Should I keep my cats on a wet food only diet or supplement with some dry food everyday?
Lisa asked:
I’m gone to school everyday for about 4 or 5 hours. Sometimes it’s longer than that. Right now I’m feeding them only Wellness canned food everyday (each get more than 6 oz of canned food). Is it a good idea to leave out some dry food when I’m gone so they can snack on it? Or will it be better for their health to stick to the Wellness canned food? Of course their main diet will be the canned food. Btw my cats will not even touch Wellness dry food. They love EVO dry food so much that it’s like a treat for them, they eat it within literally seconds but the store is 30 miles away from me. I’m trying to choose from Petsmart and Petco. I’m going to choose a somewhat good quality dry food like Halo, Organix, Blue Buffalo or Natural Balance.
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I’m gone to school everyday for about 4 or 5 hours. Sometimes it’s longer than that. Right now I’m feeding them only Wellness canned food everyday (each get more than 6 oz of canned food). Is it a good idea to leave out some dry food when I’m gone so they can snack on it? Or will it be better for their health to stick to the Wellness canned food? Of course their main diet will be the canned food. Btw my cats will not even touch Wellness dry food. They love EVO dry food so much that it’s like a treat for them, they eat it within literally seconds but the store is 30 miles away from me. I’m trying to choose from Petsmart and Petco. I’m going to choose a somewhat good quality dry food like Halo, Organix, Blue Buffalo or Natural Balance.
March 8th, 2010 at 9:11 am
I feed my cats wet food in the morning and night and leave them out dry food during the day to snack on. Ensure that you leave plenty of fresh water though. Leanne T
March 8th, 2010 at 2:00 pm
Their main diet should actually be dry biscuits. Only feed a small amount (like 50g) of wet food as a treat in the afternoon. Or ‘dinner’. Give them about 1/2 - 1 cup of dry food a day, as it has much more nutrition, and too much wet food causes diarrhea. Animal lover
March 9th, 2010 at 2:57 pm
Personally i have always said go for dry food. But if it is used to the wet food then give it in the evening and give the dry food in the morning. MissBehave
March 10th, 2010 at 5:52 am
A little dry wouldn’t hurt, but I don’t feel cats should solely be feed dry or a lot of dry so using a high quality moist is very good! Moisture in the diet is so important for cats. Cats will eat mice in the wild, which are 70% water (kibble doesn’t have moisture). Also, all kibble will use some form of carb to bind food together. Those binders (rice and potato) stick to their teeth. EVO would be my choice. Dor
March 13th, 2010 at 2:29 am
I know that a vet would advise sticking to one or the other. Dried food can be bad for their kidneys in the long run anyway. Your cat is probably asleep when your at school & would still ask for food on your return even if you did leave dried down. Annie P
March 15th, 2010 at 6:56 pm
Your cats, unless they are very young kittens (less than 4-5 months) can certainly handle having as much as eight hours between meals. If they are fully grown, they can handle more than that. I have worked some very long days, 12-16 hrs, and fed my cats when I got up in the morning and then again when I got home from work. They did just fine. The benefits of the wet food are so important that using kibble for more than a treat isn’t something I recommend. Just as a matter of giving them some fun, and a challenge for their brains and minds, you might like to get some of those treat dispensing toys such as this one to put those treats in.
You probably already know this, but just in case someone tries to convince you that wet food is bad and dry food is healthiest, I’m going to say it anyway. It is a myth that dry food helps clean teeth. Dry food generally has more refined carbohydrate, which causes tooth decay. And it is not like cats really chew their food so thoroughly that there would be much scrubbing action going on. Cats who eat only dry food still need regular dental care - both at home if you can manage it, and professionally at the veterinarian’s. As for wet food, if carefully chosen to have a high amount of protein and a greatly limited amount of refined carbs, the cat’s teeth should be healthier due to not having the carbs causing tooth decay. Plus, the increased amount of water in the food will be healthier for the rest of the cat’s body in the long run. As a species that developed originally for desert survival, cats are meant to derive most of their water requirement from the bodies of prey animals. So their thirst instinct is not as well-developed as it could be. A cat fed on dry food will be chronically dehydrated because it simply will not ingest enough water to make up for the lack of liquid in the food - no matter how fresh and appealing their water dish or fountain or leaky faucet or toilet may be.
EVO is the best of the dry, so in your shoes, whenever I happened to be near that store, I’d get some. The brands you mention are definitely of better quality. Offhand I would say that Blue Buffalo is the best in that list. Windi Lea
March 16th, 2010 at 4:04 pm
windi is completely right theres nothing good about dry food. everything in it is bad for cats. i wouldnt worry about them crying for food because my cat sits in front of his dish and meows every time i go out to the kitchen even if he has food in his dish. unfortunately i cant afford to feed wet food all the time so i give wet for dinner and dry 2 times during the day i also give some chicken scraps cut up small at dinner that he just loves. jaqi
March 16th, 2010 at 7:09 pm
They are not going to starve during the time you’re gone, even though they may insist otherwise. I’d just do what you’re doing, and feed them when you get home. The Halo, Organix, and Natural Balance aren’t as good as the EVO, so you may want to look into their Wilderness for their snack. No need to really supplement their diet with a dry food meal, but it sure won’t hurt them to have a bit, as long as you’ve got most of their diet taken care of with the canned. You can switch up the canned with the Blue Buffalo and the Natural Balance, too. Mine love both of them, and won’t touch the Organix or Halo. J C
March 18th, 2010 at 11:40 pm
I also feed my cats wet food in the mornings, sort of like a treat and then leave dry food out for them all day. If your not home for a certain amount of time it is good to let them have a snack or such while your gone. It is better it is there than not. My cats are perfectly healthy, I personally use IAMS dry food. They seem to enjoy that the most. chelsea_xo_13
March 22nd, 2010 at 8:01 am
IMO, a cats optimal diet consists of dry food as the staple with wet food as the supplement. (albeit a daily supplement).
Also - ideally you would not be feeding your pets one brand of dry and another brand of wet. Check out this site for an explanation of why:
Despite what some clueless urban myth-believers here will tell you - VETS will tell you that dry food does help - and does not harm - oral hygiene. “Cats don’t chew their food too much” … REALLY? Try watching your cat eat dry food sometime. Crunch much?
Dry food is of course no substitute for brushing - it simply helps. If you don’t brush your cats teeth regularly, you’re running a high risk that they will eventually get periodontal disease. Tooth pullings, possible systemic health problems like kidney disease.
You say your cats already love a great dry food -EVO. Then I say DONT BREAK UP A GOOD THING. Especially if they seem to be finicky (you say they hate Wellness dry). With cats - the most important thing is to find a good food that they like and will eat.
The shop that sells it is 30 miles away? I assume you’ve looked for a closer dealer through EVO’s website? Failing that you could buy double the food while you’re there, so you don’t have to make the trip as often.
As for Petsmart and Petco, I know Petsmart carries Blue Buffalo and Innova - both great cat foods. I’ve tried NB and Innova wet food with our cats. The NB is pate style, and the Innova is stew style. Some cats are finicky about one style vs. the other.
NB and BB are better than “somewhat good quality”. I’d put them in the 2nd tier, below Wellness, EVO and just a handful of others in the top tier. They’re still better than most of PetCo and PetSmarts other offerings. cjrossi
March 25th, 2010 at 2:55 am
A little dry and canned food each day is a good diet and one that every cat should have. I would also give a mix of the flavors and brands in canned (its ok to give a different one each day) so your cat doesn’t get hooked on one flavor or brand. The dry you have to gradually change over.
Petco/Petsmart (where I shop) has all those brands, so you should have no problem getting whatever dry food you want to change).
We give our cats dry for breakfast and the canned at night for supper. I would not leave the canned food out all day and same for the dry - they should eat before you leave in the morning and then again at supper time - they don’t need to have food out all day unless you want them to be fat cats. Ocimom
March 25th, 2010 at 10:46 am
I feed my cat both wet and dry and for dry, a good one to try is Blue Buffalo Wilderness. My cat loves it. I also feed Wellness Core dry but she likes the BB even more. I’ve never tried EVO. kubism05