Babies were born to breastfeed. asked:


I’m ashamed to admit but in the last few months (due to a combination of human illness, time, and budget constraints) we’ve been feeding our sweet feline friends only dry food (Science Diet). I know this is terrible so you don’t have to remind me of that. All the press on the cat food recall has now got me thinking again about their nutritional needs. So, we are planning to return to an exclusively wet food diet (we’ve tried raw, which I know is best, but they won’t go for it and honestly, as a 2 x full-time student household with an infant, it’s not sustainable.) So, I have a two-part question for introducing a fully wet diet: 1) How should we transition from dry kibbles to canned foods? 2) What brands are best? I’m trying to strike a balance between quality and cost. Here is a list of recommended wet foods: http://cats.about.com/cs/catfood/tp/tpcannedadult.htm Anyone have any thoughts on these brands? Thanks.
P.S. Previously we feed them PetGaurd branned canned food.
Wow. Um, dry cat food is really bad for cats … I’d prefer to get some answers from people with vet training and/or who have done research into feline nutritional needs. Thanks.
By the way, the recall problem was with wheat-gluten. This is a primary ingredient in dry foods. All of the cat food brands on the link above do not include wheat gluten.
Yeah, uh, by the way. Cat dental problems are usually the result of insufficient protein of which dry foods are sorely deficient. If you are serious about their dental health, you need to brush your cats’ teeth.
I never thought that I’d be the one doing the educating on this question. I’d encourage you all to visit: http://www.catinfo.org/
So, if anyone is else is actually interested in getting the answer to this question. Here is an essay about the very issue. How to make the transition from dry to wet food and why:

http://www.catinfo.org/#Transitioning_Dry_Food_Addicts_to_Canned_Food_
I made the choice to feed our cats wet food based on scientific research on the evolution of feline diets and vet essays. If anyone has any scientific/medical vet essays that argue that a dry food diet is better, I’d be really eager to see them (after all, I do want the best thing for the cats). Please post the sources. I have access to medical journals and if given the complete citations, can easily find them. Thanks!
A few people have asked, what’s wrong with dry food. If you are really interested, there are some good books out there about it. But, we are all pretty busy (as for me I’ve got to get to campus to teach) so here’s some quick info. Basically, the the three key negative issues associated with dry food are: 1) type of protein – too high in plant-based versus animal-based proteins; 2) carbohydrate load is too high; 3) water content is too low. Cats are carnivores (not omnivores like us) they are evolved to eat no more than 3-5% carbs in their diets (usually fresh grass to clean their digestive tract from time-to-time. (Sure they can tolerate more – just like you can eat only Wonder bread and vitamins.) Diseases linked to insufficient animal protein in cat diet include: diabetes, kidney failure, bladder problems, IBD, obesity, fatty liver disease, and dental disease.
To Batgirl: thanks for the link. I actually visited the site and it confirmed everything else I’ve read. I’m not sure how familiar you are with that site but it is about some cats who died from Chronic Renal Failure (CRF). That site links to another site on CRF which states that diet (in particular low protein diet) is linked to CRF. It looks like this information is posted to show people why dry food is insufficient and actually contributes to disease. They state: “In the past, it was believed that a low protein diet was essential in controlling CRF. The idea behind this is to cut down on the kidneys’ load. However, studies done on dogs in renal failure, show that a low protein diet did not help the GFR or BUN of said dogs. Since cats have an even higher protein requirement than dogs, it seems unlikely that they could thrive on low protein diets.” They recommend feeding your cat organic meat to prevent/help resolve CRF. (Source: http://www.holisticat.com/crf.html#feed)
You know why your cat prefers dry food to wet foods and raw meats? It’s because it’s sprayed with animal digestive enzymes. Think kitty potato chips!

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