I have a new kitty.

Hey, I just bought a new domestic kitty, long hair. Now he's only 6-7 weeks old, I would like to know what food is safe for him, Dry and wet canned food. I would prefer to stay away from brands on the PF recall list.

Thanks in advance .

Hello and welcome. Your new kitten is very young to be away from his mother - although he will be eating solid food, he would normally probably still be suckling some from her. So you should feed him the very best quality kitten food you can buy, a mix of wet and dry. If he were mine I would also be offering him some kitten milk or goat milk once or twice a day (available in pet stores or good grocery stores). He needs small meals at regular intervals - four or five meals per day of wet dood, with a bowl of dry left for him to snack on in between. If you can, to make sure he is gaining weight, weigh him twice a week. And of course, contact your vet as soon as you can regarding a check-up and vaccinations. Do this even though whoever you bought him from says he is healthy. Good luck.

Any specific brands i should look at, For the dry and canned? Also, what about regular milk, 2%?

It's best not to give regualr milk to cats. Some are lactose intolerant. They make special cat milk that is sold in pet stores. There is also a milk replacer for kittens that are extremely youngand unable to nurse from mom. As for foods, definately check the FDA web site for lists of all the recalled foods before deciding on a brand. My cats eat either Innova Evo or Wellness Core dry food. I feed them Merrick, Evo and Wellness canned food. The most important thing is to look for high quality meat sources and as few fillers like corn and wheat as possible. Both Core and Evo are labelled as cat and kitten food. With kittens you just need to feed them often and as much as they can eat.

My pet food store is recommending the new Wellness cat food -wet and dry. I am ffeding it to my adult cats, will be getting my kitten @ 12 weeks old. The manager of my store says that the kitten will be able to eat the same Wellness as the adult because it is grain free and high in protein. That being said, you should get "kitten milk" for your new kitten. As Jenny and Miss kitty said, 6-7 weeks is really young to take a kitten from it's mother! Good luck and please post photos!

I would reccomned looking into the following brands:
Natura
Chicken Soup
Wellness
Merrick

IMO, I like Merrick best. Natura brands second best.

I much prefer a wet only diet as it is closest to what a cat would eat in the wild. Your kitten is young enough that it would be easy to transition to an all wet diet now.

I would advise a food for hairballs if feeding dry ...

Wet well right now I am not recommending much since every other day more is recalled....

Kandie eats Wellness , "Nutro not till back in production" , eagle pack , evangers lowest cost and great ingrediants , some merrick

I recommend Royal Canin Baby Cat or Kitten foods - the one is for younger kittens about your age.

How did you get your kitten? Its really too young to be away from mom - should be with her and littermates another 3 weeks or so.

Ok, I bought purina one healthy kitten formula, as the dry food.

for the wet canned food, I bought, Friskies "purina" Shredded.

Neither of the two showed up on the recall list, so..?

So should i just keep feeding him the dry until he gets a little older, or should i mix both up?

EDIT:

For those wondering where i got him, I got him from a nice lady in a newspaper add.

Originally Posted by gr1M

Ok, I bought purina one healthy kitten formula, as the dry food.

for the wet canned food, I bought, Friskies "purina" Shredded.

Neither of the two showed up on the recall list, so..?

So should i just keep feeding him the dry until he gets a little older, or should i mix both up?

EDIT:

For those wondering where i got him, I got him from a nice lady in a newspaper add.

Click to expand...

BUMP

Also, If i cant find any milk for kittens at a pet store, Should i atleast let him drink some regular milk? My other cat, when he was a kitten he would drink some regular milk and have no problem, maybe just go to the bathroom a little more often..

Originally Posted by gr1M

BUMP

Also, If i cant find any milk for kittens at a pet store, Should i atleast let him drink some regular milk? My other cat, when he was a kitten he would drink some regular milk and have no problem, maybe just go to the bathroom a little more often..

Click to expand...

DON"T give your kitten people milk, if it gets diahrrea, it is very tough to stop it.

So how long should i keep feeding him the dry food? When should i crack the wet open? remember, he is only 6 1/2 weeks old. When he turns 8 weeks old, I'll be taking him to the vet.

Originally Posted by gr1M

BUMP

Also, If i cant find any milk for kittens at a pet store, Should i atleast let him drink some regular milk? My other cat, when he was a kitten he would drink some regular milk and have no problem, maybe just go to the bathroom a little more often..

Click to expand...

there is no reason that your kitten needs to drink milk, stick with cat food.

OK thanks. Now, Should i just continue feeding the dry, at what age should i start feeding wet food? I need a good brand that is safe as can be!

I would introduce the wet food now.

My cats prefer Wellness... www.omhpet.com/wellness

There IS a kitten variety in cans, although I see no problem feeding the other varieties. It's all high in protein, with quality ingredients, with no "by products"...and most of the flavors have no grains.

It's typically available from smaller independent pet food shops. There's a store locator on their site.

As for the friskies...Purina products have been touted as "safe" from the recall issues however ...I'm not a Purina fan. Friskies is at sort of a junk food level. When you read the labels of various foods, one thing to avoid on the ingredient list is "by products". Those are typically cheap miscellaneous items like heads, feet, intestines etc. More real meat is what you are looking for in a good food, and few to no grains.

I used to feed my kittens Purina One and then I found The Cat Site,started reading the nutrition section and realized that my boys deserved better food. They ate "Chicken Soup for the Kitten Lovers Soul" for awhile with great results (shiny hair, less litterbox odor) until the recall and are now eating grain free Natures Variety "Raw Instinct" dry food and Merrick and Wellness wet food. The Chicken Soup food actually cost's about the same as I was paying for Purina One so it might be a good choice?

Edit: So that there is no confusion, Chicken Soup Dry food was NOT recalled and should be safe to feed. I chose to switch them off of all grains for the forseeable future because it seems like less of a risk IMO

I think you should focus on feeding wet food. Your kitten is still very young. Leave the dry food for snacks and all day nibbling. It sounds like you don't know a lot about pet foods. This is an excellent place to learn and have support. Let's compare the Purina food to the foods I feed.

Purina Kitten
Chicken, chicken by-product meal, corn gluten meal, brewers rice, soy flour, animal fat preserved with mixed-tocopherols (form of Vitamin E), fish meal (source of DHA), whole grain corn, poultry by-product meal, non-fat yogurt, wheat gluten, brewers dried yeast, phosphoric acid, caramel color, animal digest, salt, tetra sodium pyrophosphate, potassium chloride, choline chloride, taurine, zinc sulfate, Vitamin E supplement, ferrous sulfate, manganese sulfate, DL-Methionine, niacin, calcium carbonate, Vitamin A supplement, calcium pantothenate, thiamine mononitrate, copper sulfate, riboflavin supplement, Vitamin B-12 supplement, pyridoxine hydrochloride, folic acid, Vitamin D-3 supplement, calcium iodate, biotin, menadione sodium bisulfite complex (source of Vitamin K activity), sodium selenite.
N-4159

Manufactured by: NestlÃ[emoji]169[/emoji] Purina PetCare Company, St. Louis, MO 63164 USA

Animal feeding tests using Association of American Feed Control Officials (AAFCO) procedures substantiate that Purina ONEÂ[emoji]174[/emoji] Healthy Kitten Formula provides complete and balanced nutrition for the growth of kittens, reproducing females in stages of gestation and lactation, and maintenance of adult cats.

Innova Evo
Ingredients
Click on an ingredient to learn more.
Turkey
Chicken Meal
Chicken
Herring Meal
Chicken Fat
Potatoes
Egg
Turkey Meal
Natural Flavors
Vitamins
Apples
Potassium Chloride
Carrots
Cranberries
Alfalfa Sprouts
Minerals
Tomatoes
Herring Oil
Cottage Cheese
Ascorbic Acid
Dried Chicory Root Extract
Direct-Fed Microbials
Vitamin E Supplement
Taurine
DL-Methionine
Lecithin
Rosemary Extract

Real meat like Turkey, Chicken, lamb should make the primary ingredients. These are usually the first five or six ingredients before the first fat source. Chicken meal or other specified meat meal would be second choice and by-product are the bottom of the rung. Cat have no nutritional need for grains so fillers like gluten(rice,corn), gluten meals etc serve no purpose. Here's a final thought for you. Most of the recalled pet foods were using wheat gluten, corn gluten or rice gluten which happened to be contaminated. It may have been contaminated on purpose to increase the protein ratios of these products.

Visit these manufacturer's sites to see the ingredients used in high quality pet foods.
http://www.oldmotherhubbard.com/
http://www.naturapet.com/
http://www.merrickpetcare.com/