MYTH 1: Corn is just filler

[AdamSavage]

Thoughts on this ? I personally don't buy it, as corn is hard enough for a Human body to digest and doesn't have the best nutritional value. However the vet tried to sell me on Hills cat food, and how corn meal is not a filler etc etc.

http://www.hillspet.com/healthyadvantag ... myths.html

[Dewclaw]

I wouldn't necessarily go by what Hills says. Of course they're going to say it's ok, they want you to buy it. Look for trustworthy, outside (preferably neutral) sources of info whose top priority isn't to get you to buy their product.

I've always heard corn is a filler.

[Silivren]

I wouldn't necessarily go by what Hills says. Of course they're going to say it's ok, they want you to buy it. Look for trustworthy, outside (preferably neutral) sources of info whose top priority isn't to get you to buy their product.

I've always heard corn is a filler.

^ Because it is... corn is by all reasons a fattening food. Why do you think they feed it to pigs, chickens etc? To make them full and make them grow large QUICKLY. Corn is not food for a cat or a dog, thats what my vet tells me and I believe her(the lady is super smart). I feed my pets Blue Buffalo because while pricey it has no fillers, no corn, nothing bad for your pets. My animals seem healthier and happier after that switch. In fact my vet told us NEVER to feed our pets this Hills brand you speak of. I'd never heard of it but she did said specifically for the reason you mentioned, they say corn is ok when its not.

[Wain]

Hill's has a good reputation around the Vet hospital and university here (I work for a different company on site).

However Hill's, in my experience, is extremely expensive.

Many cheap pet foods are too high in calories and more like feeding your pet MacDonald's every day, but I'd be tempted to find a brand that has a good reputation but is cheaper than Hill's.

Also, be careful trusting any vet (including my sources), as they really can be prone to influence from huge handouts from pet food companies. I believe Hill's is for the most part nutritionally balanced, but I also know they sponsor things at the university, so I wouldn't trust the info either.

[AdamSavage]

Well the Vet did give me a 3.5 pound bag of this stuff, which I have not used yet.

http://www.hillspet.ca/en-ca/products/h ... y-dry.html

I'm currently slowly switching her over to Simply Nourish Chicken & Rice Kitten Food from Royal Canin Kitten 36

http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.j ... lInUS%2FNo

[cowmuflage]

Just remember to buy the stuff you can afford. Don't force yourself to eat poorly just so you can afford the really really good stuff! I've seen heaps of people who ruin their health just so there pet can live like royalty XD (Hell I was like that once )

Find something that's good but not too costly. We used to feed our cats the stuff they fed them at the pound till it became a burden to us money wise so we had to buy cheaper stuff and our cats are just as happy.

[Serendipity82]

My cats are on Hills cause my one cat needs a prescription diet and my other roommate has her cats in it. So it just keeps the peace in my house. Though I will say that she has added canned food to their diets because her vet said "canned food has less fillers" If I had my way, I would put my cats on something with no grains at all.

Corn is absolutely a filler, especially when you consider that cats are carnivores.

Another thing to take note of is that Hills is coming out with a grain free line. I still wouldn't buy it.

[Rawr]

I'm curious as to when it was decided that turning carnivores into omnivores was a good idea. I mean I don't see many zoos feeding their lions and wolves salads. I can see putting vitamins in the food but.... (I'm also wondering how much Lord Marrowgar would like if I started feeding him tuna, kippers, and steak.)

[AdamSavage]

I'm curious as to when it was decided that turning carnivores into omnivores was a good idea. I mean I don't see many zoos feeding their lions and wolves salads. I can see putting vitamins in the food but.... (I'm also wondering how much Lord Marrowgar would like if I started feeding him tuna, kippers, and steak.)

That's pretty funny, I literally laughed out loud on that.

[Rawr]

Lord Marrowgar LOVES kippers and tuna, he sees me getting into the can shelf and he goes nuts. Not sure about steak, he also loves chicken, turkey, and bacon (no I didn't feed it to him it fell on the floor )

[cowmuflage]

Yeah Rawr reminds me of a handy hint don't get in the habit of feeding your cat human food it just makes trying to eat on something like a sofa a pain as you will have a cat bugging you I used to do that with my old cat XD I don't do it with my new cats and they hardly bug me when I eat.

[Rawr]

Yeah I've had beggy dogs before, I only feed him the meat raw and in between when I cook (also males are forbidden to enter the kitchen when I'm cooking )

[Sukurachi]

Cats are carnivores.
More so than dogs.

Corn is in cat food (and dog food) for ONE single reason, and it has NOTHING what so ever to do with nutrition.

Corn was first added to pet food when DRY food was invented. Corn is a binding agent. It has zero nutritional value for dogs and cats. The only reason it is in pet food is that it is what permits the process of creating "kibble". Without corn, there is no kibble (or there WAS no kibble.. there are now companies that can make dry food without the use of corn).

Carnivores have short intestines, which are not designed to digest cellulose fibre (plant material).

Some pet food advice:

Do not get tricked into thinking that if the first ingredient is "chicken" that it's better than if the first ingredient is "chicken meal".

Chicken meal actually contains more protein per weight than chicken meat itself. Why? Because the meal is dried. It's meat that has been dehydrated. All the water (which is not protein, obviously) has been removed. So gram for gram, a fish or meat meal contains considerably MORE protein than fresh meat or fish. The actual protein is now concentrated, with the water all gone.

If the company puts fresh chicken or fresh fish into a dry kibble, what do you think they have to do to it? Dehydrate it! but if "fresh meat" is first on the ingredients list, it means that it still contains all of its water when they weight it, which WILL be removed during the cooking process. Food products list ingredients by descending order of weight/content. Anything first on the list is what is most present in the food. Anything last is in very small quantities. So it LOOKS good to see "fresh chicken" as the first ingredients.. but this is "weight before cooking"... which means that once cooked, the food actually contains FAR less protein than one that has "chicken meal" as its first ingredient.

Pet foods also MUST contain fat. They need it.

And cats require a certain amount of ash in their food as well. Cats cannot live on dog food, the PH balance is wrong.

And in my opinion, anyone who has a cat or dog and tries to make it "vegetarian" is a freaking idiot. There's nothing natural about being vegetarian for those animals. They are carnivores. Period.

So final analysis: corn = bad.

Brown rice = better, but should not be in the first 2-3 ingredients.

[Sukurachi]

By the way, one of my cats was on one of those special diet foods from the vet's.
He was overweight (very sedentary cat). So they put him on a low-cal food. Then he got stones. So they put him on a special food for that, a low PH food that was supposed to allow the body to break up the salt crystals that accumulated.
Then he started throwing up all the time.

The vet, after years of these problems, wanted to use yet another "vet only" food. I put my foot down and said no.
We did some research and found a good food that has no corn, and a good blend of ingredients.
Since?
The cat has lost weight, he's become FAR more active than he ever was before.
He's also considerably MORE affectionate than before (he was already pretty darned affectionate, but now!)

And his stone problems have completely vanished.

And the food we found is inexpensive, too. So you don't HAVE to spend a fortune on vet-only food. That's a whole crock of... cat poop. Vet-only food is a scam to make money for the vets.

If you live in Canada, you can buy the Walmart brand pet food "Actr1um", which is made in Canada, from local ingredients. Both our cats and our dog are on it, and they have never been better. It's not the absolute highest quality pet food, there are other better choices, but the other choices are far more expensive.

Since you (Adam) have a Bengal, I would strongly recommend you stay away from vet foods and try and find a good high meat-content cat food. Remember that your cat is part wild cat. As such, its food requirements are far closer to those of a wild cat than of a domestic cat.

Ideally, you should make your Bengal kitty's food yourself.

[AdamSavage]

The stuff I have my kitten on:

Ingredients:
Chicken, Chicken Meal, Rice Flour, Canola Oil (preserved with mixed tocopherols), Natural Flavor, Tomato Pomace, Oatmeal, Dried Chicory Root, Flaxseed, Dried Cranberries, Dried Carrots, Dried Sweet Potatoes, Vitamins (Vitamin E Supplement, Niacin, L-ascorbyl-polyphosphate, Vitamin A Supplement, D-Calcium Pantothenate, Thiamin Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Vitamin D Supplement, Folic Acid, Biotin, Vitamin B12 Supplement), Minerals (Zinc Sulfate, Ferric Sulfate, Copper Sulfate, Manganese Sulfate, Calcium Iodate, Sodium Selenite), Choline Chloride, Potassium Chloride, Taurine

Guaranteed Analysis:

* Crude Protein Not less than 36.0%
* Crude Fat Not less than 16.0%
* Crude Fiber Not more than 3.0%
* Moisture Not more than 10.0%
* Ash Not more than 7.0%
* Calcium Not more than 6.5%
* Phosphorus Not less than 1.2%
* Potassium Not less than 1.0%
* Magnesium Not less than 0.60%
* Zinc Not more than 0.1%
* Selenium Not less than 175 mg/kg
* Vitamin A Not less than 0.30 mg/kg
* Vitamin E Not less than 30,000 IU/kg
* Taurine Not less than 0.25%
* Omega-6 Fatty Acids*Not less than 0.20%
* Omega-3 Fatty Acids*Not less than 3.0%
* Ascorbic Acid Not less than 0.75%
* (Vitamin C)*Not less than 10 mg/kg
* Beta carotene*Not less than 3.0 mg/kg
* Lycopene*Not less than 0.5%

[Nachtwulf]

Like most people have said, grain is not cat food (this includes rice flour). Cats are obligate carnivores (unlike canines) and when left to their own devices, the only green thing they eat is grass, and that's to make them throw up.

Many cats are somewhat intolerant of grains and this will often get worse as they grow older; my oldest cat is almost 19, and he is the reason I had to switch to grain-free. His diarrhea had gotten so bad he was doing it on the carpet because he couldn't get to the box in time.

Grain-free is ideal, but I can't say I'm too fond of Blue, mostly because it's more expensive than it needs to be (which probably goes to feed their constant marketing campaign) but also because most of my cats won't eat it. Even my now-passed diabetic cat, who would eat ANYTHING because he was so hungry all the time, tried starving himself rather than eat it.

I usually feed Innova Prime, which uses peas as the binding agent (admittedly also vegetable material, but not grain and actually possessing protein), although Taste of the Wild went over really well too. Taste of the Wild is usually found at feed stores though, not at your local PetSmart/PetCo.

Despite the somewhat ridiculous cost of grain free kibble, I -have- noticed my cats eat noticeably less of it; the high-protein content lasts longer and they don't return to the kibble dish as often as they did on my old brand (science diet). So honestly, it probably ends up being not that much more than the regular stuff.

[Serendipity82]

See, I heard that Innova got bought out by Proctor and Gamble, the kings of changing a foods formula and not listing it on the package. A lot of the holistic pet food sites won't list them as a good grain free food now because of it.

Sikh, do you think I can move my one cat safely to a grain free diet without him getti.g crystals again? Because if I can, I am going to push my roommate for a food change.

Also, a lot of foods advertise as being grainfree, but I still see things listed like beet pulp (which is fine to feed a horse..but cats?)

[Suicune]

Yeh, as many said before, the vets get handouts and sponsors from companies like Hills. I feed my cats Blue Buffalo Wilderness, and Wellness Core. For wet food I use Wellness canned. Things are a bit tight with cash for me at the moment so I have also shifted the dry to Chicken Soup for the Cat Lover's Soul. It's not the cheapest, but it is a lot cheaper than the two I mentioned before, and is still Holistic. The difference in a food makes a huge difference in your pet's health. I went holistic when I got my own cats because it hurt so bad to see my childhood cat suffer at the end of her life. Looking at how my cats are compared to how cats on the low grade food live, it's better by leaps and bounds... no urinary issues, large, strong and healthy. Only thing I think corn is GREAT for- is on the cob with butter for me to munch lol and the cob for litter- Nature's Miracle is sooooo much better than clay garbage.

[AdamSavage]

It's hard to find a cat food that does not contain grain, in some form. The best I could find is Blue Buffalo Wilderness Cat Food and few others.

http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.j ... lInCA%2FNo

http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.j ... lInCA%2FNo

http://www.petvalu.com/in-our-store/pro ... in-chicken (Before Grain Chicken)

http://www.petvalu.com/in-our-store/pro ... ct-chicken

The stuff I have my adult cat on is: http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.j ... lInUS%2FNo

Ingredients:

Turkey, Turkey Meal, Oatmeal, Rice Flour, Dried Chicken, Tomato Pomace, Natural Flavor, Canola Oil (preserved with mixed tocopherols), Dried Chicory Root, Flaxseed, Dried Cranberries, Dried Carrots, Vitamins (Vitamin E Supplement, Niacin, L-ascorbyl-polyphosphate, Vitamin A Supplement, D-Calcium Pantothenate, Thiamin Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Vitamin D Supplement, Folic Acid, Biotin, Vitamin B12 Supplement), Minerals (Zinc Sulfate, Ferric Sulfate, Copper Sulfate, Manganese Sulfate, Calcium Iodate, Sodium Selenite), Choline Chloride, Potassium Chloride, Taurine.

Guaranteed Analysis:
* Crude Protein Not less than 32.0%
* Crude Fat Not more than 10.0%
* Crude Fiber Not less than 5.0%
* Moisture Not more than 10.0%
* Ash Not more than 7.5%
* Linoleic Acid Not less than 2.7%
* Calcium Not less than 1.7%
* Phosphorus Not less than 1.3%
* Potassium Not less than 0.60
* Magnesium Not more than 0.12%
* Zinc Not less than 175/kg
* Selenium Not less than 0.3 mg/kg
* Vitamin A Not less than 30,000 IU/kg
* Vitamin E *Not less than 350 IU/KG
* Taurine Not less than 0.20%
* Omega-6 Fatty Acids *Not less than 2.8%
* Omega-3 Fatty Acids *Not less than 0.35%
* Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) Not less than 10 mg/kg
* Beta carotene*Not less than 3.0 mg/kg
* Lycopene*Not less than 0.5 mg/kg

[Nachtwulf]

"Holistic" is one of those advertising buzzwords that doesn't really amount to anything. Don't automatically assume something is better because it's on the package (it's as bad or worse than "Organic", which is pretty much also just a marketing ploy.) As someone who works in advertising as a living, I can tell you that ALL manufacturers (Blue included) use these terms to get people to think their products are automatically more wholesome, when the fact is, there is no real regulation regarding the term and what it can be used to represent. Holistic is even worse than Organic since there are at least a few rules -FOR HUMAN FOOD- relating to the use of the word 'organic'. Not so for pet food, however. Holistic is just on there to make people think it's magically more natural when in fact the contents of all the major grain free pet foods are basically identical.

Also, the thing about 'P&G being able to change the contents without saying' is, I have a serious suspicion, pure and unadulterated bunk, quite possibly generated by Blue. Falsifying ingredients is illegal, and as a large conglomerate, P&G is LESS likely to upset people by doing so simply because it will reflect on their other brands, and that's a lot of other brands. I'll be honest, I've had more than a few of the rescue organizations I've worked with complain about Blue's product more than they have any of the others. (and like I said, my cats universally hated it.)

I mentioned Blue's frantic advertising campaign in an earlier post, as well. Have you noticed that Blue is the only "natural" brand that advertises constantly? That should be a warning flag. First, it means that a fat portion of their budget is devoted to marketing and PR, not product development, ingredients, and quality control, and if they have to spend that much on marketing, what are they trying to make up for? It's like those 'scooter store' ads that are constantly on the air; there are an awful lot of mobility supply places out there really (my grandfather is mobility impaired, so I've had to help him with that), and yet the only one that advertises is The Scooter Store? The reason is, they're one of the worst, and often pad their prices so that insurance companies are basically being scammed by being cornered into paying extra for scooters bought through them; something that costs Medicare and other insurers a lot of money, yearly, which contributes to inflated prices for everyone else. I'm not saying that Blue is necessarily crap (although my cats do!), but I personally have an issue with paying $5 extra a bag for bad television commercials and other ads, and the constant nagging wondering of 'why do they feel so compelled to do this' makes me inherently steer away from their product.

In an unrelated note, whenever you see a big company going out of their way to carry on about 'How They're Great for The Environment/The Nation's Schools/Feeding The Hungry/Insert Hot-Button Topic Here', it's about a 95% certainty that they've had some PR crisis come up and are trying to do damage control. This is called 'whitewashing' or, in environmental cases, 'greenwashing' of their image. ALL companies do this to a greater or lesser degree... they are businesses, and their whole purpose is, no matter what they may say on their website, to make a profit. They are simply NOT going to spend that profit on charity UNLESS they need to shine up their image in order to increase sales... it's advertising with a slight beneficial subtext. This is less true of local business, where the person making the money calls isn't reporting to investors or a board of directors, and may actually be making charity donations based on their personal feelings, but as soon as you get into the corporate world, it's ALL marketing, no matter how good the cause.

Check out http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/29/busin ... .html?_r=0 for more on the whole 'organic' thing, although if you look around the interwebs (AND NOT on 'organic' food sites) you can find others saying basically the same thing.