Grains in dry food

I've been reading different opinions on whether or not cats need grain. Is there any reason why I should be feeding them a dry food with grain (assuming they do get some grains in their wet food) or is it okay to just go with a grain free like TOTW or Orijen?

Cats don't need grain for any reason and the less of it in the food, the better.

Originally Posted by Minka

Cats don't need grain for any reason and the less of it in the food, the better.

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Absolutely. In fact, they are not even biologically equipped to digest grains, don't have the ability to get any real nutrition from them, and it stresses their systems to have to try. Imagine a snake, a bird of prey or a shark trying to live off cereal!

Sometimes, folks feed kibble with grains because feeding kibble that lacks grains seems to cause diarrhea, while kibble with grains seems to "correct" that issue. Unfortunately, what's really happening is the cat's body is reacting to being fed kibble - which is really not a species-appropriate food - and the addition of grains covers up one of the symptoms of that reaction.

If I were you, I wouldn't feed any kind of kibble at all, but would, instead, stick with the canned foods. Grain-free primarily, but also fish-, veggie- and fruit-free, too. Wellness, Natural Balance, Evo, Nature's Variety, Go! Natural and many others manufacturer grain-free canned foods.

Best regards!

AC

Originally Posted by Auntie Crazy

If I were you, I wouldn't feed any kind of kibble at all, but would, instead, stick with the canned foods. Grain-free primarily, but also fish-, veggie- and fruit-free, too. Wellness, Natural Balance, Evo, Nature's Variety, Go! Natural and many others manufacturer grain-free canned foods.

Best regards!

AC

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Kibble is just a small part of their diet - I put a little down at night because Cindy likes to graze. And she also won't eat most of the brands you mentioned (Natural Balance being the exception, but she won't eat it all the time). If I could go totally with the canned, I would.

Originally Posted by Misty8723

Kibble is just a small part of their diet - I put a little down at night because Cindy likes to graze. And she also won't eat most of the brands you mentioned (Natural Balance being the exception, but she won't eat it all the time). If I could go totally with the canned, I would.

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I would LOVE to have my cats on an all canned food diet, but most of the higher end brands get ignored. It drives me to distraction and bankruptcy (lol) trying to find different foods and flavors they will even try.

Originally Posted by anita1216

I would LOVE to have my cats on an all canned food diet, but most of the higher end brands get ignored. It drives me to distraction and bankruptcy (lol) trying to find different foods and flavors they will even try.

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I have SO been there! I don't have as many problems with Swanie (hey! its food! I'll eat it!), but Cindy will sit there and look at me as if to say, you can't be serious.

Originally Posted by Misty8723

Kibble is just a small part of their diet - I put a little down at night because Cindy likes to graze. And she also won't eat most of the brands you mentioned (Natural Balance being the exception, but she won't eat it all the time). If I could go totally with the canned, I would.

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Originally Posted by anita1216

I would LOVE to have my cats on an all canned food diet, but most of the higher end brands get ignored. It drives me to distraction and bankruptcy (lol) trying to find different foods and flavors they will even try.

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Because kibble isn't something a cat would naturally eat, it's strongly flavored and appetizingly coated; getting cats to switch to canned is often - as you have both found - a tough sell.

Catinfo.org, Catnutrition.org and Feline-Nutrition.org all have transition articles that should be helpful. In addition, regularly rotating through several different flavors will help the cats become accustomed to a variety of offerings and make them less likely to turn their noses up (before I switched to raw, I was feeding 21 different canned foods; no flavor was repeated within any seven-day period). Sprinkling the foods with crushed treats, freeze-dried meat treats, Parmesan cheese, fish food flakes or whatever else the cats REALLY like is often effective in enticing them to eat (I swear by Whole Life's Freeze-Dried Chicken treats!).

Best regards.

AC

Originally Posted by Misty8723

I've been reading different opinions on whether or not cats need grain. Is there any reason why I should be feeding them a dry food with grain (assuming they do get some grains in their wet food) or is it okay to just go with a grain free like TOTW or Orijen?

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Note that any commercial food wet or dry is going to be vastly different from a cats natural diet, but these cats are also living a heck of a lot longer than their counterparts, and spaghetti isn't something you would find in nature either but is fine for you to eat. Nothing wrong with natural, but its not necessary.

Good quality wet foods and low carb dry foods tend to have about the same ingredients and ballpark fat/protein/carbs compared on a dry matter basis, and this often includes various plant sources for different reasons (some as antioxidants, omega 6, binder, flavor, cheaper protein, etc). So you'll notice that when you look at grain-free foods, they still often have things like potato and peas and flax and carrots and cranberries and blueberries and barley and kelp and you name it.

The benefit of grain-free is that while some cats can eat grain without issue, it is a common allergen in cats. The other issue is that some grain foods contain prodigious amounts of grain such as corn (which is super cheap since its government subsidized), and these high carbohydrate diets have been shown in several studies to contribute to diabetes and overall obesity due to feline digestive limitations. So grain-free doesn't necessarily mean low-carb, but in practice its usually the case and low-carb is a good thing.

However, grains can be useful as well. Brown rice for example is often added to both wet and dry cat food not only because its a cheap filler, but it helps to control the target urine PH (raises it) and is lower in ash/mag/merc/etc than most meats. Specialty urinary foods often take advantage of the latter and correct the former by adding an acidifier... not natural, but it works. So as long as rice isn't a first or second ingredient, its no problem that some is in the can or bag, and some with UTI prone cats prefer it.

Cliffs Notes: Unless your cat has some kind of unusual health issue, you don't have to panic about grain or grain-free foods. Just make sure the main ingredients are quality meat sources, and its not loaded with corn and wheat and soy and the like, and definitely cut it out if you have soft stools that indicate it may be a food allergy issue. I would suggest a low-carb dry but mixed feeding with wet, as the wet food helps with hydration since cats aren't always big drinkers and studies have shown that cats eating exclusively dry diets are persistently mildly dehydrated. Our dry is grain-free, but for wet food I'm not concerned w/ the rice in some recipes and my kitties are active and healthy.

Hi Ducman69,

I just have to say I agree with everything you said in the last post. You are 1,000% right. Your a very wise person, in my opinion .

Ducman69
While I agree that there is no reason to panic, I don't think an omnivore eating spaghetti and a carnivore eating grain is comparable. Carnivores aren't meant to eat grains and don't need them to regulate urine PH, no matter what the back of some bag says.

I have never been try of feeding grains to my cats,it's because we haven't proven that it can be digest...

I subscribe to the see how your pet reacts school of thought. I have tried for years... to bring grain free dry foods into my cats rotation with very little positive outcome. Feeding all wet would fall flat here to considering my one male is an occasional wet food eater to begin with.

I think both foods you mentioned are good, unfortunately not everyone finds that they work for there cats, but that is true of just about any foods, it's all about going with what works for yours..