Combination diet suggestions

rissa1112 · May 16, 2016

Hello! I have three male cats, ages 8 month to 1 year. They are currently eating a daily combination of Natural Balance Limited Ingredient green pea/duck formula and LuvSome canned food. I would ultimately like to switch them to a homemade raw diet but that is not ideal at this time.

After learning more about cat diets I have decided for now to switch them to Primal frozen raw food. I would like this to comprise 50-75% of their daily diets, as that is more affordable for the time being since I have three.

My question is, should I supplement their daily diet with a canned cat food, (if yes, do you have an affordable suggestion as to a brand? Preferably less than $1 per can), or a dry food, such as Nature's Variety grain free?
Thank you!

LTS3 · May 16, 2016

rissa1112 said:
After learning more about cat diets I have decided for now to switch them to Primal frozen raw food. I would like this to comprise 50-75% of their daily diets, as that is more affordable for the time being since I have three.

My question is, should I supplement their daily diet with a canned cat food, (if yes, do you have an affordable suggestion as to a brand? Preferably less than $1 per can), or a dry food, such as Nature's Variety grain free?
Thank you!

If the raw is only going to be up to 75% of the diet then you will need to also feed regular cat food to make up the remaining 25% or so of the diet. Ideally it would be best to feed canned food instead of dry because dry food takes a longer time to digest than raw and the different digestion rate may result in an upset tummy.

Here are some threads on affordable canned foods:

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/308964/healthy-but-affordable-canned-food

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/306956/new-affordable-petsmart-brand-d

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/292890/4health-now-has-affordable-grain-free-wet-food

paiger8 · May 17, 2016

rissa1112 said:
After learning more about cat diets I have decided for now to switch them to Primal frozen raw food. I would like this to comprise 50-75% of their daily diets, as that is more affordable for the time being since I have three.

I'd also encourage you to try Rad Cat frozen raw if you are able to find it at an independent store near you. I haven't fed Primal Frozen (just Primal Freeze Dried) but from my understanding around these boards, Rad Cat is better received by most cats. And at my store, Rad Cat is cheaper than Primal Frozen per ounce. It's a tiny but more work (I thaw it and portion in 4 oz containers, and refreeze) as opposed to the Primal nuggets that you just toss in the fridge to unthaw. My cats took right to frozen RC, from the Primal Freeze Dried Nuggets. RC has 0 veggies too.

There are a bunch of lists floating around about good canned food. It also depends on what your cats will eat, and textures. And what you prefer to feed. I feed Merrick Limited Ingredient canned, and it comes out to about $1.37 per 5.5 oz can on Chewy.com. If you're okay with Carrageenan, Dave's Pet Food brand is decent for the price, I think it's around $1.09 at the indy store near me. They have 95% meat varieties too. Dave's also has 12 oz cans for around $2, and you could split that between the 3. Wellness also has 12 oz cans, which helps decrease the cost per serving drastically. I fed Wellness for quite awhile, but traded it for Merrick.

I'm a believer that as much wet as possible is best, so if you can afford it, canned in addition to raw would be my choice.

rissa1112 · May 17, 2016

LTS3 said:
If the raw is only going to be up to 75% of the diet then you will need to also feed regular cat food to make up the remaining 25% or so of the diet. Ideally it would be best to feed canned food instead of dry because dry food takes a longer time to digest than raw and the different digestion rate may result in an upset tummy.

Here are some threads on affordable canned foods:

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/308964/healthy-but-affordable-canned-food

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/306956/new-affordable-petsmart-brand-d

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/292890/4health-now-has-affordable-grain-free-wet-food

Thank you! Those links were very helpful.

Paiger8 said:
I'd also encourage you to try Rad Cat frozen raw if you are able to find it at an independent store near you. I haven't fed Primal Frozen (just Primal Freeze Dried) but from my understanding around these boards, Rad Cat is better received by most cats. And at my store, Rad Cat is cheaper than Primal Frozen per ounce. It's a tiny but more work (I thaw it and portion in 4 oz containers, and refreeze) as opposed to the Primal nuggets that you just toss in the fridge to unthaw. My cats took right to frozen RC, from the Primal Freeze Dried Nuggets. RC has 0 veggies too.

There are a bunch of lists floating around about good canned food. It also depends on what your cats will eat, and textures. And what you prefer to feed. I feed Merrick Limited Ingredient canned, and it comes out to about $1.37 per 5.5 oz can on Chewy.com. If you're okay with Carrageenan, Dave's Pet Food brand is decent for the price, I think it's around $1.09 at the indy store near me. They have 95% meat varieties too. Dave's also has 12 oz cans for around $2, and you could split that between the 3. Wellness also has 12 oz cans, which helps decrease the cost per serving drastically. I fed Wellness for quite awhile, but traded it for Merrick.

I'm a believer that as much wet as possible is best, so if you can afford it, canned in addition to raw would be my choice.

Thank you! I got Primal today and am excited to start switching them to it and see their reactions. I decided I will also be cutting out dry food completely so they will be on raw/canned. I will look into RadCat! I used their locator and the nearest store carrying it is about an hour away. We will see how it goes!

Combination diet suggestions

rissa1112

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LTS3

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paiger8

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rissa1112

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