What Cat Food To Feed...?? Hhhmmm...

Hello All

I am having a little trouble decideing what I should do.

Over the last two years I have tried many different cat foods for my cats from Purina to Nutrience to Iams to Orijen (the list goes on) and ALWAYS atleast ONE of my cats will not eat the food I put out or one of them get sick!! I had the best luck with Purina Cat Chow which was the least expensive food. My vet explained to me that the "less expensive" brands of food are like feeding your cat potatoe chips and so yes, they will LOVE it. lol. But it isn't all that healthy for them.

My most recent discovery was the Orijen and from what I can gather it is a great quality cat food! Terrific ingredients. The problem... at first my cats liked it but now not so much. I mean, they will eat it but it's like watching a 4 year old pick at his brocolli.

I was wondering if any one has used Innova? What is the quality like in comparison to Orijen?

I never thought about it before but I read some where that buying a pet food at the vets office is not necessarily the BEST CHOICE because vets are not nutritionists. So even though I discovered Orijen at the vets office it doesn't necessarily mean it is the best choice of food?

Can any one suggest a good quality cat food that cats LOVE and won't get tired of?

Thank you for your help!

I'm actually quite amazed that you found Orijen at your vet's office. Usually vets only carry the really crappy foods like Science Diet. It would seem your vet may know more about nutrition than most.

Orijen is a no-grain food - all protein which is why it is good but it can also be too rich for some kitties. Our cats eat it but I don't feed a lot of dry - I feed wet morning and night with a small amount of dry in between so luckily they have not gotten tired of it.

Sharky has many threads and posts about quality food so if you do a search you will find mega information. This is one of those subjects that comes up very frequently.

I have been going throughe the very same thing with my 5 cats!!and I too have seemred to have tried every food from the cheap to the high quality....I for the last couple of weeks have been switching my cats over to natures variety instinct ( grainfree) and the LOVE it!!noone complains!noone gets sick, and they all eat it happily there stool has firmed up consierably ( it smells but to me if it is poo it is gonna smell) I would suggest you try this! it was 12.49 for a 4.5lb bag....or you could even write the company and ask them to send you a sampl.Good luck

They are both good foods, Orijen is grain free so that is the "better" thing about it. But Orijen has a lots of fruits and veggies that it could do without. They both have potatoes and fish but Orijen has more fish which is not great. They are both good foods, not as good as many wet foods but still good quality for dry foods. I would not hesitate to feed Innova. After a few months see how the cats are doing and decide from there whether to stay on it or not.
I switched mine to "Before Grain" which they LOVED but it did nasty things to their poo and coats so off they went, no matter how good the ingredients sometimes it still does not work for your cat so you have to go to another high quality food. On the Cal natural their poops are back like they were on Felidae but Neko's coat is not great (dandruff). Parents won't let me switch again so hopefully once I find a wet food they'll eat we can get improvement on the coat.

Have you tried Wellness CORE? I have a really picky eater and he loves CORE. It smells like fish, which I don't like, but he seems to. Everything else I had fed him he would just pick at and never finished a meal.

Once we can afford it (meaning, once I get a job) I plan to start buying Wellness Core. They sell it at the Petco a block from my house. It is no grain which I'm excited about, I want to see what difference it makes. Right now I give Iams, which is the best we can afford right now, but I don't like all the by-products that are in it.

Thank you all for your suggestions! I really do appreciate it.

I did speak with the lady at the pet store and she also agreed that Orijen is really the best you can get. So I guess we will just keep feeding that. Not only is it a great food but at my vets office you buy four bags and get one free (the LARGEST ones). So I thought that was fantastic. Over all my cats will eat it but they do not necessarily LOVE it. They seem healthy though, have much more energy and their coats are quite nice.

I really like Taste of the Wild...it is also a grain free and it is CHEAP! at least compared to other grain-frees... All three of mine went crazy for it, but I couldn't keep feeding it due to UTI issues...

Another one that all of mine really liked was chicken soup for the cat lovers soul. It is not grain free, but has good protien sources and is pretty inexpensive. All of mine also seemed to like the wellness (not CORE), but it is very pricey. Nutro Natural Choice is OK and my cats enjoyed it as kittens (but it has a good bit of grain in it).

I am feeding my cats nutro MAX now (for UTI reasons) and it has a lot more grain than I like...but, I feed 1/2 wet food, so that helps some what.

Good luck!
Art

Ny boy eats mainly wet food, but I've been trying to wean him from Fancy Feast (which he loves) to a better quality. He hated Wellness, but seemed to love Fromm and Ticki Cat and Weruva. The problem is that Weruva has gravy, and anytime he get anything with gravy, that's the only thing he'll eat. He leaves the rest. He was hospitalized recently and fed Pro Plan which he ate well. But when I feed him Pro Plan, he "picks" at it and obviously doesn't prefer it. I think he's just spoiled, hoping I'll give in and feed him only Fancy Feast!

The only dry he likes is Taste of the Wild and Fromm, and I keep that available to him.

I rotate drys and feed a variety of canned brands/flavors.

Taste of The Wild is a big hit with all of mine. California Natural Chicken and Rice (not grain free yet is a simple ingredient food, I believe) is the most favorite. They will pick out the Calif Nat and leave the Orijen.

Cats will let you know their favorites.