Hills Prescription Diet for cats

lowis

MaximumImpact wrote: »

Lowis

I have 2 Mastiffs,1 GSD and 2 cats. Big time food bills to go on prescriptions diets so they aren't and in all honesty don't need to!!!

The dogs would need 2.5kgs a day between them of dry food and thats almost £250 a month before you even look at any wet food or the cats!!!

:eek:

ohmygoodness!

Taniab_2

One of my cats is on the hills CD although I haven't bought it from the vet in over a year. I've bought it from a few places on the internet and it's always a few quid less than the vets. Recently the cat has been on mostly perscription food but with a main brand wet food aswell for variety. I must say though that he does seem to like the Hills CD

If you have the dry food make sure the cat drinks lots

the_devil_made_me_do_it

She ain't too keen on the dry food either & to be honest neither am I. However, I know in my heart of hearts, she does need to loose the weight, so will battle on. I did speak to the nurse again today about the cat not really eating the dried food, and she suggested pouring boiling water onto the dried food and trying that. The cat did actually eat it, but whether she does again remains to be seen.

~Chameleon~

MaximumImpact wrote: »

Lowis

I have 2 Mastiffs,1 GSD and 2 cats. Big time food bills to go on prescriptions diets so they aren't and in all honesty don't need to!!!

The dogs would need 2.5kgs a day between them of dry food and thats almost £250 a month before you even look at any wet food or the cats!!!

:eek:

I don't think you can make a fair comparison with extremely large breeds of dogs which obviously are going to eat a much larger quantity of food. I find that for most people owning average sized dogs/cats then Hill's is not that much more expensive than other premium diets, and in some cases is actually cheaper than supermarket brands!

What your dogs consume in one day will feed the average sized dog (25kg) for over a week

Incidentally, what sort of Mastiffs do you own? To be consuming over 1kg of Hills dry food each per day they must be the size of a small elephant weighing ~220lbs each!!! :eek: :eek: :eek:

~Chameleon~

the_devil_made_me_do_it wrote: »

My kittie is 15 yrs old and is a fatty to say the least. The vet and the nurse both kinda talked me into getting her on a diet and monitoring her weight by taking her to the vets, initially once a week, the once a month. I'm just hoping they ain't going to charge for the weigh ins.

Is this the same cat that is diabetic? ... the one you said your vet had advised you never to feed dry food to?

the_devil_made_me_do_it wrote:

I feed my cat a range of cooked meats and pouch cat food, usually felix, as it's been recommended to me, as my cat is diabetic. I'd never go back to dry food under any circumstances. As with the insulin I give twice daily at the moment, I've noticed a tremendous difference in changing my cat's diet. She isn't a youngster either, she's pushing 15 years old. But she seems so much more settled and her fur is great condition.

The vet told me that cats can't digest veg matter or starch/sugars, so I needed to stop feeding her any dried buscuits/food with veg in it and stop the cat milk. It has made a huge difference.

MaximumImpact

Incidentally, what sort of Mastiffs do you own? To be consuming over 1kg of Hills dry food each per day they must be the size of a small elephant weighing ~220lbs each!!! :eek: :eek: :eek:

They are both Neo crosses. Each weighing just over 70kgs!!

If you look at the feeding guidelines, Hills prescription only goes upto 50Kgs so you have to ratio it out and comes to almost 1kg a day. Then add on a 30kg GSD and it adds up!!! It'll be an inusrance job if they end up on a prescription diet!!!

the_devil_made_me_do_it

~Chameleon~ wrote: »

Is this the same cat that is diabetic? ... the one you said your vet had advised you never to feed dry food to?

Yes incidently it is. As I said in earlier post tho', I'm seriously not keen on this diet due to the dry nature of it and neither is the cat. She is practically refusing to eat now and I'm getting very concerned. I'm seriously considering scrapping the diet and going back to feeding her regular food. Not sure the Hills diet is worth it, my cat seems so miserable and to be honest I'm quite anxious about it myself.

~Chameleon~

MaximumImpact wrote: »

They are both Neo crosses. Each weighing just over 70kgs!!

If you look at the feeding guidelines, Hills prescription only goes upto 50Kgs so you have to ratio it out and comes to almost 1kg a day. Then add on a 30kg GSD and it adds up!!! It'll be an inusrance job if they end up on a prescription diet!!!

I think that's being rather on the generous side as far as food goes

I follow the guideline of roughly 10g per kg of bodyweight per dog so your mastiffs would need ~700g each and the GSD would need ~300g so a total of 1.7kg a day, which would cost you approx £5 per day or £150 per month to feed all 3 dogs (based on bulk cost of £3/kg) so only half the cost you originally feared.

Not a lot really considering the breeds of dogs you own

What do you currently feed and how much does that cost you?

~Chameleon~

the_devil_made_me_do_it wrote: »

Yes incidently it is. As I said in earlier post tho', I'm seriously not keen on this diet due to the dry nature of it and neither is the cat. She is practically refusing to eat now and I'm getting very concerned. I'm seriously considering scrapping the diet and going back to feeding her regular food. Not sure the Hills diet is worth it, my cat seems so miserable and to be honest I'm quite anxious about it myself.

But the food you were feeding before has caused your cat to become OBESE resulting in DIABETES!!!! :rolleyes:

I really don't think it's a good idea to go against your vet's advice, but it's your cat so do as you please as I'm sure you will.

Hill's R/D is also available as a wet food so you don't have to force her to eat dry food if you think she really won't eat it, although I've no doubt she would if there was no alternative. It's only humans that are fussy over food, not the animals

MaximumImpact

I currently feed my dogs Vitalin and Wagg which I bulk buy and it costs me around £45 a month so it is more cost effective to feed them on that me thinks....Where did you get the 700grams from as it says on the Hills precription that I was given as a trial.....

50kg dog....510 to 705 grams
60kg dog....585 to 805 grams
70kg dog....655 to 905 grams

The above was for 1 mastiff with non prescription Light large breed. The cheapest I could find is £45 for 15kgs. As I would put both the GSD and one mastiff on this at a combined intake of 1.2kgs a day..this works out at £3.60 per day.

The other mastiff has diet sensitivity issues and would require prescription as he suffers from being underweight. which is given as....

50kg dog ... 490 to 675 grams...and vet reommended that he would need around 850 grams per day as he weighs almost 74 kgs. The best buy I can find is £40 for 10kgs which even at 700grams a day would be £2.85 per day but as the vet recommended 850 it is around £3.63 per day

£3.60 + £3.63 = £7.20 per day

times an average of 30 days per month is around £216 per month...without any tinned meats as a change or treat and then I need to add on the cats....

my vet was quite honest with me and said that a good balanced diet would be as good.

Does this make a bit more sense?? Myself and DH worked out the above a while ago as we were considering Hills but as the lads have settled well on a muesli diet decided against the cost.