how important it is to read the label, I was going to switch to blue spa select gradually. No wheat or corn gluten! I may not be able to prevent it, but I can decrease any chance of there being another problem with a recall. At this point, we have rarely fed them wet food. I know that switching will cost more, but in the end it will be better for them in the long run.
 

sharky

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Originally Posted by katachtig

Since we're on the Purina UR, I'm going with that even though the wheat gluten on the label is of course worrisome. Their wet food is still Wellness and doesn't have wheat gluten. Wellness states that they don't use the affected plant. So I watch the cats constantly but everyone is still doing fine.
Well that is the THIRD different thing they have told... wonder what the truth is ... I will call monday .. cause the 955 meat is what I got and I would like to try it... I am gluten intolerant myself and I know the pain of eating somethingsupposedly gluten free made in a plant with gluten
 

nedra

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I'm feeding mine nutro indoor dry food. Supposely that doesn't have wheat gluten so I think we are okay
 

momto3cats

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I was lucky that my cats hadn't been eating any of the recalled brands in the past few months - I had fed them some of those brands before. For now, I am staying with brands that are not made by Menu & don't contain wheat gluten. I've ordered some of the By Nature pouches to try, and I'll also feed them Evanger's canned food.
 

jean44

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Fortunately none of my cats like the cuts in gravy type food so I escaped the recall.

Now I am even more careful to avoid wheat gluten. I'm also hesitant to feed anything made by Menu especially from the plants involved in the recall. For now I'm feeding almost exclusively Natural Balance. I have a few cans of Evo and Innova to use. After that is finished I'll wait a while before buying Natura products even though I know the are taking a very pro-active approach in dealing with recall related problems.
 

gizzie

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Well I was doing ok until last night when Marbles started to throw up and refused to eat. This morning he throw up again after he had his food. I had all my animals dogs and cats on Nutro Natural Choice and Purina can food. I endedup taking Marbles to the vet and they said he doesn't seem to have any poisoning problems. However I freaked out took everything that we had left for dogs and cats and sent it back to PetsMart. Even though Nutro and Purina was not recalled they still took it back. From what I understand a lot of people doing that and PetsMart takes it back. I literally cleared my entire house of ALL food I had for my dogs and cats. I went to Holistic pet store and bought Felidae for cats and Canidae for dogs. I also bought can food made by Natura which is all natural food made in the US and not using any Wheat and Corn in their food. I thought holistic and natural food would be much more expensive but actually it's only few $$ more than Nutro. My cats love their food and so are my dogs. I can now sleep in peace. Crossing my fingers that do well on it and I will probably stick with all natural food now on.
 

sharky

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Originally Posted by Gizzie

Well I was doing ok until last night when Marbles started to throw up and refused to eat. This morning he throw up again after he had his food. I had all my animals dogs and cats on Nutro Natural Choice and Purina can food. I endedup taking Marbles to the vet and they said he doesn't seem to have any poisoning problems. However I freaked out took everything that we had left for dogs and cats and sent it back to PetsMart. Even though Nutro and Purina was not recalled they still took it back. From what I understand a lot of people doing that and PetsMart takes it back. I literally cleared my entire house of ALL food I had for my dogs and cats. I went to Holistic pet store and bought Felidae for cats and Canidae for dogs. I also bought can food made by Natura which is all natural food made in the US and not using any Wheat and Corn in their food. I thought holistic and natural food would be much more expensive but actually it's only few $$ more than Nutro. My cats love their food and so are my dogs. I can now sleep in peace. Crossing my fingers that do well on it and I will probably stick with all natural food now on.
One Nutro is an all natural food


Two Natura is made BY MENU though the VP has stated they will build there own plant...

Felidea wet is well recieved here till right about recall time when the girls grew tired
 

carolpetunia

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As of this morning, we've stopped using the Purina ProPlan dry altogether, along with all the treats we'd been giving our kitties. We also put away all the Fancy Feast cans that have wheat gluten in them.

Instead, we bought two wheat-free brands: "By Nature" dry food, both adult and kitten formulas, and "Natural Balance" (the Dick Van Patten brand) cans.

Please, please, please... have we done the right thing?
 
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