Critique My Cat Food Selections

It's been crazy hard trying to find affordable good quality cat food. List of bad things to avoid goes on and on.

Kitten Food (Currently 5mths)
-Switching from Natural Balance Ultra to Welless Core Grain Free Kitten Food - no grain and seems to have high quality protein sources. Not too expensive.
-No wet food yet but planning on introducing Nutro Grain Free Chicken Soft Loaf - no grain, carageenan and that bad vitamin K supplement

Cat Food (For Later)
-Wellness Core Grain Free Cat Food - same reason as above but i read some people saying it causes crystals. One website recommended that i mix this dry food with Merricks without Grain because theres no phosphate or something. Your thoughts?
-For wet food Weruva Funk in the Trunk or Home Style Giblets Moms Turkey. Reason is no grain, carageenan, bad vit k supp, and its about $1/can.


Let me know what you guys think!

We don't feed our cats any dry food so I can't comment on that but I think the Nutro Natural Choice food is a great choice -- our cats love the NNC "adult" foods that don't have carrageenan. Weruva's canned Cats in Kitchen foods are good, too, though I probably wouldn't feed a lot of Funk in the Trunk because of the tuna. Our cats very willingly eat the Double Dip, Chicken Frick A Zee, and Fowl Ball (about once a week each, which is pretty often for them!), though I do occasionally give them a small can of something with fish, usually Goldie Lox, which they love. I'm not very familiar with the Mom's foods (and couldn't feed it because one of our cats can't eat potato) but it seems like the vegetable quantities must be small, which is a good thing.

And yes, I hear you about the list of bad things! It really is difficult to find decent foods that don't have all the things I can't or don't want to feed -- carrageenan, that menadione junk, grains, lots of fish, potato, peas... -- without spending a small fortune. Or insulting the cats' refined taste.

Have fun with your kitten! And welcome to the Cat Site!

Thank you! It's nice to have a resource for cat stuff.

Is tuna bad? There's more chicken than tuna in there so im assuming thats why theres none of that menadione stuf.

You're welcome! I'm sure you'll get plenty of other responses, too.

As for tuna, our vet isn't into it, largely because of mercury. Beyond that, some cats tend to get addicted to fish, plus there seems to be a link to thyroid disease. (Our previous cat was a big little fishhead: she ate a lot of fish-based foods and it got to where fish didn't seem to agree with her. Fish seems to do that pretty frequently.) I'm not sure if your kitten is a boy or a girl but I think male cats can also have urinary tract issues from eating a lot of fish. (I've only ever had female cats so don't know much about this, sorry!)

FWIW, our vet thinks feeding an occasional food with salmon is fine. That's one reason I went for the Goldie Lox, which also has more chicken than fish -- I have the same theory about the lack of menadione in those foods.

I feel kind of glad that our cats aren't super-interested in fish!

Ah i see. Well good thing is it has more chicken than tuna so maybe it can be a once a week type of thing.

kittyluv387 said:

Ah i see. Well good thing is it has more chicken than tuna so maybe it can be a once a week type of thing.

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Exactly! That's what I do, too: I'll serve (serve!) something fish once a week or so, something with carrageenan every now and then, etc., to spread out the ingredients I don't really like to feed. But that the cats like.

Ah that sounds like a great idea for other types of canned food!  Will try it once my kitty gets a full check up tomorrow since he currently has chronic diarrhea

I like the tiki carnivore collection, it is a good mix they seem to like all flavors

kittyluv387 said:

 
Ah that sounds like a great idea for other types of canned food!  Will try it once my kitty gets a full check up tomorrow since he currently has chronic diarrhea

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Oh no! Sorry to hear about the diarrhea. Do you think it's linked to the food? (Dry foods tend to have a lot of ingredients, making it hard to figure out what's causing problems...) The Nutro wet kitten food has a pretty simple recipe so that might be a good thing to try him on.

bonepicker said:

I like the tiki carnivore collection, it is a good mix they seem to like all flavors

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I agree, it is a good mix, I'm so glad it works for your cats! Our cats like those foods, too, though lately the little foodies have gotten a little too picky about their canned foods.

The chicken Liver and tilapia got eaten the fastest, the others they came back and finished, still good though since one is a real foodie!

bonepicker said:

I like the tiki carnivore collection, it is a good mix they seem to like all flavors

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I like those too but it's a bit too pricey for me.

No idea what the diarrhea is about. Had 3 fecal tests done today and results were negative. Vet said i can switch him quickly to the higher quality food i bought him since he already has diarrhea. I went to the pet supply store but couldnt find the nutro can for kittens! So i just bought a few adult cans for him to try out.

Seems good. You might want to check out the Wellness Core Kitten wet food. My kittens like it and i mix it with tiki cat or something else with gravy to get them really into it. 

missmimz said:

Seems good. You might want to check out the Wellness Core Kitten wet food. My kittens like it and i mix it with tiki cat or something else with gravy to get them really into it. 

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Yea i looked into that one but it has carageenan and its pretty expensive.

Red barn tricky chicky and pride rockstar rabbit, tiki and weruva all good. Nutro Natural good. Iams purrfect delicacies turkey, and liver Earthborn chicken jumble good,I still rotate merrick pate and FF classics to keep cost down, I stay with what the cats like to a degree even if one might have carrageenan. I feed dry as a treat Merrick chicken grain free very tiny kibble, seems to stay down better. I only give a teaspoon here and there because they love dry! I have a no waste system, if the diva will not eat it, it goes to my big disposal unit with fur, my big male. If he won't eat it my little feral that I TNRd gets it, if she does not like it the racoons get it![emoji]128062[/emoji][emoji]10084[/emoji]️[emoji]128062[/emoji] ALL GOOD. I bought two cases of EVO on clearance half off, feral is eating it my guys did not like it!

bonepicker said:

Red barn tricky chicky and pride rockstar rabbit, tiki and weruva all good. Nutro Natural good. Iams purrfect delicacies turkey, and liver Earthborn chicken jumble good,I still rotate merrick pate and FF classics to keep cost down, I stay with what the cats like to a degree even if one might have carrageenan. I feed dry as a treat Merrick chicken grain free very tiny kibble, seems to stay down better. I only give a teaspoon here and there because they love dry! I have a no waste system, if the diva will not eat it, it goes to my big disposal unit with fur, my big male. If he won't eat it my little feral that I TNRd gets it, if she does not like it the racoons get it![emoji]128062[/emoji][emoji]10084[/emoji]️[emoji]128062[/emoji] ALL GOOD. I bought two cases of EVO on clearance half off, feral is eating it my guys did not like it!

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Thanks i added tricky chicky to my list! I have nutro and tiki funk in the trunk as well.

Well ive been introducing wellness core grain free kittn food for the last couple of days and my Benny let me know he doesnt care for his old food Natural Balance Ultra anymore. The old food had not been touched and he ate all of his new one! Dont blame him, the new one has real meat.

kittyluv387 said:

Well ive been introducing wellness core grain free kittn food for the last couple of days and my Benny let me know he doesnt care for his old food Natural Balance Ultra anymore. The old food had not been touched and he ate all of his new one! Dont blame him, the new one has real meat.

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He's a smart cat!

Fed him half a can of nutro chicken. Think he liked it a lot! Licked his bowl clean. I put in a tiny bit of more pumpkin than usual to help with digestion since this is a new food. Hes currently has normal stools since hes on antibiotics. It was so nice to watch him enjoy his meal. Ill be ordering a case from amazon.

That's great it's always exciting when they enjoy their food since we put so much effort into it.

kittyluv387 said:

Fed him half a can of nutro chicken. Think he liked it a lot! Licked his bowl clean.

I put in a tiny bit of more pumpkin than usual to help with digestion since this is a new food. Hes currently has normal stools since hes on antibiotics. It was so nice to watch him enjoy his meal. Ill be ordering a case from amazon.

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I'm so glad he likes it! Our cats love their foods, it's one of the brands they'll consistently eat without complaining.