New Kitten - Food suggestions?

Dublin21

Hi all,

Looking for some advice from anyone with Kittens/cats that are really into their diet!

I've just adopted a 6 week old kitten - as far as i know he was away from his mother at two weeks (They were abandoned). He was weaned and litter trained before he even came to our place (In the door 2 minutes and was already in the tray!). He's tiny but has a big personality!

Basically i don't want to feed him rubbish food!
We have him on Felix kitten food at the moment and where as im sure its OK i want to get him something a bit better!

I've been looking into the RAW diet but im a terrified i won't get the balance right and end up making him ill.
I've already gave him some raw chicken drumsticks (No bone yet!) which he seems to like. Gave him some cooked chicken last night and again he liked it. Ive tried him with Tuna but he doesn't seem interested.
Im going to try pick him up some organ meat at the weekend and will try pick him up half a game hen or chicken necks etc to see if he is into eating off the bone.

There are loads of sites in the USA that sell the RAW diet food already made up (Which includes extra oil, Taurine, Vit e etc) but I can't seem to find anywhere in ireland that does the same.

I do not want to put him on dry food.

If anyone has any suggestions i'd be very grateful!!!

Thanks

Zapperzy

I get all my food from here http://www.zooplus.ie/shop/cats/canned_cat_food_pouches I buy a mixture of brands and rotate them so she never gets bored. I get a variety of bozita, grau, smilla and animonda carny in a few different flavours. I'v read that grau is particularly good, even the grain one (it only contains 4% rice) but it is quite expensive.

Research raw diets very well and make sure what you research is specific to cats as from what I understand it's much easier to go wrong with cats than it is with dogs. I done a search a while ago for a RAW food supplier in Ireland and all I could find was the natures menu raw nuggets and prize choice blocks which both seem to be more aimed at dogs than cats, worth a look at the prize choice though. Go easy on the offal for now, you don't want to introduce too many foods at once and offal can be a bit rich for such a young delicate stomach. As for introducing bones, quail has lovely fine little bones perfect for cats but I would hold off on it for a few weeks if it were me.

Dublin21

Thanks Zapperzy,

I have used that site to purchase a Cat tree already, they seem reasonable enough so ill take a look at the food.
Not that i have cash to be throwing around but i don't really care about the expense.. If i feed him cheap stuff full of 'derivatives' and unnamed cereals etc i can only imagine ill be in for expensive vet checks/treatments in the future!

I have been looking into the Cat raw diet alright. I found catnutrition.org which i found very interesting however she suggests grinding 80% of the ingredients and throwing some hunks of fleshy meat in for chewing etc.
Other sites say not to grind!.. So i just don't know whether to go that route or not atm! Think it will take a few months of research and trial and error at this stage!
If you come across any 'raw diet' distributers in the near future please let me know!!

Thanks again!

Well Pet

There are great deals on Royal Canin 400g at the moment. Have seen nearly 50% off here http://www.equipetstores.com Works out about €2.49 for 8 days top quality feed. Hope this helps.

Dublin21

Thanks Well Pet. I have certainly heard of the brand.

I was checking out the ingredients there and again there are cereals and
derivatives etc in them which i am trying to avoid.
I know i sound quite fussy but ive heard so many horror stories about cats that have been fed a diet of grains etc and now have a history of sensitive stomachs etc.
Plus i have to admit i never thought such a small creature could create such a smell!! I think thats down to the grain in the food also!

There are so many conflicting stories and research out there at the moment. Feed them wet/feed them dry. Only feed them raw, Grind/don't grind etc. Its all a bit overwhelming!
Ideally i would love to do a well balanced raw diet just because naturally cats out in the wild will generally kill and the eat raw food but i reckon with the amount of info out there it will take me a good while to get the balance right

The Grau food looks good though.. Might try getting that while i do Lots of research!

Rommie

Dublin21 wrote: »

Thanks Well Pet. I have certainly heard of the brand.

I was checking out the ingredients there and again there are cereals and
derivatives etc in them which i am trying to avoid.
I know i sound quite fussy but ive heard so many horror stories about cats that have been fed a diet of grains etc and now have a history of sensitive stomachs etc.
Plus i have to admit i never thought such a small creature could create such a smell!! I think thats down to the grain in the food also!

There are so many conflicting stories and research out there at the moment. Feed them wet/feed them dry. Only feed them raw, Grind/don't grind etc. Its all a bit overwhelming!
Ideally i would love to do a well balanced raw diet just because naturally cats out in the wild will generally kill and the eat raw food but i reckon with the amount of info out there it will take me a good while to get the balance right

The Grau food looks good though.. Might try getting that while i do Lots of research!

Good for you OP for staying away from the foods with grains, I used to use royal canin and had an amazingly smelly cat on it! And he farted on it; silent but deadly ones too!
Since then I've gone through several different grain free types; try applaws or meowing heads if you want to go with dry. But the plan from here on in is to go raw. I've been looking it up as well and it is very confusing so I'm going to continue researching for while but i still give a couple of chicken wings once a week to my guys.

meoklmrk91

I use porta 21 for my cats, it was the cheapest grain free food that I could find. The cats love it, they look so healthy, their coats are so shiny and soft, plus the litter tray doesn't stink out the house for ages after they go to the toilet. Just a recommendation that you could look into while you are researching RAW, highly recommended and really easy on the pocket.

Dublin21

Hi Rommie!

I will check those brands out too, thanks!

Thats exactly what im doing at the moment, a boneless drumstick here and there just to get him accustomed to it. He's going on 7 weeks now and seems to like the raw so happy enough!

Need to get him off the Felix ASAP as the farts are something else! At first i found it funny he could smell so bad but now its getting worrying!!

I'd be interested to know how you get on with the Raw diet! Try keep me informed if ya can
Catnutrition.org has ingredients with a pictorial but as said in my original post some other sites say not to grind etc so I just don't know!!
It seems to be balanced anyway.

Thanks for the help and good luck with the Raw diet!!

Dublin21

Hi Meoklmrk91,

Do you know if Porta21 is suitable for kittens?

I was on zooplus and i can't seem to find any specific to kittens?

We were at the vet last night for the first time and she gave us a free sample of Hills science plan.
Its dried food but doesn't seem to have grains in it so i tried the kitty with some.. He took a few but wasn't crying out for more!
I don't want to get him used to any particular brand though as i intend trying to get him on the raw diet as soon as i can!

Off to the butchers later today to get some chicken wings/necks if possible! And then home to assemble his new cat tree

Rommie

Dublin21 wrote: »

Hi Meoklmrk91,

Do you know if Porta21 is suitable for kittens?

I was on zooplus and i can't seem to find any specific to kittens?

We were at the vet last night for the first time and she gave us a free sample of Hills science plan.
Its dried food but doesn't seem to have grains in it so i tried the kitty with some.. He took a few but wasn't crying out for more!
I don't want to get him used to any particular brand though as i intend trying to get him on the raw diet as soon as i can!

Off to the butchers later today to get some chicken wings/necks if possible! And then home to assemble his new cat tree

Which Hills was it, because the Hills I've seen in the pet shops is full of wheat and maize. I'm going trying a bag of Almo Nature Duck with my guys next to see how they go with it. These are the ingredients:

Duck meal, Brown rice, Fresh chicken meat, Chicken oil, Whole Linseed, Vegetable Pomace, Lucerne, Grape-seed Extract, Green Tea Extract

They do a kitten one as well, but it has maize in it

Dublin21

Hi Rommie,

Don't have it to hand but looking at the kittens pouches online (Tuna and Chicken) the ingredients do indeed have gound maize in them!
Ill be having a chat with that Vet!!
I was with her last night and said that we wanted off the wet food and were going to try Raw and she suggested this stuff. (Hills)...

He didn't seem too pushed on it anyway so i doubt it will be hard to stop giving it to him.
I have ordered some of the Grau so looking forward to seeing how he gets on with that.

Let me know how you get on with the Almo.. Would the rice content be low in that? >1%?

Rommie

Dublin21 wrote: »

Hi Rommie,

Don't have it to hand but looking at the kittens pouches online (Tuna and Chicken) the ingredients do indeed have gound maize in them!
Ill be having a chat with that Vet!!
I was with her last night and said that we wanted off the wet food and were going to try Raw and she suggested this stuff. (Hills)...

He didn't seem too pushed on it anyway so i doubt it will be hard to stop giving it to him.
I have ordered some of the Grau so looking forward to seeing how he gets on with that.

Let me know how you get on with the Almo.. Would the rice content be low in that? >1%?

The rice content would be pretty high but I've one guy with a sensitive tum and he seems to do well on rice. I'll be trying them on the porta as well though and see which one suits them better. The vets will all reccomend hills and royal canin because they get commision on every bag they sell. Definitely not great foods though

christmas2012

only stick to fish,beef meat and chicken,wet foods are easier to digest for kittens than rice or dry food,rice can be quite dangerous to give to a cat as it bloats its tiny tummies which is a bit too much for a young kitten be careful!

Dublin21

Hi Christmas2012,

Ive no intention of purposely giving my kitten rice.. however most wet Kitten pouches contain grains/cereals of some sort which i am trying to avoid

Thats scandalous about the Vet recommending food due to commission. The pack she gave me last night was a freebie although i don't think ill be dishing out for another bag anytime soon!

She recommends that i put him on dry food regardless. Not that i like the wet food but why would a vet recommend dry food at all (Commission aside!).. When we told her we were going to try raw she completely ignored it..

I suppose the raw vs processed debate is among vets too!

Rommie

Dublin21 wrote: »

Hi Christmas2012,

Ive no intention of purposely giving my kitten rice.. however most wet Kitten pouches contain grains/cereals of some sort which i am trying to avoid

Thats scandalous about the Vet recommending food due to commission. The pack she gave me last night was a freebie although i don't think ill be dishing out for another bag anytime soon!

She recommends that i put him on dry food regardless. Not that i like the wet food but why would a vet recommend dry food at all (Commission aside!).. When we told her we were going to try raw she completely ignored it..

I suppose the raw vs processed debate is among vets too!

My vet told me himself that they're not supposed to reccommend the raw diet at all, though he has no issue with me using it for the dogs and I suspect he uses it himself. Thankfully he's never tried to push dry food on them because they're doing great on the food they're already on, but I suspect two of my cats have the beginnings of gingivitis despite eating the so-called oral care food for the past year and a half. Instant I build an outdoor cat run, they're going out into it and being fed raw on its own.