Dry/Wet Food Questions

We just adopted a kitten 10 days ago and have been learning as much as possible. I'm currently feeding her Blue Wilderness - Chicken Dry and added a few wet foods (Blue Wilderness, Wellness, and Wellness core). Here are some of my questions:

- Is it best for me to stay away from fish protein foods or can/should I rotate it in?
- What other wet/canned foods do you recommend that I can get at Petco/Petsmart?
- Is it necessary for me to stick with grain free on wet if I feed dry grain free?
- Should I add variety to her diet (different dry's - chicken, duck, turkey and different wet's) or just stick with a one?
- How often should I feed wet vs. dry?

For a young healthy female, there's really no reason to avoid fish, as long as it's fed now and then and isn't the staple diet.

High-quality canned foods from PetCo or Petsmart (I'm going by memory here). . .Soulistic, Natural Balance, Solid Gold, Authority, Avoderm, Nutro (I don't like their dry foods but most of their canned foods have decent ingredients), Halo, Merrick, and, oh a few more I can't think of right now. Just start reading labels and you should be able to find the good stuff.

You don't have to stick to grain-free canned, but most higher-quality canned foods are grain-free. I wouldn't worry about it as long as it's a decent food altogether.

While I do think that rotating foods is a good idea, most people just stick to one kind of dry food and rotate canned food flavors. After a while, you'll get a feel for her favorites and then you can have a good lineup of 5-6 different flavors for her.

I think that 50/50 dry/canned is a good balance, especially if funds are tight (canned food is pricey!). More canned would be fine if you prefer.

We just adopted a kitten 10 days ago and have been learning as much as possible. I'm currently feeding her Blue Wilderness - Chicken Dry and added a few wet foods (Blue Wilderness, Wellness, and Wellness core). Here are some of my questions:

- Is it best for me to stay away from fish protein foods or can/should I rotate it in?
Even for a female, I'd keep fish to 6 ounces a week. It is not good for cats in general, male or female, http://www.littlebigcat.com/health/w...rous-for-cats/ goes more into depth about that.
- What other wet/canned foods do you recommend that I can get at Petco/Petsmart?
http://ibdkitties.net/CommercialFood.html has a list of foods that do not contain grain, dairy, or certian herbs. Some do contain rice, so if that is something you want to avoid, I think it is mainly the Friskies as well as Felidae. Blue Wilderness, By Nature 95%, Organix, Fancy Feast, Friskies, Halo, Merrick, Before Grain, Natural Balance, Solid Gold, Soulistic, and Wellness are all sold at Petco.
- Is it necessary for me to stick with grain free on wet if I feed dry grain free?
The above foods are all grain free (except for Friskies and Fancy Feast, which may contain rice) Friskies Poultry Platter is actually a fairly good food and is cheap. If you buy the big cans of Wellness, your kitten should be able to go through them fast enough that they wouldn't go bad if stored in the fridge.
- Should I add variety to her diet (different dry's - chicken, duck, turkey and different wet's) or just stick with a one?
I rotate between 10 differant brands of canned food and use differant flavors from each brand besides. The more variety the better for canned food, IMO, and you can switch from one canned to another without needing a transition. Dry, if you feed it, it is best to not change it very often, as that can cause upset stomach.
- How often should I feed wet vs. dry
Feed as much wet as you can manage, IMO, and keep dry to the minimum, if fed at all. http://catinfo.org/ is one site explaining why wet is much better to be feeding than dry. It is actually better for cats to not have food available to them at all times - try feed 3-5 meals a day, and let your kitten eat all she wants at those meal times.

IMO, if money is an issue, one thing to look into is feeding a raw diet. Lots of people say it takes to long to get food ready to feed this way, but it really doesn't, and is well worth it to me in the end. Last week I made up 30 twenty ounce ziplocs of food for my kittens, in around 75 minutes. At the peak of my kittens growing, they were going through about a pound of food a day. But now that they are 9.5 months old, they are going through way less, anywhere from 5-10 ounces each day. The cost can depend on where you live, for me each twenty ounce bag of balanced raw costs $2-2.50, depending on what is in it. Anyway, if you are willing to look into the raw feeding option, http://www.rawfedcats.org/ is probably the best site to read through.

-I own a male with FIV so I stay away from fish, but even if I had a female, I'd probably still be cautious because of all the heavy metals in them. I have an app on my phone specifically so I can check fish when I look at cat foods and if I find a food with a bit of the safe kinds then I'll let him try it, but nothing regular.

-Petco: Before Grain, Wellness, Blue Buffalo, Natural Balance
Petsmart: Authority, Wellness, Innova, SImply Nourish, Avoderm, Blue Buffalo

-No but grain free is good. I personally look for low carb/high protein instead because grain free can still be high carb.

-Different wet is fine, stick to the same dry.

-Wet more than dry is best.

Originally Posted by msujohn

- Is it best for me to stay away from fish protein foods or can/should I rotate it in?

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Its fine and has great nutrients, but not too much. We limit it to one or two 5.5oz cans a week tops, divided between two cats.

Originally Posted by msujohn

What other wet/canned foods do you recommend that I can get at Petco/Petsmart?

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Learn to read ingredients, then just get whatever looks decent that is on sale (and if it is an awesome sale price, buy in bulk as unopened cans last years). Avoderm, Blue Spa Select, Innova, Nutro Natural Choice Complete Care, By Nature, and a few others are our regulars.

Originally Posted by msujohn

- Is it necessary for me to stick with grain free on wet if I feed dry grain free?

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Nope, not necessary.

Originally Posted by msujohn

- Should I add variety to her diet (different dry's - chicken, duck, turkey and different wet's) or just stick with a one?

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I prefer to stick with one dry, and just rotate random wets for flavor variety. I buy the biggest dry bags I can find, as they have super long shelf lives and stay fresh unless you leave the bag wide open to the air (in which case its fine, just a bit stale like leaving a box of cereal open).

Originally Posted by msujohn

- How often should I feed wet vs. dry?

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When my two were bitty kittens, we had dry out 24x7 and 3 wet meals a day. When they were a bit older at 8months IIRC, we schedule fed less dry and kept 3 wet meals. At around a year old, we went to two wet meals and one dry meal, except when on vacation they get two dry meals from the autofeeder and one wet, that way I only have to ask someone to come by once a day. The benefit of dry is not nutrition, its just a lot more convenient and even the "expensive" dry food in big bags is very cheap compared to 5oz canned wet food calorie for calorie. So if you want to feed more wet, great, but nothing wrong w/ half of their diet being dry for cost/convenience compromise, just make sure they have a couple good water fountains IMO.

Originally Posted by msujohn

We just adopted a kitten 10 days ago and have been learning as much as possible. I'm currently feeding her Blue Wilderness - Chicken Dry and added a few wet foods (Blue Wilderness, Wellness, and Wellness core). Here are some of my questions:

(1)- Is it best for me to stay away from fish protein foods or can/should I rotate it in?
(2)- What other wet/canned foods do you recommend that I can get at Petco/Petsmart?
(3)- Is it necessary for me to stick with grain free on wet if I feed dry grain free?
(4)- Should I add variety to her diet (different dry's - chicken, duck, turkey and different wet's) or just stick with a one?
(5)- How often should I feed wet vs. dry?

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Congrats on your new kitten, Msujohn! Here are my answers to your questions:

(1) I would stay away from fish; at the most, I'd offer one can a week. Fish has more than one issue to be aware of (Eight strikes against fishy feeding).
(2) Anything and everything that is grain-free and especially if it's fish-, fruit- and/or veggie-free. Petfooddirect.com is a great place to review and compare foods and their ingredients and nutrient analysis.
(3) I wouldn't feed any dry at all, and would stick to grain-free and veggie-free canned foods as much as possible.
(4) Feed LOTS of varieties. This will help prevent your kitty from becoming fixated on any one variety (bad if they change the ingredients of that product or stop manufacturing it altogether) and will also dilute any potential negative consequences if any single product's quality assurance programs fail. Before I began feeding raw, I was offering my cats 21 different varieties.
(5) All canned, no dry!! Four times a day and as much as the kitten can eat (~11 ounces) until at least a year, then three times a day, ~5.5 ounces thereafter.

Best regards!

AC