Quality Food Makes Difference in Cat

I feel dumb about starting a new thread, but wanted to share. We've had Tigger for about 2 3/4 years, since she was 14. When we got her she was PAINFULLY thin. I felt bad petting her because I was afraid it would hurt her.

So she's done well, and even thrived, really, but recently her consumption of canned food has really gone up. I've got her on fairly good dry food, but, well, I must admit, not too good soft food. Fancy Feast. So just about every time I get up from my computer she's after me to feed her - like 4 times every evening, and once, sometimes twice in the morning before I go to work.

Well, I just went to the feed store and bought a few cans of premium food (several different brands) and fed each cat 1/4 can of WELLNESS formula canned food.

I have not seen her so content in a long time. My DH noticed it as well. After just one time, it filled her up with real food, not filler. Oh my gosh, I can't believe it. She hasn't eaten for at least 3 hours. That must be a record!

That is so true!! I'm learning this as well with my two kittens. It's great your kitty adapted to the new food so easily .

Originally Posted by Cat Mommy

That is so true!! I'm learning this as well with my two kittens. It's great your kitty adapted to the new food so easily

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Well, we'll see, we haven't had a poop yet. But she loves the hard food she's on (Iams Hairball) and we haven't seen nearly as many hairballs as before. As a matter of fact, all the cats love it, and prefer it to anything else I have out. I have 3 longhair and 1 shorthair cat(s) so I guess that works.

Right now Tigger is sitting with DH, "smiling" at me.

If I may ask, what flavor did you give her? I've tried every flavor they make on my cats and the only one that even had a lukewarm reception was the chicken and beef, my usual fish lovers even turned up their noses at the seafood flavored ones!

Wellness Chicken & Herring. (Well, she liked it, LOL)

She's not particularly picky, though.

Yup, tried that one. Wasn't populare, but I believe they attempted to eat that one Mine are incredibly picky apparently

Too funny! Well, Tigger isn't very picky. I would say Nadette is pretty picky and Elsa sometimes and sometimes not. I think it's ironic that my formerly stray kitties are the pickiest!

We tried Natural Balance Ocean Fish this morning. All seemed to like it. Tigger either wanted more because she liked it, or it didn't fill her up as much as the Wellness. Hard to tell with that one. But she really was a different cat last night!

Originally Posted by katiemae1277

If I may ask, what flavor did you give her? I've tried every flavor they make on my cats and the only one that even had a lukewarm reception was the chicken and beef, my usual fish lovers even turned up their noses at the seafood flavored ones!

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Mine are extremely picky, too. I have tired dozens of premium canned and they have refused to eat them all. Have you tried mixing just a little with their regular wet ? With the Wellness, I started mixing just a little with their regular canned and microwaving it on low just to warm it up a tad and they seemed to accept it a bit more. Im planning on adding more and more until I get them completely off the bad canned I was feeding them.

Originally Posted by kluchetta

Too funny! Well, Tigger isn't very picky. I would say Nadette is pretty picky and Elsa sometimes and sometimes not. I think it's ironic that my formerly stray kitties are the pickiest!

We tried Natural Balance Ocean Fish this morning. All seemed to like it. Tigger either wanted more because she liked it, or it didn't fill her up as much as the Wellness. Hard to tell with that one. But she really was a different cat last night!

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I kinda got my cats stuck on the Meow mix pouches/cups and even when I mix the premium in with the MM, they eat the MM and leave most of the premium, and I really mix it up The only one that i have gotten a fairly good reaction from is the Felidae, i may just go back to the MM cause at least they eat every bite with that

Originally Posted by Pami

Mine are extremely picky, too. I have tired dozens of premium canned and they have refused to eat them all. Have you tried mixing just a little with their regular wet ? With the Wellness, I started mixing just a little with their regular canned and microwaving it on low just to warm it up a tad and they seemed to accept it a bit more. Im planning on adding more and more until I get them completely off the bad canned I was feeding them.

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I answered ya on the mixing thing above, before you even posted! At least my babies Nike and Eros will eat anything and they love the Wellness! but then again, they've never gotten Meow Mix

Originally Posted by katiemae1277

I kinda got my cats stuck on the Meow mix pouches/cups and even when I mix the premium in with the MM, they eat the MM and leave most of the premium, and I really mix it up

The only one that i have gotten a fairly good reaction from is the Felidae, i may just go back to the MM cause at least they eat every bite with that

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Katie, have you tried mixing the Meow Mix & another wet food in the blender? I know I've done that for some of the kitties, mainly Twitch, & it worked! I always go 3/4 "good stuff/old stuff" & 1/4 "new stuff" to make sure it smells like the old food. That way, I can blend in some Nutri-Cal, or pumpkin.... I sometimes add tuna juice or salmon juice(from the people stuff).

How is it our cats can outsmart us?

I've also noticed in a recent switch from Purina ONE to Solid Gold Katz-N-Flocken that we are easting drastically less.

I didn't have any luck with my kitty on Wellness dry at all and she would only eat the Wellness wet if it was mixed with Fancy Feast. When I got her on Wellnes wet alone she began to throw up - I think there was something in it that disagreed with her. I just started her on Innova Evo wet and she loves it. I am so happy to have found something she will eat.

I have to say I was going to get her the California Natural wet food as well as the dry, but the pet stores only had one flavor - salmon and sweet potato and I didn't want her to have that much fish. I ended up getting the Innova Evo out of desperation for something high quality that they would stock. I have been lucky so far. Anyone know what is up with California Natural wet? It isn't available online either, at least not the chicken and rice.

Hershey wouldn't eat Wellness canned either, plus it has garlic in it so I don't like the food for that fact. I feed Chicken Soup wet with Fancy feast mixed in. And Chicken Soup Dry I free feed.

Corwin and Lilly LOVE the Wellness Beef and Chicken.Thanks to your advice, I went out and bought them 6 cans of different flavors.

I know I saw California Natural on petfooddirect.com. I've got Puppy on Eagle Pack since I heard good things about it and there were more flavors (he may be allergic to some proteins).

And on the OP's topic, we had the same thing happen here. Puppy ate 1/2 a can of wet a day, plus lots of dry. Now he eats 1/3 can wet, almost no dry, and he still is gaining weight!

Originally Posted by white cat lover

Katie, have you tried mixing the Meow Mix & another wet food in the blender? I know I've done that for some of the kitties, mainly Twitch, & it worked! I always go 3/4 "good stuff/old stuff" & 1/4 "new stuff" to make sure it smells like the old food. That way, I can blend in some Nutri-Cal, or pumpkin.... I sometimes add tuna juice or salmon juice(from the people stuff).

How is it our cats can outsmart us?

I've also noticed in a recent switch from Purina ONE to Solid Gold Katz-N-Flocken that we are easting drastically less.

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the problem with the blender thing is that I think the main thing is they just don't like the pate style, they're definitely a chunky bunch the Solid Gold wet food did go over fairly well, at least with Pandora, she wolfed it down! I actually gave them the Felidae last night and they absolutely refused it arg!!!!! they ate it all last time, but barely sniffed it this time!!! I even tried the Nutro because it is chunky and they weren't real thrilled, so since everybody eats the Meow Mix, and they eat it all, I'm just going to give them that for their dinner. Better mid-quality wet than barely any premium I suppose. Eros & Nike wil remain on the premium because they eat it at least!

Originally Posted by MyFirstRagdoll

Hershey wouldn't eat Wellness canned either, plus it has garlic in it so I don't like the food for that fact. I feed Chicken Soup wet with Fancy feast mixed in. And Chicken Soup Dry I free feed.

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I also free feed Chicken Soup dry, since my kitties won't eat a premium wet, I may switch up to a better dry now

Wellness, Felidae and Newman's Own (as in Paul Newman's) were absolute yucks for Gizmo. She would not eat a bite and really did rather go hungry.

She's eating the Dick Van Patten Natural Balance wet but only in tuna flavour. I've still got the canned Nature's Logic rabbit and hope she will eat this as well, but her previous owners obviously fed her tuna and she is a tuna junkie.

stoli loves the wellness chicken and lobster flavor.

Well this is interesting.....
coming from dog boards you almost get lynched if you admit that you feed your dog a grocery store brand or something like Science Diet. Still, as a new dog woner that is exactly what I was doing until I noticed that my 1st dog Zircon had dry itchy skin. Switching to a premium brand (Canidae) helped. I ended up switching again to Nutro Max because it has a larger kibble size and I get fed up with them throwing their kibble all over the floor. (The larger kibble is easier to clean up).
But what I have been doing for my semi-feral is the same thing as I do for my dogs-they get raw food. For now Brady is getting a bit of diced beef kidney along with the commerical cat food. Does anyone else feed their cat raw? Or do you just let nature take care of it!

Kluchetta - do they have the chicken and lobster where you are? Stoli tried the chicken and herring and his breath was SO BAD my husband spent the next morning driving around to get the right kind.