We’ve been giving our cats a mix of dry/wet food (mostly dry…), but want to switch to 100% wet, since it is better for their kidneys.
We’re also trying to avoid Purina/Fancy Feast/Friskies, since they’re owned by Nestlé.
Any suggestions are appreciated!
Edit: shoot, apparently Sheba and Royal Canin are owned by Mars, which isn’t much better.
Dry is really hard on cats’ kidneys because they drink so little water. Wet is a lot better but why not just feed raw? Our two cats are absolutely thriving on raw, a mix of balanced mince and whole prey, which they have been on since they were kittens. Their coats are shiny, their breath doesn’t smell and even their poop smells a lot less bad than the poop of my friends’ cats on who are on commercial dry/wet food.
A lot of info on raw feeding can be found in the Pet Fooled documentary available for free on YouTube. Happy to answer any questions about raw feeding too, good luck!!
Dry is fine if you have a water fountain for them. Cats hate drinking stagnant water.
“Most cats fed commercial wet diets will still drink some water, but cats fed dry food will drink more as a result of the lower water content in the diet (Villaverde Haro, 2020). However, cats on a dry diet will drink less than the moisture consumed if on a wholly wet diet with a similar nutrient composition (Xu et al, 2014; Villaverde Haro, 2020).” Source: https://www.theveterinarynurse.com/review/article/moisture-matters-a-focus-on-feline-hydration
We have a water fountain going too and they hardly drink any water from there. But why leave it to chance?
My cat decided to start knocking over her water fountain every day, so she got it taken away.
She does pretty well with drinking out of her bowl, though. We just make sure to clean and refill the bowl every day, and that seems to keep her happy.
Yeah, my mom’s cat does that because she tries to play with the water. Ended up giving her our ceramic fountain that can’t be knocked over and it’s a success.