Question for Orijen users.....

Is it okay to soak the food in water and feed thus satisfying the wet food only requirement?

Mosimom said:

Is it okay to soak the food in water and feed thus satisfying the wet food only requirement?

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Not sure what you mean by satisfying the wet food requirement? Dry food made wet does not equate to wet canned food.

If you wanted to increase the amount of moisture your cat is getting, then you could try adding some water to the Orijen, but I would not recommend leaving wet kibble out in a dish as bacteria will develop making for an unhealthy situation.

I see in your signature that you are/were feeding Wellness canned and dry food? Are you still feeding this food?

Something is going on with Wellness Cubed Chicken. My cat will either dive in or completely turn up her nose. It depends on different batches. I buy it by the case so it is getting frustrating. I have tried all the other grain free brands and she just walks away. I've had to resort to Fancy Feast chicken (gasp) for her three wet meals per day. She still eats her Wellness dry as free range.

I just know that Orijen is good and she used to eat that exclusively before I put her on Wellness dry and wet. I thought if I poured cold water over Orijen and put in fridge overnight to soak then I feed the next day meals by warming up the portions as needed. She will eat immediately so the food won't sit out more than 15 minutes after being warmed up. Will bacteria still grow by doing this? Why can't it give her the moisture needed like canned food?

I'm getting desperate here.

I hear you .. I have a fussy female who often will not eat the premium brands but will eat FF. She is a cat who is just not very food motivated, unlike her brothers. Perhaps your kitty is the same, and in this circumstance sometimes it takes a bit of creativity and having persistence to get them to eat. For my female, I sometimes have to go back to the dish and 'swirl' or mound the food a bit and she will most of the time continue eating, sometimes not, so back in the fridge it goes.

I am not sure what is happening with the Wellness Cubed as I have not tried this type (just the pate), but have you tried using toppers to entice her to eat this brand again? As for adding water to the Orijen and refrigerating, I don't see a problem with this provided she eats this right away. I used to feed Orijen to my cats and so I would agree with you that it is a good food, but as far as moisture content, there is a vast difference between dry and wet food. Wet is roughly 75% or better for moisture, whereas dry is typically 10% which is not enough if a cat is not getting water from other sources. Fortunately my cats were big water drinkers when they were on dry exclusively, so I felt they were getting enough but, dry food proved to not be good for Max when he started having problems with constipation, so I switched to a mostly wet canned diet for everyone.

Fancy Feast is not the best but not terrible either. We do what we have to, to ensure that our kitties are getting the protein and moisture that they need. One other thing you can try is supplementing with some cooked chicken or turkey, maybe a piece of sardine and add this to some wellness and see if she will go for it?

Don't give up .. Sometimes it takes trying a few different things

My female is a little more fussy about food, too, and I've had to resort to a couple of tricks to get her to eat what I want her to eat. What is working now is I heat water in the microwave oven, mix it with her wet food, and feed immediately. The warm water seems to "release" the scent of the food, making it more appealing. What I've done in the past that works well is to pulverize turkey breast meat (or you could use chicken breast meat) and mix well with the wet food. I had to pulverize and mix, otherwise she would pick out the pieces of breast meat and leave the cat food.

Good luck!

I just can't rely on Wellness canned anymore. I've tried toppers. I've added water. I've mixed with FF and she picks out the FF and leaves Wellness behind. I've been to all the pet stores and gathered Wellness cans from different batches/dates. Some she scarfs and others sniffs and walks away. I can see and smell the difference in the cubed chicken batches too. Right now she will not eat any batches with an expiration after July 2016. So it is obvious something is going on.

I haven't tried boiling real meat yet, but will. I've tried all the grain free canned varieties. I've mixed them with the FF and she won't eat them. UGH.

That's interesting about the Wellness cubed Mosimom. Your kitty may be on to something .. They usually are pretty good judges of food, don't you find?

I recently purchased a couple of cans of the Wellness pate and swear that this smells more like potato than I remember! It wouldn't be the first time that Wellness has changed their formulas. There was a thread about the Wellness Indoor Dry being different and causing some kitties to have diarrhea? What annoys me is the recent price hike. Wellness used to cost me $3.49/12.5 ounce can. It recently jumped to $4.19, some places are still $3.69 but probably won't be for long .. Grrrr. I am currently looking at a commercial raw for Max and Thomas called Pets4Life. It is made here in Ontario, Canada and is something my holistic vet recommended. I will be getting a sample of this soon.

oneandahalfcats said:

 
Not sure what you mean by satisfying the wet food requirement? Dry food made wet does not equate to wet canned food.

If you wanted to increase the amount of moisture your cat is getting, then you could try adding some water to the Orijen, but I would not recommend leaving wet kibble out in a dish as bacteria will develop making for an unhealthy situation.

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I'm with this. Orijen with water just becomes soggy and bigger Orijen. Hugo doesn't like it when it is kept out too long like that.

lucentstreak said:

I'm with this. Orijen with water just becomes soggy and bigger Orijen. Hugo doesn't like it when it is kept out too long like that.

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Do you just feed Orijen or canned as well?

I picked up Six Fish Orijen sample (free) and a 5 lbs bag of Cat and Kitten Orijen. She just about plowed me over when I opened the Six Fish. She likes the Cat and Kitten too.

I tried some raw chicken, but she turned up her nose (sigh).

Mosimom said:

Do you just feed Orijen or canned as well?

I picked up Six Fish Orijen sample (free) and a 5 lbs bag of Cat and Kitten Orijen. She just about plowed me over when I opened the Six Fish. She likes the Cat and Kitten too.

I tried some raw chicken, but she turned up her nose (sigh).

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Not all cats will take to raw meat right off. Maybe try some cooked chicken and see if she will go for this.

Mosimom said:

Do you just feed Orijen or canned as well?

I picked up Six Fish Orijen sample (free) and a 5 lbs bag of Cat and Kitten Orijen. She just about plowed me over when I opened the Six Fish. She likes the Cat and Kitten too.

I tried some raw chicken, but she turned up her nose (sigh).

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I do orijen cat and kitten which he loves and merrick's canned. It's quite hard to find orijen canned here. Hugo once bite through the bag to get to his orijen...

lucentstreak said:

I do orijen cat and kitten which he loves and merrick's canned. It's quite hard to find orijen canned here. Hugo once bite through the bag to get to his orijen...

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I tried the Merrick Chicken al a king just tonight! Nope, didn't want it. It looked exactly like Wellness Cubed Chicken...smelled better too! Darn!

Do you purchase in store or online?  I don't feed dry anymore after reading an article regarding the ingredients and processing methods but can't recall enough detail to give an argument so I'll just stick with "have you ever seen a cat eat a dry mouse?"  Cats are not great at keeping hydrated at the best of times so it's good to keep to wet food with real meats (no by-products). Fish recipes are best spaced out. Chicken and duck are great, some lamb recipes too.

I've just looked at ingredients listed for "Orijen Cat & Kitten Grain-Free Dry Cat Food". While some ingredients look of highest quality, some of the ingredients look like gimmicks. I would not feed my cat anything with chicory root, rose hips or tumeric (a spice!). This may not be the exact formula you choose but I believe that things like this are designed to look good to people rather than benefit the cat. You can normally find the brand and product on sites like wag.com or chewy.com but good manufacturers will have everything listed on their website.

Catinfo.org might help you but I can understand why raw or cooked might be a bit much, I do a mixture but will lightly cook.  Chicken liver (in small doses) sends my boys (and feral girl) crazy, it stinks though. Try the occasional chicken broth with a pinch of rice and half a full egg, it always goes down well here.

I can recommend  Weruva (Cats in the Kitchen) - My picky eater licks his bowl clean! Nature's Variety Limited Ingredient Diet (Duck reportedly hold less water weight than chicken. Avoid rabbit recipes. Please avoid any with  Ethylenediamine Dihydriodide as it is a cheap and controversal source of iodine, best is Calcium Iodate) and certain Tiki Cat recipes (though they're stupidly expensive IMO) as well as Feline Caviar (also a bit pricey). I do like a few of the Blue Buffalo and Wellness ranges but a few give as much as they take in terms of ingredient quality. CORE can be a good range, some of the wilderness stuff is good too. You might consider those if you're dealing with a picky cat. Innova and perhaps By Nature though the latter has some transparency issues with their ingredients so I've gone off them personally.

Thanks for all the advice and support. I'll let you know if I find success with anything. Still have a couple canned foods to test and will try cooked chicken later this week. She loves the Orijen over her FF chicken.....I don't know whether that is good or bad at this point? Great dry? Or crappy wet?