Protein content in Wet Food?

Ok..I seem to be missing something when I look at the labels for Protein content in wet canned food.

I read that wet food has more protein than dry food..but when I look at the cans of wet food I have, the protein usually reads anywhere from 7% to 12%.

When I look at the protein content of my dry food, it reads 35%.

How can there be such a huge difference? What am I missing here? Do I need to convert something? Or subtract out the water content in wet food?

thanks!

there is a really acurate formula but I use what I call the ball park formula for wets ...

if the moisture is 75 then three quaters is water or brothe

protein says 9% ... well multiple by 4 to get the dry matter ... protein is really 36% or higher

Exactly what you said (allow for water content) and what Sharky said.

The "exact" way is to divide the % you see on the wet food can by the "dry" percentage of the food.

So if you see 9% protein on the can

And you see 78% moisture on the can

100 minus 78 equals 22 ...22 is the "dry" part of the food.

9 divided by 22 equals .409 ..move the decimal over 2 places, that's 40.9 = that is your "real" protein percentage ("dry matter basis")

Like Sharky said, multiplying by 4 is a close estimate.

Beat me to it!

Here is a site that explains about dry matter analysis

http://www.thepetcenter.com/imtop/dm.html

When comparing nutrients in different foods you always need to do it on a dry matter basis so that you're comparing like with like, esp if comparing wet and dry foods.

Ahhh! Thanks everyone! I suspected it had something to do with the water content of wet food..

That helped clear things up for me