hi all

im currently feeding my 15 week kitten whiskas, two days ago she wasnt eating properly so i read up on the internet to see what i could give her as i was worried so lastnight i boiled some plain chicken and i gave that to her which she wolfed up and loved it.

this morning i gave her breakfast, which she sniffed and walked away and dint eat so my partner gave her the tub we use out the fridge and she ate..
now this could be the bowl im using and prefers to eat from the tub..

my partner went to the vets and she recommended hills dry food and said that whiskas could be harming her more than doing any good for her and also said to wean her onto dry food gradually over next 2 weeks..
i dont like dry food i prefer wet food.

i gave her whiskas wet for lunch a hour ago in her bowl which she ate had to coax her with a treat though.

now im confused as to what food i should be giving her hills dry or whiskas wet?

Could someone please explain to me ive read a-z guide for foood but it dont really make sense at all..

this is the first cat ive had that ive had to use my own initaive..

i would appreciate if someone could help me

thanks

Hi there

my little one is 14 weeks old and she eats mostly the adult Hi-Life (it's almost exactly the same as the kitten version). It's convenient because Sainsbury's sell it. I've also fed her on Nature's Menu kitten food. I also have Whiskas kitten food that a neighbour gave me, but after reading Hobbes' food threads, she only gets this now and again.

I seem to be lucky as Phoebe will eat pretty much anything I give her. I don't like the thought of giving her dry food, but she gets it occasionally (IAMs Kitten, which I won't be buying again after reading Hobbes' thread).

I would stick to wet, but not Whiskas if you can get something else.

This is the one I mainly buy, they do a fish version as well:

Sainsbury's online groceries

i want to stick to wet but also give her dry i might mix them both and see what happens..

awww this that your kitty? if so mine is the same only she has a black upper face with a white chin awwwwww

Not wishing to argue with your vet but feeding dry food is generally not a good idea. Some vets like to push Hills or Royal Canin because of deals with the company reps
Whiskas isn't the best food out there and personally I would look for something like HiLife or Natures Menu - both easily available from good petshops and some supermarkets. There are kitten varieties available in both brands but aren't really necessary as there is not a great deal of difference. Look for foods with a high meat content (Pets@home and Tesco do their own brands too) and then it may be a matter of trial and error to find something your kitten likes.
I advise the easily available brands because with a lot of the others on the A to Z, though being better quality and value in many cases, are only available online and are only economical if bought in bulk. Exception to that is probably Bozita which is stocked by some pet shops.
If she doesn't like eating from her own dish try one made of a different material.

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Yes, that's her. I like to see a pic of your kitten as well.

ill try and take some on camera and put them i have loads on my phone but cant upload from my phone to laptop..

What to feed?

As I said on your other thread, I personally would feed a wet only diet for these reasons

1) cats are not naturally good drinkers, which goes back to the time when they would have satisfied most of their moisture needs from the prey that they catch - meat contains a lot of water but they also drink the blood of their prey. So, for example, raw food contains about 70-80% of water, and wet food contains about that too. Now compare this to the 7-10% of moisture content of dry food.

Indeed, studies have shown that cats who are fed a diet consisting of wet food that contains about 70-80% of moisture don't tend (and don't need to either) to take in any more water from external sources. Also, cats who previously were fed dry food and were drinking a lot stopped drinking from external sources when fed a food high in moisture content.

Ok, so cats who are fed a dry diet take in moisture from external sources more so than their wet-fed peers. Fair dos one might think. However, studies have also shown that although cats drink a lot more than wet-fed cats, they still don't take in as much moisture as cats take in from their wet food, which leads to more concentrated urine, which CAN lead to urinary and other issues.

So, that is one of arguments. The other is

2) the carb content of dry food, which tends to contain an excessive amount of grains. Don't get me wrong, there are some wet foods that I rate very highly that also contain grains (Grau, Mac's, Pfotenliebe etc) but they only contain a small percentage of fillers; nothing compared to the 30-40% + often seen in dry food. Cats aren't very good at utilising that amount of grain (protein) and it can have all sorts of unwanted side-effects, from smelly to frequenty poops, to obesity (the high amount of carbs), to urinary issues (because the high grain content alters the urine ph).

Orijen is one of the best dry cat foods there are, as far as such a thing as a good dry food exists (for the lack of moisture discussed above). It has a comparatively low carb content compared to other dry foods, but the carb content is still higher than most of the wet foods you can find (and even those that contain grains).

So, in answer to your question, I would rather feed Whiskas wet than Hills dry.

When looking for other wet foods, things to watch out for at the most basic are:

1) it is a complete - not a complementary food. Complete foods contain the nutrients your cat needs to grow (kittens)/maintain his/her weight. Complementary food, on the other hand, doesn't

2) the food has a good protein (9 + %) and a good fat content (min 5%)


Those are the things you very easily find on the mostly rubbish labels.


Furthermore, imo opinion, as a bare minimum a good food needs to contain a high meat content: min 80% overall meat content would be my starting point. These foods tend to be pate foods.

As a rule of thumb, the best foods are found online, though you can also get Nature's Menu from pets at home and independent pet shops. It currently contains sugars but this has been taken out of the recipe and the pouches are now coming on to the market.

Hobbs, I wondered if I could ask a huge favour and maybe see if you could cast your eye over the Yummy Scrummy range from Pets at home? Wet food, pate style, 90% meat content, think about 8% fat, but can't remember other stuff. can get screenshot of ingredients list if it would help.

It's really convenient for us to buy and appears to be pretty good quality, but in the A-Z you covered the 50% meat content version rather than the 90% one.

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Bottom of this link: A-Z of wet food for cats

Loads of unknowns as P@H have been quiet re my enquiries.

Does that help?

Also just noticed that I need to update the Purely bit as the ingredients have changed and the ones in that post are still the old ones.