Feeding your cat only canned food will cause her to gain weight over time, increase hairballs and slow digestion. Dry food offers more fiber and calorie control and improves dental health. I urge you to talk to your vet and rethink her diet.
I've read a lot of things about it recently, to the point that I think I'm sufficiently educated on the matter to make an informed decision. it really just makes more sense to feed an all-meat diet to an animal that has zero requirement for dietary carbohydrate. dry food has a lot more carbohydrate, which converts to fat if not used for energy quickly- for a mostly sedentary cat, it's mostly going to turn into fat. also, there's really no evidence of any significant dental benefit to dry food. I've read opinions by practicing veterinarians and cat breeders on both sides, and I feel like I've made the right decision.
I used to give one of my cats glucosamine chondroitin supplements twice a day. We also used to (I don't know how they do it now) give them dry food once a day and wet once a day. Usually the dry food would be premium, but the wet would be whatever was on sale that week.
Also, we're talking three times as many cats in my case...
One thing about the dry vs wet food debate is you're going to have to pay a lot more attention to your cats dental health. Canned food leaves a lot more deposits than dry. Another naughty little secret about the gorcery store canned cat foods is that they are loaded with sugar, that's why they taste so good. I feed Luna nothing but dry food and I feed her Iams. It's more expensive but it's better for and her coat is soft and shiny.
"The only benefit of feeding dry food is the marginal dental benefit. However, as is typical of carnivores, the teeth of the cat are appropriately modified for grasping, puncturing, and tearing (cutting), rather than for true mastication. With the exception of "crunching" dry food, cats do little, if any, actual chewing. The hinging of the lower jaw can only be moved up and down and possesses no ability for a lateral chewing motion.
The cat has no first premolars and no lower (inferior) first or second premolars; the molars consist of a single upper and lower tooth on each side. When the mouth is closed, the upper sectorial tooth slides across the vestibular surface of the lower sectorial tooth, producing an effective scissor-like cutting action, rather than a chewing action. Thus the dental benefits of feeding dry food are grossly overrated.It has long been felt that feeding a cat or a dog a dry kibble diet is better for the teeth than feeding them a canned diet. The logic goes that dry food leaves less residue in the
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other people have vets that tell them Iams sucks/Brand X r00lz. they all have the same credentials... so why can't they agree on something? probably because they're only slightly (if that much) better educated on the subject of animal nutrition than we are. most degree plans only require 3-4 hours on the subject, and it's rarely specialized to the point that any vet would really know what they were talking about unless they actually raised lots of cats.
for this reason I put more trust in common sense and successful breeder opinions. I mean, you don't need a vet to tell you not to feed a cow tacos, right? same logic. cows don't need meat and do better without it, just like cats don't need grain.
ok now I'm done. and don't take offense, I just like debating. hehe :D
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Also, we're talking three times as many cats in my case...
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I feed Luna nothing but dry food and I feed her Iams. It's more expensive but it's better for and her coat is soft and shiny.
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"The only benefit of feeding dry food is the marginal dental benefit. However, as is typical of carnivores, the teeth of the cat are appropriately modified for grasping, puncturing, and tearing (cutting), rather than for true mastication. With the exception of "crunching" dry food, cats do little, if any, actual chewing. The hinging of the lower jaw can only be moved up and down and possesses no ability for a lateral chewing motion.
The cat has no first premolars and no lower (inferior) first or second premolars; the molars consist of a single upper and lower tooth on each side. When the mouth is closed, the upper sectorial tooth slides across the vestibular surface of the lower sectorial tooth, producing an effective scissor-like cutting action, rather than a chewing action. Thus the dental benefits of feeding dry food are grossly overrated.It has long been felt that feeding a cat or a dog a dry kibble diet is better for the teeth than feeding them a canned diet. The logic goes that dry food leaves less residue in the ( ... )
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I've got vets that tell me Iams is best.
Whatever. I don't want to argue with you.
*hugs*
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other people have vets that tell them Iams sucks/Brand X r00lz. they all have the same credentials... so why can't they agree on something? probably because they're only slightly (if that much) better educated on the subject of animal nutrition than we are. most degree plans only require 3-4 hours on the subject, and it's rarely specialized to the point that any vet would really know what they were talking about unless they actually raised lots of cats.
for this reason I put more trust in common sense and successful breeder opinions. I mean, you don't need a vet to tell you not to feed a cow tacos, right? same logic. cows don't need meat and do better without it, just like cats don't need grain.
ok now I'm done. and don't take offense, I just like debating. hehe :D
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