Kitten ratio of wet to dry food

Hi everyone! I'm new to the forums, and joined to get some dietary help with my new seven month cat, Finn. I've had cats since childhood but this is my first cat since moving out, and I really want to get him started on the right foot as far as a healthy diet goes.

At the shelter he was being free fed Purina dry food, and since bringing him home I'm slowly switched him over to Blue Buffalo's kitten dry food. Since he's so young I've been free feeding him throughout the day and letting him eat whenever he wants. He's extremely active, loves play sessions and chasing/bunny kicking toys. He also drinks a lot of water per day. His BM have always been a little loose, noted by the shelter when he came in, but he has no gastrointestinal problems and his BM are a lot less smelly since switching him to Blue Buffalo. Going forward, I know that wet food is a great alternative to dry food because of its protein and water content, but I've also seen benefits of dry food as well. I was wondering if anyone fed their cats (especially young cats) a mixed diet of wet and dry -- whether literally mixed together, or wet food during the day and dry food to graze on during the night or something. How did you determine the ratio (in terms of daily calorie content) of wet and dry food to give your cat? Or would strictly wet food diet be better?

Thank you so much for any help!!

Hi @littlecatt  Welcome to The Cat Site.

I have a cat called Fynn too! He's going to have his first birthday this month.

Strictly speaking wet food is better than dry, but if feeding a mixture of the two suits your budget and Finn is happy on it there are no major problems with feeding both.

My cats all get wet food twice a day and I leave dry food out for the to snack on, mainly because a few of them prefer to graze rather than eat a whole bowl of food and I worry they wouldn't get enough to eat otherwise. I have to admit, leaving a little dry food down at night means I don't get woken up to early too.

How many times a day do you feed Finn?

Do you put a bowl of wet and a bowl of dry down at the same time or do you mix wet and dry in one bowl?

It's better to give them dry food "dry" as once it's got wet it starts to get a lot of bacteria growing on it.  

Hi @Norachan, thank you so much for responding!! That's so cute you have a young cat named Fynn too!

Right now he's only receiving dry food -- since that's what he was eating at the shelter, I thought first I'd switch him over to a better quality dry food before making any dietary changes. He's not a fast or big eater so he might do well on a tighter feeding schedule and not need the option to graze. I'll try switching him over to wet food and feeding him 2-3 times a day. If he seems to get more desperate for food I might try leaving some dry food out for him to munch on. Right now he's definitely not an over-eater but I don't want to start out over-feeding him. Budget isn't so much an issue as making sure he's got the right nutritional foundation.

Thank you so much for your help! Googling wet vs dry food uncovers pages of heated debates, and it's great to get a more sound opinion. I'll talk with his vet next time I take him in, too.

Brought home my gal from the Rescue Center and she is 1 year old this month.  The Rescue Center staff people fed her kibble, and I continued that at our home.  I initially decided to give her wet about three times weekly, since she appeared to consume a healthy amount of fresh water daily.  However, in the last two months I have been  splitting the wet/dry servings fairly evenly.  She loves kibble, so that's one reason why I continue with it.  She never refuses kibble, while she might take her time and ignore wet food  for hours, or even overnight.

Choose both styles judiciously because there is over-priced food out there that simply does not justify its premium price.  There are reasonably priced no corn, no wheat, no soy products out there, especially from online retailers.  We still have corn-content kibble in our cupboard but as our stock diminishes I add grain-free kibble to her routine.  Incidentally, I am not fully convinced that corn-content kibble is unhealthy, as long as corn is not a primary ingredient.  I have read arguments pro and con about plant sources in cat food.  If your cat enjoys kibble, stick with it as part of a rotation along with wet food, but do try to provide kibble that has a better than average meat protein content.

My kitten (about 14 weeks old now) gets a small can of food (1/2 morning, 1/2 evening) and has dry food (Blue kitten) for when she gets hungry in between. She probably eats a half cup of dry every day. 

Wet Food is always considered better than Dry Food (even by Vets) so If your cat likes it then try to switch him to entirely wet food (if your schedule allows it). A little dry for snacking or as I call it topping off their hunger is not bad. It is also good to know that your cat is good at drinking water, which means dry food is not too bad for him.

Rather than throwing out an opinion I would just throw down a statement I heard recently on a Podcast.

A renowned vet (guest) made the statement that every cat that she has seen with UTI were on dry food. She never saw a cat that had UTI and wasn't eating dry.

I can link the podcast episode here if you wanna listen to it.

Thank you so much for all of the advice! I'm going to pick up some wet food after work today -- I don't think Finn's ever tried it, so fingers crossed he likes the ones that I pick up! If not I'll try playing around with brand and type... If he's not into the wet food at all I'll go from there. But assuming a best case scenario, I'll make the wet food his main diet and dry food for between-meal munching! Thanks all for your help.

littlecatt said:

 
Thank you so much for all of the advice! I'm going to pick up some wet food after work today -- I don't think Finn's ever tried it, so fingers crossed he likes the ones that I pick up! If not I'll try playing around with brand and type... If he's not into the wet food at all I'll go from there. But assuming a best case scenario, I'll make the wet food his main diet and dry food for between-meal munching! Thanks all for your help.

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If you are having some difficulty then there was a trick that I used to have one of our kittens eat dry food.

She ate wet food but never wanted to eat dry although it was always available (other kitten ate both wet and dry without any issues). Due to this, we were not able to leave the house for more than 5-6 hours as that will mean that She will miss a meal. I mixed in some dry crumbs with wet and soon I saw her latch onto dry food. Now we can leave in the morning and come back in the evening if we leave dry food out for them to graze on.

You can do the same with wet food.

In my opinion, cats should enjoy wet food more than dry, it smells more and has closer texture to what cats eat in nature. Cats don't have as many taste buds as humans do so texture and smell are prime importance for them. Both our kittens still enjoy wet food over dry.  I have seen that my cats enjoy canned food with Morsels more than Pate (paste or grub) because of the texture.

If you have any questions let us know.

Picked up some Buffalo Wild kitten wet food on the way home and served it for dinner! No problems with encouraging Finn to eat it at all. He ate about a third of it and then decided he was done -- maybe because he'd had dry food out all day? Going to try leaving less dry food out tomorrow and switch to feeding him meals instead.

littlecatt said:

 
Picked up some Buffalo Wild kitten wet food on the way home and served it for dinner! No problems with encouraging Finn to eat it at all. He ate about a third of it and then decided he was done -- maybe because he'd had dry food out all day? Going to try leaving less dry food out tomorrow and switch to feeding him meals instead.

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Amazing, here is what I think about timed meals (from another thread). Serve as much as he wants to eat and store the rest in the fridge.

Zoop said:

 
I second the timed meal concept. Food is one way that you develop your relationship and communicated with your cats.

If food is magically laying around in a bowl your cat will never understand your role in their life.

If you are feeding timed meals then the cat will associate you with the pleasure of getting fed and it will help control bad behaviour as well as strengthen their affection towards you. They will also see you as their master and respond better to you.

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