What makes a good wet food?

I am switching my Flutd cat's diet. I went a bought a bunch of different types of wet food. From Special Kitty to Blue Buffalo. I've used the catinfo site and crunched the numbers on % of calories of carbs, protein and fat. Not what I expected. Brands that are supposed to be "good" are high in carbs and brands that are " cheap" are low in carbs. What should the % of calories of carbs, fat and protein be? I know not more than 10% carbs. Some brands are over 50% fat?

The only problem, IMO, with the cheap brands that have low carbs (like Fancy Feast) is the quality of the protein. But if used in rotation, shouldn't be a problem!

Same with the high fat foods. If your kitty isn't overweight, cats do quite well with fat. There the only real issue is whether or not kitty is fat or prone to gaining weight - they'd need less of the fattier food, which is just something to keep in mind as re: portions. But again, if a fatty, but low-carb food is used in rotation, it shouldn't be a problem.

A good food to consider, actually, is Wellness Core kitten... or Wellness (grain free) turkey or chicken... Any of the Nature's Variety Instincts grain-free foods... the Fancy Feast classic formulas, and... EVO (in rotation, because it's high fat stuff).

Depending on how much you're spending, what about including some commercial frozen raw? :dk: It often works out to be cheaper (depending on what's available locally) than some of the pricier canned foods. (That's one of the reasons I switched - it was cheaper).

The "ideal" mix (one that cats eat naturally) on a DMB basis is about 63% protein, 23% fat, 11% ash (but that's because they eat bones, and canned foods use calcium supplements, so look for protein or fat - or carbs - to be higher and ash to be much lower in a commercial food, because mineral supplements, not bone are used) and 3% carbs.

The main reason it's important for protein to be high - and the protein source should be meat - and carbs to be low is that meat is naturally acidifying, and carbs are naturally alkalinizing. To prevent FLUTD issues, the urine pH should be about 6.0 - 6.5.