more proof: dry food is evil

While I would never feed my cat Friskies cat food, a line from this commercial stuck with me: “Dear Kitten, you should be aware that there are two types of food: the first is sort of a dehydrated brown niblet. I think they give us these because they are training us to be astronauts. Just a guess.”

A dehydrated niblet meant for astronaut cats sums up dry kibble pretty well- it should not be fed to cats. I have covered this topic before, but pet food manufacturers continue to turn a blind eye to the nutritional needs of cats and keep producing new dry kibbles, and ill-informed consumers continue to buy them. Even veterinarians recommend dry food to cats, and working in a veterinary hospital I all too often hear this and a little part of me dies every time “wet food is bad for cats” is uttered by a doctor. I won’t go into super detail, as I have done so in some previous posts (cats are carnivores and cats do not drink water), but here are some additional articles that hopefully you will read, and share with your friends, family, veterinarians, and anyone you know who has a cat or is thinking about getting a cat.

Why do obese cats lose weight when switched to a quality canned food? Because high protein, low carbohydrate foods high in moisture are what a cat needs- NOT extruded biscuits:

“Several recent studies have evaluated use of a high protein, low carbohydrate (CHO) diet (protein 45% or higher) for weight loss in cats, and in those studies, all cats lost weight, but maintained lean body mass. Importantly, high protein, low carbohydrate diets not only result in sustained weight loss in these cats, but also in normalization of appetite (reduced urge to eat constantly because they are satiated). Because dry foods must be extruded (i.e. made into a biscuit), CHO are required in the cooking process, and thus, it is difficult to achieve a very low CHO diet that is dry. Further, many of the available high protein, low CHO dry foods are NOT low calorie, so it is extremely easy to feed too much. Too many calories, including too many protein calories, will also cause weight gain or failure to lose as well. At this time, the best commercial diets for achieving a high protein, low CHO profile, along with controlled calories, are canned (both kitten and many adult foods are acceptable) foods.”
“The commercially available diets lowest in CHO are canned foods. It is important to remember that just because you are feeding a canned food, it does mean that you are feeding a high protein, low CHO diet (you must read the label) and it also doesn’t mean you are feeding a high quality protein (low quality protein in foods can cause fecal odor and diarrhea due to poor digestibility). Most cats should be fed some (50% is a starting point) canned food as part of their diet throughout their life – both to reduce the CHO in their diet, but also to better control calories (dry foods are very calorie dense), and to increase the amount of water consumed daily.” Debra L. Zoran, DVM, PhD, DACVIM
Click here to read the full report by Dr. Zoran.