Wet or dry food??

Is wet or dry food better for a slightly obese cat.

Canned (wet) food because the calorie content is lower and you can more easily feed your cat enough calories to maintain, or in your cat's case, lose body weight. If you need help determining how many calories your cat needs to eat daily to lose the extra pounds and how to do that safely, TCS members can help

​Thank you very much for your answer. I'm sure marni will be frilled as wet food is her favourite. Do you know any good brands?

There are many brands out there. ... the cheapest stuff has fillers and more carbs. the most expensive can get just that ,expensive.My cats eat some friskies brand and fancy feast classic.. If you do research. you will see that even the least expensive wet food is better for cats than the most expensive dry food. 

Cats should not be eating carbs, and humans , me included , eat too many.They just turn to fat.

When i switched my newly acquired 18 pound cat to wet three times a day. ( a total of 5.5 ounces per day and NO treats.( she went down to 14.5 pounds.I am trying to get her to 12 pounds but it is tough. Good luck!

jeanne38 is absolutely right: it's the carbs you want to avoid. I'd suggest looking for canned foods without any grains, potato, peas, tapioca, and other ingredients that are high-carb. It's the easiest way to start!

You should limit carbs to no more than 10% but a little more every once in awhile is fine, IMO. If you limit yourself to say, 0 carbs, the number of foods out there are extremely limited. A 10% or so carb limit will give you a good selection of foods to choose from. Gravy and sauce based foods are on the higher end of carbs because of the starches so don't feed those exclusively. An occasional meal is fine. My two cents on carbs

Use this chart to find out nutritional content of canned foods: http://catinfo.org/docs/FoodChartPublic9-22-12.pdf

For calorie content, use the Catinfo.org chart and this one: http://www.petobesityprevention.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/Cat_Canned_Pouch_Foods.pdf

Many well known brands are suitable for cats who need to lose weight: Fancy Feast Classic / Gourmet, Friskies, Nature's Variety Instinct, etc. If you're outside the US, some of these brands may not be available but there are likely some other brands you can feed. I think there's list of UK / European canned foods that are good.

​Thank you very much for your reply.

I actually live in New Zealand and I think they might sell Fancy Feast Classic and Friskies.


​is this the fancy feast you recommended?

thank you very much, I will definitly look into it.

Good luck with your cat I'm sure you will reach your goal.

Yes, @KateandMarni, the Fancy Feast Classics should be very low in carbs. I think their names vary in some countries (Canada?), so you might want to check the label to make sure the Fancy Feast Classics don't contain wheat or corn gluten(s) in NZ... though they don't in the US!

I just started feeding our cats canned Feline Naturals chicken and lamb food: it's expensive here but might be more reasonable in NZ since it's made there. It's very low-carb pate and our cats love it.

Good luck!

Even the cheapest canned is better than high quality dry for any cat, but particularly an overweight cat. In fact, the only time dry was ever recommended to me was feeding a severely malnourished cat that was having trouble eating, because the dry is the most calorie-dense form of cat food. Even watering it down further might be a good idea. It will take longer to eat and make kitty more full, plus cats can always do with a little extra moisture. 

Personally, I've had good luck with generic brands. Believe it or not, they can be pretty good. If you look at the ingredients, you'll notice some flavours are better than others. Avoid anything that says "chunks" or "gravy" in it. The stuff called "chicken/turkey/seafood dinner" or "pâté" tend to have the lowest carbs. Watch for sales, buy bulk, and buy the bigger cans (and a lid so you can refrigerate the leftovers for tomorrow) as the bigger cans are more cost effective. Some stores have loyalty programs, too, for instance my local pet shop gives 10% off their generic brand food if you have their key fob. You can get the cost down quite a bit doing these things. 

I will definitly look into it.

Thank you very much for all your advice. Today I will go out and see if there is any feline Naturals.

But I think I might get 10 of the fancy feast classics and they have a offer on right now.

Thank you all so much for the help

KateandMarni said:

Thank you very much for all your advice. Today I will go out and see if there is any feline Naturals.

But I think I might get 10 of the fancy feast classics and they have a offer on right now.

Thank you all so much for the help

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What a great photo, what a sweet, beautiful cat!

Definitely try different brands on her: lots of cats like or even demand (as ours do) variety. Variety is also a good way to make your budget go further. So is, as @socksy mentioned, shopping at stores with loyalty programs. Where I live, it's the small, independent stores that have the best benefits on those, like 10% off canned foods when you buy 10 cans of any kind. They're also best about ordering pretty much anything I want and giving free samples if they get them from manufacturers.

Ziwi Peak is a good brand that is available in NZ. Feline Natural, also a NZ brand, just came out with some canned foods: http://www.k9natural.co.nz/cat-food-range/

The Fancy Feast Classics are just fine if your cat likes it and you don't want to (or can't ) spend a lot on food

Just make sure to switch foods gradually and find food that she likes. Wet food is better in terms of satiety so if she likes that, that's great for weight loss. 

Low-carb is good, just mind that they don't put in too much fat instead because that's high in caloric content as well. Too much protein isn't always good either but as long as you stick to cat food that's labeled as complete and balanced, you should be ok. If your cat is not a picky eater, variety is always a good idea. 

Is she active enough? Maybe you can encourage her to get more exercise?