Good ole Purina

Well, being that I'm 22 and planning a wedding and just starting my career, I can't afford expensive cat food but what I find at Wal-Mart. Just got Emma last Saturday at the SPCA. She was eating a mix of dry and wet food there so I tried her on some "moist" food which is kinda in between. She wouldn't touch it. I thought animals would eat anything if they are hungry enough....but I guess not....so I bought some Purina Cat Chow (a great $3.38 for a regular size bag) and she's gobbling it down. What are some cheaper brands that are good? Is the Purina good enough?

I personally would not go any lower than Purina. I had my cats on purina and I thought it was just fine. Of course that was until I was informed that cats do not vomit once a week just because. So, if there's no vomit, no loose stool and she is healthy then it is fine. From the feedback I have gotten, the Purina One is supposed to be a little better than the cat chow.

I have a question...how much better is Iams than the other cat foods at the grocery store? The only brand of cat food that I can get from my vet is Technical, and my cats hate it! I know Iams is more than twice as much as the other foods, is it worth it? What is the difference in ingredient quality? Thanks

Food is a whole debate in itself. Iams is a good food in comparison to many others you find on the shelves. If you look at the ingredient lists on the packages, you will find the lower grade foods will start with fillers such as corn meal. The higher grade foods will start with meat products. All commercial pet foods meet the daily requirements for cats. The higher quality foods go a little above and beyond just the requirements. They help to maintain a healthy coat,they don't gain as much weight, they poop less, and they have less digestive problems. However, just because it's a premium food does not mean your cats system will tolerate it well. A cat eating a diet that agrees with them will show an overall appearance of health, healthy stool and should not vomit on a regular basis.

Well, Emma hasn't puked once...even on the car ride home from the SPCA which is back on country roads nor on the way to and from the vet! I don't know, however, how much she's supposed to be pooping a day. She's absolutely starving all the time and loves the Cat Chow...probably from being a stray and having the constantly gobble her food down. The vet said for now to keep her bowl full so she'll know food is always available and it'll show her that you care about her. Then, she'll learn to slow down and take her time and probably won't eat as much. She's a little thing so she can afford to gain a few pounds, just as long as she doesn't get fat.

k...another question I did an ingredients analysis of four brands of cat food, Iams original, Purina Cat Chow, Purina ONE and Meow Mix. My findings show that of the four, Meow Mix has 6 meat based products as opposed to 4 for Cat Chow and 5 for both Iams and ONE. Do the order the ingredients appear in indicate the amount present in the food? For example Chicken is the first ingredient in Iams, and Ground Corn Meal is the first in Meow mix.Does this mean Iams is primarily Chicken, and Meow mix is primarily corn? My cats currently eat Cat chow and Kitten Chow, but i'm considering on going to a more 'premium' food. I'm not really convinced that Purina ONE is better than Cat Chow though, based on the ingredients listing. Iams is obviously better, but is it that much better, to justify paying twice as much for it? Any input anyone has is more than welcome

You are correct. They are listed in order by amount, the first being the primary. Which means that the Meow Mix is mostly filler.

Just thought I'd throw my 2 cents in here. When I got Sunshine, I bought some expensive cat food from the vets. She ate it, but wasn't so impressed. She would wait until she was starving to go over there, and then she would push it around and do other stuff like try to eat people food etc.
So, a friend mentioned that I should try a different food. I didn't want to invest a large amount to just "try" something, so I bought a few of the cheaper ones. Low and behold, all my cats LOVE Kit n' Kaboodle.
I know I know, its not a "top quality" cat food. But they love it, they have NO vomiting ( ever ), no diarrhea, they are palyful and full of energy. I discussed it with my vet, and she thought it was fine. I also give wet food once a day just to supplement.

I really think if you want to use a store brand or some other cheaper form, then go for it as long as the cat doens't have any adverse side effects.

Well, after reading tons of posts on here and researching on the 'net I decided to give Iams dry cat food a try (well, not me..my cats hee hee :LOL: ....although it does smell pretty good for cat food) Its going to cost a bit more money, but if the kitties eat less of it there shouldn't be a problem. I mixed it with their Cat Chow and they went nuts! The two kittens fought over their bowl (they have Iams Kitten) and the two adults fought over theirs( Iams Original Adult). They love the taste! I felt that Loco's fur was looking a bit dull lately so I thought the more high quality ingredients and the fish oil would help. So far so good! By the way, thanks to everyone who volunteered their advice

For all you 'experts' out there I have yet another question. Now that I am switching to Iams, should I give the cats a can of the wet food each day too or is the dry sufficient? Thanks =^..^=

Dry is sufficient as long as they are eating and are healthy. My cats have been eating dry only for 5 years and all is great.

if your cat drinks enough dry should do. my cats werent hardly drinking anything at all so they now get 50% canned food with their dry just to avoid urinary tract infections. i also bought a running(drinkwell fountain replica) water fountain for them and they do seem to drink a bit more than they did. otherwise they would all eat dry only.

here is something i found of interest: i heard that the premium foods lasted longer than the grocercy store brands and that it you may actually be spending more on the grocery store brands than you would on a high quality brand. found out this is very true. i actually compared my dogs innova (i feed her 1-1/2 cups a day) to kibble select=generic kibbles n bits(she was recommended to eat 3-1/2 cups a day). now there is your differnce, it would actually cost me $40 a month to feed her kibble select as compared to $32 a month to feed her innova. i have not done this comparison with the cats yet but i am positive that i bought alot more cat chow than i now buy innova so im probably saving money with them too.

Thats my line of thinking too...however my husband is yet to be convinced. He's a bit freaked out that I spent $25 on two small bags of cat food (one bag of Iams Adult and one bag of Iams Kitten) and says if theres theres no difference in how much they eat it will be too expensive to continue to buy it. However, I've already noticed a tiny change and I only started feeding it to them yesterday (mixed with their other dry food) and they spent less time at the dish even though they appeared to love the taste. I'm assuming it filled them up quicker. I also only had to fill the bowl once, yesterday morning as opposed to twice like I usually do. Maybe I'm jumping the gun, but I guess time will tell.

I couldn't read all of your posts yet, but I'm very interested in this cat food thing... I've been giving Royal Canin and Hill's ProPlan dry food for kittens to my 3 kitties. They like it and they drink a lot so no problem there but I was wondering about how much this food actually "protects while it nourishes" like producers claim. Because in two months a kitten go a mycosis and then a bronchitis (that was because the weather got suddenly cold, anyway healthy indoor cats shouldn't get it so easily), and another one got a granuloma (don't know how you call it in English, it's kind of a herpes on the chin), so seems like their immune system is not really that good. I've been having them for 2 months so maybe it's just that they're still adapting to the new environment and to each other, but do you think I should provide extra supplements or food designed for the immune system?
Thanks,

You can always add suppliments to thier food, but the problems you are seeing would probably be linked to their enviroment at an earlier age. With the cat colds, it is possible for indoor only cats to get it. All it takes is for a stray to come into cantact at a window or for you to pet another cat with the virus and bring it home. What you are describing with the chin sounds like feline Acne. That they usually get because of plastic bowls, lack of grooming or an allergy.

I think I'll have to wait and see when the kittens grow if they still have this kind of problems. Because we live on the 4th floor... no stray cats around. But of course it's like children, if you keep them always "under a glass bell" (this is how we put it down, don't know if it's correct English), then they don't develop anticorps and get ill more easily. So I guess it's not a tragedy if they catch some virus now when they're still so young. Maybe they'll be healthier as they grow (!?)
Anyway I give them a paste with vitamins and taurins. Any other giving supplements? What do you think?

The vet said this granuloma can come even if the cat is frightened by something, and I think this is Francis' case because everything frightens her, I think her breeder kept the litter in a cage - so she's not very social, although she's very sweet once she knows you. Vet says, the more people she sees around, the more noise she hears, the better. I'll have to organize more parties at home!