Nature's Variety Instinct Chicken canned giving cat diarrhea ?

So Nature's Variety Instinct Chicken gives my cat diarrhea/soft stool.  I noticed this a week ago but confirmed it by cutting it out totally and continuing her regular rotation and then fed it again yesterday.  This is extremely odd because I've fed Instinct before in my rotation, but only the venison, duck, lamb, and pork recipes with no problem.  I also currently have NV Prairie and Pride in my rotation with no issues.

Has anybody else had this issue with NV Chicken?  Any idea what ingredient could be causing the diarrhea?  Here is the ingredient list: http://www.instinctpetfood.com/product/instinct-grain-free-canned-cat-food-chicken

Maybe I ought to try the NV LID's.

That's odd. NVI is a very high quality food. Have you given her chicken from other brands and had a similar reaction? Maybe she's allergic to chicken. It's not as uncommon as you might think. If she can't have chicken, you can just keep that one out of the rotation and keep the other proteins in. None of my cats have ever had a reaction to any NVI. Mine love the Pride best out of all the NV foods. 

I was wondering about a chicken allergy as well.

Another thought is that while one of my cats could eat chicken, he didn't tolerate egg or egg product in his canned food.

Well she does eat chicken already.  In Nutro Natural Choice and Honest Kitchen, to be specific.  There is also egg product in Nutro.  I don't think it's the regular egg either because Pride has them as an ingredient.  She does great on both of those foods.  Most of the ingredients mirror each other in the Instinct brand.  This is really odd.  No idea what it is. 

I also find it odd because Instinct is gum free - sometimes the gums cause digestive upset, at least I've noticed that with my two cats in the past when they ate canned foods with e.g., guar gum.

It doesn't seem to be a food intolerance to chicken since you said she is eating other foods with chicken. Maybe try an Instinct can of chicken with a different batch number? 

It doesn't appear that NV has changed the chicken formula.  If you try a can with a different batch / date # and the problem persists, maybe give NV a call and report it. Not sure what else to suggest.

Well I sent an email to Nature's Variety today.  Let's see what they say....

Before I switched my Cat Beast to raw he was living on NV Instinct kibble; going between turkey, chicken, and whatever other flavor I could pick up on sale.  Usually, it was chicken.  His stool was never loose, but oh my goodness did he have terrible gas.  He would toot on one side of the apartment and I could smell it on the other side!  I always knew when he had bowl movements because my entire apartment would reek for a solid 3-4 hours afterwards, regardless of the litter type or baking soda I used.  Within days of making the complete transition to raw chicken/rabbit he stopped having the bad gas.  Haven't had a litter box odor or smelly toot since!  The NV kibble was definitely the culprit.  I'd be interested in what NV has to say about the bowel habits of felines on their food. 

On a related note, my dog is fed 1/2 Instinct raw (beef, rabbit, or lamb) and 1/2 Instinct rabbit kibble with a once a week RMB.  She has an intolerance to chicken, I discovered, so I've since removed all chicken from her diet.  Before I had done that, her toots could knock your socks off.  Her face would also get inflamed and itchy.  Neither of the animals have had any issues since being removed from Instinct chicken.  

This is interesting - I am in the process of trying to transition my 2 to raw and have started with NV raw frozen (mixing with Fancy Feast right now). In addition, I cut out the NV kibble as I was free feeding that. SInce I cut out the NV kibble the litter box room (and surrounding areas) smell a heck of a lot better. I also had the same issue with an awful, lingering smell and I was very concerned. SInce they haven't been eating the kibble (going on a week now) the litter box odor is minimal. This is odd, as I was under the impression NV is a high quality, is grain free, etc so why the horrible stench from digesting it? If that's what caused it.....

MsCatmom said:

 
This is interesting - I am in the process of trying to transition my 2 to raw and have started with NV raw frozen (mixing with Fancy Feast right now). In addition, I cut out the NV kibble as I was free feeding that. SInce I cut out the NV kibble the litter box room (and surrounding areas) smell a heck of a lot better. I also had the same issue with an awful, lingering smell and I was very concerned. SInce they haven't been eating the kibble (going on a week now) the litter box odor is minimal. This is odd, as I was under the impression NV is a high quality, is grain free, etc so why the horrible stench from digesting it? If that's what caused it.....

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I had my cats on NV LID turkey dry while I was out of town for a couple of days and when I got back, there was no odor. They normally do not eat dry. I use the rest of the bag as treats instead of Temptations. Maybe it's just the chicken variety that causes the stink. 

when I got the girls from the Humane Society, they were eating Science Diet dry. Not only could their poop clear a room, it could knock a buzzard out of the sky. same with Henry. He was eating donated food at the shelter and it was mostly Purina dry. That smell could make your nose want to secede from your face and move out. I noticed that he doesn't tolerate lamb so I don't give him that but he's OK with pretty much any other protein. 

MsCatmom,

Was it the raw coated kibble you were using? I personally think raw coated kibble is an oxymoron, actually. Don't know if you had that problem with other dry foods, however, even the "best" grain-free dry is high in starch -- cats don't need, can't digest, all that starch.

Imagine, for e.g., boiling a potato for half hour, it's cooked. Boil that same potato for three hours and the water begins to turn white, the potato becomes higher in starch, higher up the glycemic index - that's kibble. Kibble goes through a higher and longer degree of heat processing than canned.

I think it's irresponsible to raw coat kibble and add "raw boost bites" to kibble.

Glad your kitty is doing better.