Whats the cheapest way to feed my cat?
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I am having a huge issue finding a food which suits one of my cats, and so I have tried LOTS of different foods. What I have found is that the foods with a high meat content last a lot longer than the ones without. A £14.99 bag of Applaws lasted more than twice as long as a £12.99 bag of James Wellbeloved, for example. So it is true that the better the quality, the less they will eat.Mummy to
DS (born March 2009)
DD (born January 2012)
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The cheaper the food the less Vitamins etc your cat will get for good health. If you can only afford the cheapest food then I hope you have Insurance.0
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The cheaper the food the less Vitamins etc your cat will get for good health. If you can only afford the cheapest food then I hope you have Insurance.
IMO it's not the micronutrients that are the potential problem, it's the source of the macronutrients. Protein from plant sources is less bioavailable to omnivores such as humans let alone to an obligate carnivore such as a domestic cat. Vegetable oils can't always be converted to the specific essential fatty acids that a cat needs for optimal health; calories from carbohydrates are superfluous and can 'stress' the digestive and endocrine systems.
All ultra heat treated pet foods - be that cereal heavy Go Cat or meat rich Applaws - have to be supplemented with the vitamins and minerals which are destroyed by the cooking process. The only way you can avoid that is to feed a balanced prey-model raw diet, but that requires research and access to specific resources.
As someone who works in the field, I don't think nutrition is about how much you spend it's about value for money. When feeding an obligate carnivore the primary concern should the meat (inc. offal) and cereal content - for that reason I'd be more comfortable feeding the cheapest tinned than [STRIKE]meat-flavoured corn flakes[/STRIKE] most branded kibble.Declutterbug-in-progress.⭐️⭐️⭐️ ⭐️⭐️0 -
Would you eat cheap Mince or cheap Chicken?0
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I eat cheap mince and cheap chicken
but what does that have to do with cheap ways to feed a cat? Mummy to
DS (born March 2009)
DD (born January 2012)
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Cheap pet food is not healthy for the animal and could result in a short life span. That is fact. It is full of s.h.i.t.e. It has to be to be so cheap to sell.
I know we all have different opinions (and quite strong ones too when it comes to our pets
) but I don't agree with what I have quoted at all.
Coco ate cheap cat food for the whole of her life and when she died she was over 15 years old. She died of cancer, nothing to do with the food she ate. During her life she was rarely at the vet as she was such a healthy girl.
We have had Lily for a couple years now and whilst with us she has only had Tesco own brand of dry biscuits and a variety of tinned wet meats.(she's very fussy) She will also quite often catch her own food
At last check up she was perfect weight and in excellent general health.
She has only been to the vet when we thought she had been shot but turned out she had a fight with another animal and had injured her leg.0 -
Would you eat cheap Mince or cheap Chicken?
You can't anthropomorphise - domestic felines are obligate carnivores! I wouldn't choose to eat offal, bone, raw meat or animal fat but willingly feed all these to my cat as they supply essential nutrients. I don't eat cheap mince because it's full of saturated fat and I don't eat cheap chicken for ethical reasons: instead I have a very healthy and very cheap, homecooked virtually vegetarian diet. :money:Cheap pet food is not healthy for the animal and could result in a short life span. That is fact. It is full of s.h.i.t.e. It has to be to be so cheap to sell.
I hold degree level qualifications in (human) nutrition and am employed in the National Health Service: I am completely convinced of the benefits of a natural, biologically appropriate diet. I would no more advise a human to live exclusively on a diet of dried and tinned products than I would my cat - IMO ALL commercial cat food is convenience food.
Rice/ maize/ wheat (if wholegrain) are the sort of foods that research has demonstrated should form the main body of a healthy diet ... for humans. However there is NO requirement for carbohydrates in the feline diet so why are these added to almost all dry foods, even the expensive branded ones?
I don't think cheap cat food is particularly cheap - the cheapest kibble is £1 per kilo for something that contains just 4% meat! Butchers Classic wet is also around £1 per kilo, but does at least contain only animal protein from "meat and animal derivatives". Alternatively you could spend £1.40 per kilo on a bag of frozen Value chicken portions which are 100% digestible.
My cat produces smaller, virtually smell-free and less frequent 'doings' on cheap raw mince mixes (£1.50 per kilo from Food4Cats) than he did on James Wellbeloved, Burns or Royal Canin (£5-6 per kilo). Noah's coat is noticably softer, I think he has more energy and he purrs while he eats. Declutterbug-in-progress.⭐️⭐️⭐️ ⭐️⭐️0 -
interesting stuff: I find Burns the best of the bunch & add raw from the supermarket ocassionally. Having had my fair share of delivery challenges from various organisations (non-food) I can say, however, cheap food4cats is the issues around storage & whether or not issues leak/defrost etc means it's not a viable option for me as I work full time & live alone (delivery to work is not feasible).
I have decided that the vast majority of wet food is the most convenient but worse value in both the long & short term: note I have had pet cats for most of my life & financially it works out expensive
cats in poor physical condition (skin, fur & teeth) & moody
nasty niffs of huge quantities in the litter tray & related additional costs & hassle of having 2 buy large quantities of it/cleaning etc0
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