How do you choose a good cat food?

[on:]

One of my cats has been throwing up a lot. The vet said it might be from something in his food, that it has lots of preservatives in it. I was feeding Iams (wet and dry). I went to the pet store today The vet recommended Eukanuba (which is made by the same people as Iams) or Science Diet. But when I read the labels it seemed like Science Diet has an awful lot of grains. I finally settled on Purina Pro Plan Selects, it doesn't have any corn or by-products, but I don't know what to look for in terms of what are bad preservatives. Good news is he's eating it and not puking anymore...

Funny thing is when I asked one of the store workers she said dry food is better than wet because it's more concentrated and has more nutrients, and that wet food "is just full of water, so you're paying for water" that they can eat dry food and drink water on the side. I had never throught of that way before, what do you think? I thought dry food had been proccessed more and had more preservatives...

[Reply #1 on:]

Wellness is a great brand, it has more meat and I believe it is made with human grade ingredients. I highly reccomend it. Wet food is good for them, it has the water that they need plus lots of nutrients. It's a good idea to get meat based dry and canned food and mix them together.

[Reply #2 on:]

Thanks. I just did a ton more reading on cat nutrition and ingredients after I asked this question. I decided I wanted to try Wellness, especially since I have one cat slightly overweight and one underweight, and someone said their heavy cats slimmed down and their skinny cats put on some needed weight, on Wellness. It is a bit more expensive than I'm used to paying, though. Do they eat less of it, since it is more nutritious?

[Reply #3 on:]

i second wellness. chicken soup brand pet food and innova evo are also very high quality brands of pet food.

i wouldn't say you're "paying for water" when you buy canned food, but it is less caloric (making it a great food for critters on diets) the dry food. my issue with kibble is it's processed so much, that it loses most of it's nutritional value and needed to be pumped full of added flavors, colors and vitamins just to make it food again.

i've heard that they'll eat less on higher quality foods. another plus with higher quality foods is that your cats will poop in smaller ammounts and it will stink less and it's soo soo good for them!

cats have very concentrated urine, and don't drink enough water. feeding some wet food in addition to dry will help their increase their water intake.

[Reply #4 on:]

My vet told me ALL cats should have some wet food in their diet. They need the nurtrients (is there spell check in here??) anyways, feeding dry alone isnt a good idea tho my little girl wont touch can food, my boy sits on my face in the am to wake me up just so he can get his 1/4 a can in the am!!