Is this food okay to feed to my cats? ?

Question

Maxximum Nutrition by walmart.

it says no animal by-products, no artifical colors or flavors and no preservatives.

the first ingredients are chicken, chicken meal, brewers rice, fish meal, corn gluten meal, etc.

do you think this is better then purina one as for the cheap store brand foods. I feed my cats expensive canned food so i try to stick to a cheaper dry food. i give them natural balance ultra premium canned food.

Answer 1

Sounds good to me....for the cat anyways. I wouldn't eat it. LOL

Answer 2

u may want to try stop using wet and just use expensive dry food like K.D. (dry food) or fancy feast ( cheap wet food )

Answer 3

Wow, I can't believe that's a walmart brand. Sounds ok to me if that's the order of ingredients. Does it mention omega 3's and 6? Personally, I'm weary about buying cat food from any grocery or supercenter because 99% of their food is low quality. Typically those foods are grain based (corn, rice, etc) so it's much cheaper to produce. Unfortunately, it's not too good for your pet.

When picking out pet food I always make sure the first 2-3 ingredients are animal proteins. I also make sure the food doesn't use byproducts and provides a good source of fiber and omega's (fish oils).

I'm a firm believer that paying a little more for a better food prevents future health problems and can extend your pets life. Just like with people :)  

Answer 4

its a good brand of food. call your vet about any questions of what to feed them, they could help you the most (;  

Answer 5

It's not a high quality food, no. It even has corn in it.

Not all pet food is made equally. A lot of it is full of corn, by-products, dyes, unhealthy preservatives, filler grains and all sorts of nasty stuff. A lot of pet food companies are perfectly happy to dump cheap leftovers in. Will it kill your cat? No, it has to be nutritionally complete and safe to even be marketed. Is it healthy? Not by a long shot.

Corn is a low quality ingredient you never want to see in your pet food. Corn and low quality grains are two of the biggest culprits when it comes to food allergies in our pets.

Thankfully, there are some excellent cat foods being made these days that include organic, human grade ingredients rather than trash not fit for human consumption.

Examples of low quality foods to avoid: Anything you can find in a grocery store will be low end, Purina, Iams, Eukanuba, Science Diet, Royal Canin, Whiskas, Fancy Feast, Friskies, Meow Mix.

Examples of high quality foods to look for: Innova, Wellness, Solid Gold, Felidae, Fromm Four Star, Merrick, GO Natural, Nature's Variety Prairie, Nature's Logic, Artemis Fresh Mix, Timber Wolf Organics.

Although the high quality foods are more expensive, you're getting what you're paying for. Less filler material means more concentrated nutrients... this means you typically need to feed far less of the high quality food than you would of the low quality one. Which also means less p**p!

A great option is to go with an entirely grainless diet. Diets high in grain have been attributed to problems with diabetes in cats. Cats are obligate carnivores, so why should there be grain in their diet? Many of the high quality foods now put out grainless formulas. Some good grainless diets include: Innova EVO, Wellness CORE, Blue Wilderness, Nature's Variety Instinct, Orijen, Horizon Legacy, Merrick Before Grain, Fromm Surf & Turf, Now!, and Sold Gold Indigo Moon, Taste of the Wild.

Some pretty decent foods can even be found in common pet stores. Petsmart carries Blue Buffalo products (such as the excellent grain free diet Blue Wilderness). Petco carries Wellness, Solid Gold, Natural Balance, Eagle Pack Holistic, Blue Buffalo, Castor & Pollux Organix, Pinnacle, and Halo. If you can't find a food, most of the high quality food brands have websites with store locators on them.

Remember that foods should be switched gradually, especially when switching to a higher quality one, so as not to upset tummies.

Another option for feeding cats is to feed raw. This is something that should be thoroughly researched before being attempted:

http://www.barfworld.com/

http://www.rawfedcats.org/

http://www.rawfed.com/

http://www.wysong.net/controversies/rawm...

Now the question is, do you feed wet or dry? Wet is the correct answer. The reason is, in the wild, cats normally get most of their water content directly from their prey items and drink very little. Domestic cats are no different, and because of the fact that they are designed to take in water with their meal, they have a very low thirst drive. Cats often just don't drink enough. This leads to urinary tract infections and crystals. The bit about dry food being better for teeth is a myth and has not been proven in the least. Canned/wet food is better because it more closely mimics the cat's natural diet. More on why canned food is best:

http://www.catinfo.org/  (Excellent cat nutrition information by a vet)

http://cats.about.com/cs/catfood/a/canne...

http://www.littlebigcat.com/index.php?ac...

http://www.felinefuture.com/nutrition/bp...

http://www.littlebigcat.com/index.php?ac...

Another option to get cats to drink more would be a cat fountain. Cats tend to like to drink from running water and cat fountains see to that need, encouraging cats to take in more water.

More:

http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/dog_food_... (Dog food reviews. It's for dogs, but most of the high quality brands also put out excellent cat foods. Four stars is a decent food, five stars is a great food, and six stars is an excellent food.)

Answer 6

Sounds good to me.  The first ingredient listed on the label is primarily the main ingredient (70% of the product) so its great that the first ingredient is chicken.  If the first ingredient is corn, then that is bad because cats are not made to eat corn!  As long as the ingredients are good you don't need to spend a ton of money of premium cat foods, they can get all of their nutrition from dry food (but I like to give my cat canned food sometimes too). Check your dry food to make sure the first ingredient is not corn.  My vet recommends Iams which is a pretty cheap store brand food!