Vet pushing all dry diet.

Hi,

I've been to the vet with my kitten as we're looking to wean him onto adult food.
I asked my vets advice (although we didn't see the usual gent) about this, and she's reallllly pushing an all dry diet for him.
I don't think I'm comfortable with this, is that right? I asked if I should feed him a mainly meat based diet and she all but laughed in my face.

She said he shouldn't eat wet food at all and that dry has protein in it so it's fine?

Please help.

I would seek a second opinion. It can never hurt. Vets' opinions do vary, and it can depend on the level of their interest in nutrition and what they were taught at school. If they're older and were taught more "old school", they may not be as up to date on their information.

Yes, dry foods do have protein - if cat foods didn't, cats wouldn't last too long on them, but they're not as moist and they're not as high in protein for most readily available commercial brands, and cats require both very moist and very high protein foods. If you haven't already, you can check out these articles, and don't be afraid to ask what they feed their pets (the vets, the techs, the receptionists). Most are happy to share and honestly, every pet owner has a different opinion too. Some of us here feed only dry, some feed only wet, some feed only raw, and some feed a mix of two or more. As long as you're considering the needs of your cat and what you feel would benefit them most.

Choosing The Right Food for Your Cat and you

What Makes the Best Canned Cat Food?

Choosing the Right Dry Cat Food

How to Compare Cat Foods & Calculate Carbs: Dry Matter Basis (dry food is higher carb than wet food, so this may help in a decision too)

If you're not comfortable with your vets' assessment, for whatever reason, it's always wise to seek a second opinion. Same goes for your personal health. Listen to what your instinct is telling you. While most vets want the best for your cats, some vets are more on the head-scratching side, so it's always good to get another professional opinion.

FhiCat said:

If you're not comfortable with your vets' assessment, for whatever reason, it's always wise to seek a second opinion. Same goes for your personal health. Listen to what your instinct is telling you. While most vets want the best for your cats, some vets are more on the head-scratching side, so it's always good to get another professional opinion.

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Totally agree!! Trust your instincts, and maybe find a second opinion.

Is this vet a cat only vet? Maybe seek out a cat specialist if at all possible. I use a cat only vet, and she seems quite educated in cat nutrition.

If you like the vet otherwise, then just politely tell the vet that you are not going to feed dry food and leave it at that. Any good vet will respect a client's decision. Remember, it's YOUR cat and YOU make the decisions on what to feed, how to care for the cat in your home, etc. If the vet continues to push dry food and/or refuses to work with you, then find a new vet.

That seems pretty crazy to me. It's been my experience that a lot of vets don't know much about feline nutrition. What they do get in vet school seems to largely come from food companies who have a financial stake in promoting their food when the time comes. Personally, I think the average wet food is likely better than the average dry food. The wet has more moisture and fewer carbohydrates. You might decide that you want to feed a mostly dry diet for convenience, you should probably feed some canned food at least occasionally. If you never feed wet, your cat may not eat it in the future because he doesn't recognize it as food. I've had a few times where the easiest way to get some medication into one of my cats was to mix it into some wet food, Miralax for constipation for example. This would have been much harder to do if I couldn't just pop open some wet food and know that she would eat it up.

Grogs said:

 
That seems pretty crazy to me. It's been my experience that a lot of vets don't know much about feline nutrition. What they do get in vet school seems to largely come from food companies who have a financial stake in promoting their food when the time comes. 

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None of us know much about feline nutrition either. Not you, not me, not the lady next door. Only a certified nutritionist does. Lifetimes nutrition studies with animals are very scarce, so at this point we simply don't know. 



As for the whole "vet school is sponsored by big evil food companies", unless you have a reliable primary source to back that up, it's equally unfair to push this assumption to the masses.

   I asked if I should feed him a mainly meat based diet and she all but laughed in my face

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I wonder what your vet thinks cats eat in the wild.     What a strange reaction.

If you can't feed raw then I would definately feed a wet diet. 

Nora1 said:

Totally agree!! Trust your instincts, and maybe find a second opinion.

Is this vet a cat only vet? Maybe seek out a cat specialist if at all possible. I use a cat only vet, and she seems quite educated in cat nutrition.

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I'm a big fan of our cat specialist vet, too, in part because she's pretty good on cat nutrition. We switched to the cat specialist after realizing that the vets at our previous cat's vet practice weren't knowledgeable about feline diet, available foods, or the benefit of changing diets when our cat was sick.

My vet once told me there's no difference between wet and dry cat food, it's just a preference.

But have tried going raw?

i put all my cats on an all wt diet. check out Dr Lisa Pearson's info on www.catinfo.org on the subject. it made a believer out of me

Mum of two said:

 
My vet once told me there's no difference between wet and dry cat food, it's just a preference.

But have tried going raw?

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Your vet is partially wrong. Cats make their food prefences as kittens. What solid food they eat after being weaned is what they will recognize as food for the rest of their life. Many people feed dry food for whatever reason and their cats often end up refusing to eat canned food because they simply don't recognize it as food. If your cat needs to eat canned food later in life for a health reason it's usually very difficult to transition the cat's food. Grogs said it best:

Grogs said:

 
If you never feed wet, your cat may not eat it in the future because he doesn't recognize it as food. I've had a few times where the easiest way to get some medication into one of my cats was to mix it into some wet food, Miralax for constipation for example. This would have been much harder to do if I couldn't just pop open some wet food and know that she would eat it up.

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It's best to introduce a kitten to both canned and dry food early in life as possible. Older cats may be set in their food preferences but some can be transitioned to eating different types of food.

Some people do feed raw food. There are commerical raw pet foods you can buy, such as Rad Cat or Nature's Variety Instinct. Some are frozen, others are freeze dried or dehydrated. A lot of vets don't like the idea of a raw food diet, much more so than canned food. If you want to make raw from a recipie, please visit the Raw and Home Cooked Diet forum for more info.

LTS3 said:

 
Your vet is partially wrong. Cats make their food prefences as kittens. What solid food they eat after being weaned is what they will recognize as food for the rest of their life. Many people feed dry food for whatever reason and their cats often end up refusing to eat canned food because they simply don't recognize it as food. If your cat needs to eat canned food later in life for a health reason it's usually very difficult to transition the cat's food. Grogs said it best:

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That's what I meant, their preference. Because I introduced both to my baby and he disliked the wet and when I consulted the vet she said they are the same it depends on "their" preference.

There's good dry and bad dry, and there's good wet and bad wet, there's even good homemade/raw and bad homemade/raw. I wonder why the discussion with your vet focused on wet vs. dry. I think there's so much more to pet nutrition than water content. 

I wonder if it's possible that she focused on what she believes to be good quality dry as opposed to an alternative of wet which she didn't like as much, for whatever reason. For myself, I definitely do think some types of dry are superior to some kinds of wet. I don't think "wet is always superior to dry". It depends on the cat and the owner, with different lifestyles calling for different choices.

We have an interesting article by Laurie Goldstein aka @LDG  here about choosing the right food for your cat. I think it provides a relatively balanced view, as well as the pros and cons for each type of food. The bottom line is, it's easier to produce low-quality dry, but that doesn't mean that there is no high-quality dry. The main drawback of dry food is that you need to make sure your cat gets enough water. Other than that, it can provide a good and wholesome nutrition for a cat.

http://www.thecatsite.com/a/choosing-the-right-food-for-your-cat

Wow thanks for all the replies guys ha, well i've decided to carry on with what I know. He's always had an incredible mix of everything. He has mostly wet, dry when he feels like it and i'm learning about raw atm although haven't tried him yet. He is the least fussy cat i've ever met. The only thing he won't really touch is anything pâte sort of consistency.
Hes pretty happy go lucky as you can probably guess from the above.
She also said that he was overweight as an offhand sort of comment, which made me uncomfortable given the condition he was in when I found him. She mentioned nothing further than that though.

I also need to point out that there was no brand pushing

Hi MrsHutcho,

I know this thread is old but just in case you might still drop by I wanted to say that there is at least one vet I know of (online) who emphatically states wet food is superior to dry food, and not just because of the moisture content.  She goes into detail about it on her site.  Google Dr. Lisa Pierson if you'd like to hear her opinion.  

Imo, dry food companies push dry food stating that it cleans the cats teeth.  It may do a little scraping off of plaque and tartar, but it quickly becomes wet food in their mouths and gets stuck in between their teeth.  Marketers do a good job putting out an idea that "seems" good but does not pan out in the real world if you think about what they are saying.  That being said,  I still feed my kitties some dry food as they are such carboholics, but I have switched them to grain-free low carb.  They haven't taken to it well, especially Oreo, but they like that crunch.  Oreo's skin condition has cleared up since getting all of them off grain.  Now to get him to lose some weight!  That's what makes dry food so bad: grain.  Cats don't need grain.  Humans don't either, imo.  It stimulates their appetites and encourages overeating.  I have personally found I do not digest grain well at all, and it has caused a lot of my indigestion - also milk and sugar.  Now I am totally off Prevacid!