Cat Chat (please go to cat chat 2)

[SaraCO2013]

Forgot to add my question with all the talk on food- how much taurine does a cat need daily/what is a good percentage of taurine in dry food bags guaranteed analysis? I read one bag of food had 0.1% and another had 0.15%.

[Lunarsnow]

@TransKitty Wow! I didn't look at the ingredients right. It says on the front "made with real chicken". They lied. Does Orijen sell in Canada? I may give it a try with my kitty :).

Yeah that's the problem with labels. Technically it is "made with real chicken" but it's not the good stuff that your cat needs but they can still label it as such without technically lying. You'll also want to avoid any cat food that has grains or corn in the first five ingredients, especially multiple corn ingredients as it's just undigestable filler.

Here's an article with a list of brands to consider. They tell you what their recommendations are and why they removed certain brands from the listing. And several brands that have been recommended here on this thread appear in that list as well like Orijen and Acana.

As for Orijen, here's a link to their site's store locator!

[MidnightCelestia]

Thanks for all the help people! My cat was losing unnecessary amounts of weight, and he was not eating much. I am trying to analyze if it's the food or not. I still may take him to the vet if this continues though.

Would the brand Blue be good for my cat? Thanks?

[Nyxeva]

Orijen and Acana are both made by the same company, Champion Pet Foods, which is based in Canada! So just use the link on their website to see if there are any stores close to you that carry it!

As for Blue, I personally wouldn't feed it. They were recently subjected to a lawsuit for ingredient splitting, which is a way to hide the amount of low quality foods contained in their foods. The lawsuit also got them for lying about the ingredients in their food.

Also, I would take your cat to the vet anyway, just to be safe. Any time a cat stops eating, they really need to see a vet. Going for longer than 24 hours without food significantly increases the cats' risk for hepatic lipidosis, or fatty liver disease. This risk isn't related to the quality of their diet either, unfortunately.

As far as taurine, as a general guideline, an intake of 400 mg of taurine per kg of body weight is recommended for younger cats whereas for adult cats, an intake of 500 mg of taurine per kg of body weight is recommended. You really only need to worry about this if you're feeding raw. No matter the quality, all of the commercial foods on the market for cats have to meet the minimum requirements for them to survive. Any cat food will supply enough taurine for your cat to survive. However, they wont thrive on a grain heavy food.

[Thalassic]

@TransKitty Wow! I didn't look at the ingredients right. It says on the front "made with real chicken". They lied. Does Orijen sell in Canada? I may give it a try with my kitty .

Yeah that's the problem with labels. Technically it is "made with real chicken" but it's not the good stuff that your cat needs but they can still label it as such without technically lying. You'll also want to avoid any cat food that has grains or corn in the first five ingredients, especially multiple corn ingredients as it's just undigestable filler.

Here's an article with a list of brands to consider. They tell you what their recommendations are and why they removed certain brands from the listing. And several brands that have been recommended here on this thread appear in that list as well like Orijen and Acana.

As for Orijen, here's a link to their site's store locator!

oh dang, I've never seen any of those brands around here.
What are some main things I should be looking for (or avoiding) when buying catfood, as I doubt any of the good popular brands are going to be found near here?

[Nyxeva]

@TransKitty Wow! I didn't look at the ingredients right. It says on the front "made with real chicken". They lied. Does Orijen sell in Canada? I may give it a try with my kitty .

Yeah that's the problem with labels. Technically it is "made with real chicken" but it's not the good stuff that your cat needs but they can still label it as such without technically lying. You'll also want to avoid any cat food that has grains or corn in the first five ingredients, especially multiple corn ingredients as it's just undigestable filler.

Here's an article with a list of brands to consider. They tell you what their recommendations are and why they removed certain brands from the listing. And several brands that have been recommended here on this thread appear in that list as well like Orijen and Acana.

As for Orijen, here's a link to their site's store locator!

oh dang, I've never seen any of those brands around here.
What are some main things I should be looking for (or avoiding) when buying catfood, as I doubt any of the good popular brands are going to be found near here?

Pet food labels list ingredients by weight, so you'll want to keep in mind that meat sources have a lot of moisture. That means that an ingredient label that says something like: "beef, ground yellow corn, wheat" will actually have more corn and wheat in it than beef. The process of making dry food removes most of the moisture from the meat, which means it actually doesn't make up as much of the food as the label implies. Because of this, you'll want something with at least five named meat sources first. Meat meals are even better, since the moisture has already been removed. This means they really do make up the majority of the food like the label says.

You'll want to avoid anything that has grains in it, since they are indigestible for cats. Cats are obligate carnivores, which means that they can only get the nutrition they need from meat based sources. Like all other obligate carnivores, cats lack the salivary amylase needed to break down the cells in plants and vegetables. You'll want to avoid ground yellow corn, wheat and rice. Because of this, plant based foods just pass through them. This means that your cat will need to eat more of the lower quality kibble. That also means they will use the litter box more as well.

I personally look for shorter ingredient lists that contain words I recognize. This doesn't guarantee quality, but many high quality foods do have a shorter ingredient list.

[woospuss]

So I took my cat Archie to the vet today since he hasn't been urinating properly... he has crystals in his urine.... great!
Got antibiotics for two weeks and 100 days worth of tablets to help dissolve the crystals. Looks like he may need a specialised diet change some time in the future so this doesn't happen again!

[MidnightCelestia]

So I took my cat Archie to the vet today since he hasn't been urinating properly... he has crystals in his urine.... great!
Got antibiotics for two weeks and 100 days worth of tablets to help dissolve the crystals. Looks like he may need a specialised diet change some time in the future so this doesn't happen again!

I believe urine crystals are normal.

My mom took her cat to the vet because the cat had urine crystals, they charged her $500 and said "It's normal". No antibiotics. Maybe this was something different..?

But hopefully the antibiotics work , if your cat has an issue while urinating.

[flyteck]

So I took my cat Archie to the vet today since he hasn't been urinating properly... he has crystals in his urine.... great!
Got antibiotics for two weeks and 100 days worth of tablets to help dissolve the crystals. Looks like he may need a specialised diet change some time in the future so this doesn't happen again!

I believe urine crystals are normal.

My mom took her cat to the vet because the cat had urine crystals, they charged her $500 and said "It's normal". No antibiotics. Maybe this was something different..?

But hopefully the antibiotics work , if your cat has an issue while urinating.

Crystals are not normal; they're like bladder stones in people. I think they're fairly common but it makes urinating very painful for the cat... Imagine having to pee out little pieces of gravel.

[woospuss]

So I took my cat Archie to the vet today since he hasn't been urinating properly... he has crystals in his urine.... great!
Got antibiotics for two weeks and 100 days worth of tablets to help dissolve the crystals. Looks like he may need a specialised diet change some time in the future so this doesn't happen again!

I believe urine crystals are normal.

My mom took her cat to the vet because the cat had urine crystals, they charged her $500 and said "It's normal". No antibiotics. Maybe this was something different..?

But hopefully the antibiotics work , if your cat has an issue while urinating.

Strange that they said it was normal to have crystals. If they are left for too long and build up there is a chance that the cat will block up and that can be life threatening