Cats are carnivores and have quite complex dietary needs. Vets are now strongly advising that cats are fed a primarily wet diet. This means good quality canned or pouch foods coupled with meats like chicken, rabbit, roo, beef or lamb. I like to feed the meat as stir fry strips or chunks so that my cats chew on them and clean their teeth.
To protect their kidney and bladder health cats must consume water in their food as well as drinking it. Cats on wet foods have a much higher intake of fluids than cats on dry foods.
A good quality commercial food is high in protein and low in carbohydrates. In the wild cats consume very little carbohydrate ie wheat, maize and a lot of animal, not plant, protein.
In our busy lives we are forced to feed our cats some dry food for convenience sake but wet foods should provide the bulk of their intake.
Hi Dr Kate,
ReplyDeleteMy cat needs to be on T/D for her teeth. Should I be feeding her meat as well or stick to just the dry?
Chunks or strips of meat will keep her teeth clean and supply the fluid necessary for her kidneys' health. I would give both t/d and meat.
ReplyDeleteI thought Hills was a balanced diet and we didn't need to feed our cats anything eles?
ReplyDeleteHI Anonymous! My general advice is to feed half wet food (which includes meat) and half of a good quality dry food. This is tailored to the individual cat and household. Current cat vet thinking is that the more meat and wet food in general a cat has in her diet the healthier she will be.
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