How much fish is too much??

[klunick]

If I have to get rid of the BFF brand of foods from Boone and Gracie's weekly feeding because they won't eat them, I may have to go strictly with Weruva. Most of the flavors they offer are "surf and turf" like chicken and salmon, chicken and tuna, etc. I *think* only three of 14 I was looking at are fish only.

Would it be ok to feed them a "fish type" meal once a day or would that be too much fish in their diet? I read on here that too much fish isn't good for cats but don't know if that means straight fish. I am really hoping you guys say that if the fish is mixed with another meat, it will be ok.

 

[game misconduct]

If I have to get rid of the BFF brand of foods from Boone and Gracie's weekly feeding because they won't eat them, I may have to go strictly with Weruva. Most of the flavors they offer are "surf and turf" like chicken and salmon, chicken and tuna, etc. I *think* only three of 14 I was looking at are fish only.

Would it be ok to feed them a "fish type" meal once a day or would that be too much fish in their diet? I read on here that too much fish isn't good for cats but don't know if that means straight fish. I am really hoping you guys say that if the fish is mixed with another meat, it will be ok.

i think they are meaning straight ocean fish because of mecury levels getting to high from to much fish. i cant remember where i read about it that was before i adopted graycie and was flooding my brain about what to feed her to keep her healthy etc. so i only buy wellness cans of salmon here and there or tiki fish dinners i do know her poop stinks when she eats a fish meal

 

[klunick]

i think they are meaning straight ocean fish because of mecury levels getting to high from to much fish. i cant remember where i read about it that was before i adopted graycie and was flooding my brain about what to feed her to keep her healthy etc. so i only buy wellness cans of salmon here and there or tiki fish dinners i do know her poop stinks when she eats a fish meal

I lack a sense of smell so I'd have to rely on others in the house to let me know if it stinks. I was hoping that if it's half and half, the mercury issue would be null. I am going to wait until I get through a full week with the new feeding to see if maybe it's just a couple of the BFFs they don't like and will just substitute those instead of getting rid of all of them.

 

[game misconduct]

I lack a sense of smell so I'd have to rely on others in the house to let me know if it stinks. I was hoping that if it's half and half, the mercury issue would be null. I am going to wait until I get through a full week with the new feeding to see if maybe it's just a couple of the BFFs they don't like and will just substitute those instead of getting rid of all of them.

please dbl check with your vet about the fish its something i recall reading about. so i could be totally off think i found that info when i was researching if it was ok to feed canned tuna in water as a treat

 

[Maurey]

Personally, I feed fish only once a week, though I raw feed, and it'd be expensive, otherwise. I do give salmon oil every day I don't feed fish, though.

If the first two or three ingredients are non-fish sources of protein, I think you'd be perfectly fine feeding it a few times a week, though I'd personally not suggest feeding it daily, unless it's something like a 5th ingredient.

Might be worth reaching out to the company to ask about phosphate and potential mercury levels in their fish formulations, as those are the main two concerns in feeding cats too much fish.

Edit: FWIW, I went through Weruva's foods that were well-rated on catfooddb, and here are the formulations have have no or very minimal fish

Weruva Meal Of Fortune Cat Food Review
Weruva Meowiss Bueller Cat Food Review
Weruva Jeopurrdy Licious Cat Food Review
Weruva Let’s Make A Meal Cat Food Review
Weruva The Double Dip Cat Food Review

Weruva Press Your Lunch! Cat Food Review
Weruva Peking Ducken Cat Food Review
Weruva Nine Liver Cat Food Review

Weruva On The Cat Wok Cat Food Review

Weruva On The Cat Wok Cat Food Review, analysis, ingredient list, nutritional information and calories

catfooddb.com

 

[klunick]

Personally, I feed fish only once a week, though I raw feed, and it'd be expensive, otherwise. I do give salmon oil every day I don't feed fish, though.

If the first two or three ingredients are non-fish sources of protein, I think you'd be perfectly fine feeding it a few times a week, though I'd personally not suggest feeding it daily, unless it's something like a 5th ingredient.

Might be worth reaching out to the company to ask about phosphate and potential mercury levels in their fish formulations, as those are the main two concerns in feeding cats too much fish.

Edit: FWIW, I went through Weruva's foods that were well-rated on catfooddb, and here are the formulations have have no or very minimal fish

Weruva Meal Of Fortune Cat Food Review
Weruva Meowiss Bueller Cat Food Review
Weruva Jeopurrdy Licious Cat Food Review
Weruva Let’s Make A Meal Cat Food Review
Weruva The Double Dip Cat Food Review

Weruva Press Your Lunch! Cat Food Review
Weruva Peking Ducken Cat Food Review
Weruva Nine Liver Cat Food Review

http://[URL]http://catfooddb.com/product/weruva/On+The+Cat+Wok

[/URL]

Meal of Fortune, Jeopurrdy, Let's Make A Meal, and Press Your Lunch are all ones I am or plan on feeding them.

I made out a possible feeding chart. Out of the 14, only 3 don't have another protein like chicken or beef. Those would be Tic Tac Whoa (tuna and salmon), Slice Is Right (salmon) and Name 'Dat Tuna (tuna).

 

[klunick]

please dbl check with your vet about the fish its something i recall reading about. so i could be totally off think i found that info when i was researching if it was ok to feed canned tuna in water as a treat

According to some on here, vets don't know anything about nutrition. Plus listening to people's opinions on here makes me second guessing everything as it is. Add in another opinion and I might as well just set Boone and Gracie loose in the world and stop worrying about all of it.

 

[game misconduct]

just gut load some mice and use them as feeders for the cats

 

[klunick]

just gut load some mice and use them as feeders for the cats

Seeing how Boone went all primal with the Da Bird toy, I think he'd fair pretty well. But I could never feed mice to them. Alive or dead, I'd be .

 

[Maurey]

According to some on here, vets don't know anything about nutrition.

There are some great nutritionists, and nutritionally-trained hollistic vets, but they do tend to be a pain to find, sadly. I have a wonderful nutritionist local to me that will formulate diets based on commercial foods, as well as help formulate any homemade foods, whether cooked or raw.

I made out a possible feeding chart. Out of the 14, only 3 don't have another protein like chicken or beef. Those would be Tic Tac Whoa (tuna and salmon), Slice Is Right (salmon) and Name 'Dat Tuna (tuna).

As long as you feed something that doesn't contain fish at all for the other meal on days you feed fish, it's most likely fine, honestly.

 

[klunick]

Personally, I feed fish only once a week, though I raw feed, and it'd be expensive, otherwise. I do give salmon oil every day I don't feed fish, though.

If the first two or three ingredients are non-fish sources of protein, I think you'd be perfectly fine feeding it a few times a week, though I'd personally not suggest feeding it daily, unless it's something like a 5th ingredient.

Might be worth reaching out to the company to ask about phosphate and potential mercury levels in their fish formulations, as those are the main two concerns in feeding cats too much fish.

Edit: FWIW, I went through Weruva's foods that were well-rated on catfooddb, and here are the formulations have have no or very minimal fish

Weruva Meal Of Fortune Cat Food Review
Weruva Meowiss Bueller Cat Food Review
Weruva Jeopurrdy Licious Cat Food Review
Weruva Let’s Make A Meal Cat Food Review
Weruva The Double Dip Cat Food Review

Weruva Press Your Lunch! Cat Food Review
Weruva Peking Ducken Cat Food Review
Weruva Nine Liver Cat Food Review

http://[URL]http://catfooddb.com/product/weruva/On+The+Cat+Wok

[/URL]

From Weruva's FAQ page about fish/mercury:
Fish will have some level of mercury, and we do test for mercury, histamines and polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB). Yet, not all fish were created equally. In a nutshell, the lower on the food chain, the younger and smaller the fish, the less mercury the fish will have. We use fish that meet the FDA’s list of those lower in mercury. There are many species of tuna, some of which have high levels of mercury; we use skipjack, a smaller and younger species that has lower levels.

Here are the stats from their page about phosphate levels. What is an acceptable level?

 

[Maurey]

To be honest, most of these look fine for healthy cats (CKD cats need under .6% in their diet), though I'm a bit concerned about the one that's 2% phos (or nearing 2%), as that does seem excessive.


Feeding guidelines recommend keeping the calcium to phosphate ratio between 1.1 and 2, with somewhere around 1.4 being the sweet spot. If all their foods follow the guideline, I wouldn't worry overmuch, though if feeding something with 1-2% phosphate for a meal, I'd personally feed something with under 1% for the other meal (e.g 0.7 to 0.9% if feeding a 1% food, something lower if feeding a food closer to 2%).

 

[klunick]

To be honest, most of these look fine for healthy cats (CKD cats need under .6% in their diet), though I'm a bit concerned about the one that's 2% phos (or nearing 2%), as that does seem excessive.


Feeding guidelines recommend keeping the calcium to phosphate ratio between 1.1 and 2, with somewhere around 1.4 being the sweet spot. If all their foods follow the guideline, I wouldn't worry overmuch, though if feeding something with 1-2% phosphate for a meal, I'd personally feed something with under 1% for the other meal (e.g 0.7 to 0.9% if feeding a 1% food, something lower if feeding a food closer to 2%).

Ok, thanks for all you help. I should be ok. I am really hope all this is a mute point and I will only have to sub a couple brands from what I am doing now. So far, out of the 7 I have fed, they have only walked away from 2 of them and never really ate much over the course of several hours. If it's just those 2 that I need to sub, that will be ok. I really want to stay away from the pouches as those seem to be the ones with a lot of fish in them and the higher phos percentages.

 

[LTS3]

Have you seen this? Can I Feed My Cat A Fish-based Or Fish-flavored Diet? – TheCatSite Articles

A diet of only fish / seafood is too much. Fish / seafood as a meal or treat a few times a week or less shouldn't cause any issues. Food that is a mix of both meat and fish should be limited to a few times a week IMO. Some cats might get addicted to foods that contain some fish / seafood.

 

[daftcat75]

I would try to avoid fish because it is addictive. Some cats will hold out for only fish. And if you feed fish on the regular, you lose the nuclear option of its appeal when you need to restart a sick cat's eating or hide medicine inside a fish portion.

 

[Juniper_Junebug]

Personally, as a new cat "owner," I haven't figured out a good source of nutritional information I trust. I do get the sense vets don't necessarily know best but I am also admittedly skeptical of bright-line rules offered on fora such as this one, since I think a lot of things get passed around enough that they become received wisdom whether evidence based or not. I feel that way about the no-fish rule (and yes, the fact that I go based on what I "feel" perhaps confirms the heart of the problem).

I do try to avoid too much fish, and also tuna as part of any rotation, since it's high on the food chain. I suppose with the granularity provided on Weruva's FAQ page, you might not need to exclude tuna entirely, but I just wanted an easy line to draw. I feed Ziwi Peak mackerel as part of my regular rotation and feel fine about it, because mackerel is lower on the food chain. I'm also thinking to add a salmon-lamb food to the rotation. My cat does not seem to automatically prefer food with fish over food without (though she loves straight-up tinned fish, which I do save for a rare treat).

Assuming you want to feed commercial canned food, it seems nearly impossible to avoid all the "bad" foods (grains, gums, starches, plant protein, fish, menadione) and still maintain a decent variety. There are only so many Rawz meat flavors....

I've decided that variety is actually part of my overall approach to mitigating the risk posed by any given recipe. Le sigh.

 

[She's a witch]

I don’t feed tuna and salmon at all, because my guys like it too much unless for special occasions like birthdays. and I want to avoid the addiction risk as mentioned above, that’s the real thing.I’d rather have options when my cats are sick and picky. Also, I do understand the logic behind the argument that these big fish are contaminated the easiest and I’d want to avoid it. Some also say fish is inflammatory and one of the most common allergy trigger. Also, I don’t think there’s sustainable way to fish them and I want it to matter to me.
There’s also thiamine deficiency problem with fish diet:

Analysis of thiamine concentrations in commercial canned foods formulated for cats - PubMed

A wide range of thiamine concentrations was found in the foods evaluated. Thiamine concentration in a substantial percentage of commercially available canned foods was below the amount recommended for adult cats. Additional research on interlot and intralot variation in thiamine concentrations...

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

I like this article about the general fish topic, it offers some evidence:

Why Fish is Dangerous for Cats | Little Big Cat - Dr. Jean Hofve

The fish used in pet food may contain all kinds of toxins and drug residues, including persistent organic pollutants that actually stop the body from eliminating it and other toxins. Another common toxin, domoic acid, may be an unrecognized factor in chronic kidney disease.

littlebigcat.com

I do feed sardines once a week as a source of omega 3, but I use product for humans, sardines in water. I do agree that smaller fish are safer to feed.

I wouldn’t worry about phosphorus in Weruva, it’s one of the brands that has better ratios. And in general, if you have young cats, no need to worry about phosphorus for many, many years. Weruva however is one of the lower calories brand and it can be a factor if you care about $ vs kcal ratio.

 

[She's a witch]

I've decided that variety is actually part of my overall approach to mitigating the risk posed by any given recipe.

I do the same and I can’t imagine any other way. Apart from the risk you mentioned, there are also recalls, recipe changes etc or chain supply issues like right now because of COVID, and if my cats ate one brand only, that could really complicate their routine.

 

[game misconduct]

graycie is a tuna addict any time i make a tuna sanwhich she is right up in my way until i give her a few bites and mixed in the mayo then she will leave me alone

 

[klunick]

Have you seen this? Can I Feed My Cat A Fish-based Or Fish-flavored Diet? – TheCatSite Articles

A diet of only fish / seafood is too much. Fish / seafood as a meal or treat a few times a week or less shouldn't cause any issues. Food that is a mix of both meat and fish should be limited to a few times a week IMO. Some cats might get addicted to foods that contain some fish / seafood.

I am not feeding fish only. While I appreciate your opinion on limiting meat and fish to a few times per week, I am still going to feed them a meat only once a day and a meat/fish or fish only once a day.