Debating Whether Or Not To Order This

[Artistwolf]

Hi! So I got a coupon for Chewy.com in the mail the other day ($15 off a $49+ purchase!) so I went and checked out the website. I put a slicker brush, a furminator, and a 24-pack of 5.5 oz cans of Purina Pro Plan Classic Adult True Nature Grain-Free Natural Chicken & Turkey Entree. So I need some advice on the latter part.
You see, I don't yet have my cat, so I can't be quite sure what his food tastes will be. I'm going to see if I can ask the shelter for a cat that likes wet food (because I'm totally against feeding my cat dry food), but if I can't, I'll have to transition him over. And even if he does like canned food, how can I be sure he'll like this one? I would buy a couple cans at a nearby store first, but the nearest Petco is 20 minutes away (although we'll no doubt go there before I adopt my cat) but I'm fairly sure their food is more expensive than Chewy has it. And I want to have food stocked up before kitty arrives, if that makes sense. There's a Publix nearby, but the only food they have that I'm happy to feed is Meow Mix classic pate and I'm pretty sure that's more expensive in the long run than the Pro Plan food I've got here (and the feeding directions make less sense—feed 2-3 cans per 2.5 pounds of cat? How do I even know how much to feed then?). So I prefer the Pro Plan stuff. But how can I know if he'll like it?

Sorry, this got a bit long and rambly (I always seem to have troubles writing concisely), but basically I just want your opinions on whether or not I should order this food from Chewy before I get my cat and know what he likes. I've got a rather small list of foods I'm willing to feed and a lot of them are stretching my price range, and this food really fits the bill for what I want. I'm guessing there's not way to make a cat like what you would like them to eat, lol. Dogs seem a lot easier in that regard XD

 

[Kieka]

I would order it.

Chewy is really really good about returns and exchanges. So if it turns out your cat doesn't like it then give them a call and see if they can help you out with it. I had that happen with a food not available in my area that I ordered and my guys ended up hating (with a passion, I may add).

Figuring out what a cat likes is tricky. Most shelters will be feeding whatever a sponsor provides, is donated or is on sale. Around here they feed exclusively dry simply due to storage and shelf stability. So they may not be a big help with finding one who likes wet. Since most cats will eat wet when given the option I wouldn't worry about that too much when it comes to picking out a cat. If you happen to get that one in a hundred who won't touch any type of wet there are a lot of threads on here that can help with transition. I happen to have three who won't touch anything swimming in gravy so they do get dry to supplement; to each their own.

 

[maggiedemi]

Do you have a Tractor Supply store? They sell some Pro Plan canned food. My cats didn't like the Meow Mix classic pates, they preferred the Pate Toppers. Meow Mix seems to have fish in every single flavor though, even if it doesn't have fish in the name. My cats have never eaten more than 9 ounces each in one day, so I think 3 small cans per day would be plenty for one cat, maybe even less.

 

[Artistwolf]

Kieka: Thanks! So they would accept a return even if I opened one of the cans? That's really quite amazing of them. Yeah, that's what I thought—and I'm thinking that around here, they might only feed dry—I'm in a relatively small town (Cleveland, TN), so they probably don't have big budgets to spend on wet food. Oh, really, most cats prefer wet food? I've read a couple things about people struggling to get their cat to eat wet food and so I think I've unnecessarily scared myself there XD That's a big relief!

maggiedemi: I actually think we do have tractor supply stores around here! Never even thought of looking at any of those. We just moved to this town so I've never been in one of those places (in St. Louis, we haven't got any!). Oh, that's unfortunate; I was looking to avoid fish. Darn, I need to read those labels better. Thanks for that portion help! That was really confusing me. If I accidentally ended up feeding too much, would I more likely end up with a fat cat or would he just stop eating at some point? Just out of curiosity, lol.

 

[Kieka]

You hear more people talk about having trouble getting their cat to eat wet; because they have a problem. It's the same reason why people more readily will write a negative review than a positive review. I know a few people who have trouble getting onto wet food but a slow and steady change from one to the other usually will solve it.

 

[maggiedemi]

I think cats get fat on too much dry food, not wet. I was curious to see how much my cats would eat, but they never ate more than 9 ounces of wet food. I think anywhere between 6 ounces to 9 ounces a day would be fine.

 

[Artistwolf]

Oh, that makes sense. Should have thought of that, haha.

Great, that's really good to know. I think this whole food thing is actually going to be a bit easier than I thought it would... yay! I'll go look up some threads on transitioning from wet to dry now. I'm guessing I'd have to mix them for a while?

 

[maggiedemi]

You can do a mix of wet and dry on separate plates if you want, a lot of us here do that. I would keep the dry food at half a cup or less though, any time I went over half a cup with my male cat, he would start to have urinary problems.

 

[Willowy]

Just give it a try with whatever kitty you pick out---some cats will scarf their canned food down and look for more, some will want dry. I think True Nature is pretty well liked among most cats so that's a good one to start with. If your cat doesn't like it, chewy will refund your money and tell you to donate the rest to a shelter (so nobody pays return shipping costs).

Mixing wet and dry food generally isn't a favorite of most cats; they prefer each separately. Although if you crush the dry food and put it on top of the canned food that can get some kibble addicts to eat the canned. Try to get the cat to eat as much canned as possible, then if they aren't eating enough make up the rest of their calories with dry food.

Since canned food is heavy, mostly water, most cats won't overeat canned food. But you never know so if you get a little piggy who starts to gett chubby you might have to control their portions.

 

[Artistwolf]

Okay, thanks guys! So is it okay to just stop the dry food cold turkey and switch to the wet after I adopt him if he's quite happy to eat it, or do I need to keep offering a little dry so that the transition is more gradual? I'm used to pet mice who need to have their food gradually changed over in order to avoid diarrhea, lol. I can't quite figure out if cats are the same or not. I mean, they're obviously completely different animals XD

 

[maggiedemi]

I've never really had a problem switching around wet foods with my cats. I've only ever had problems with dry foods. I think if you introduce a new dry food, you are supposed to do it gradually.

 

[MissMolly08]

I know you said you have limited options for foods that fit your feeding choices and your budget... May I ask exactly what you are looking for in a food?
We seem to have similar budgets as I also feed some of the True Nature food. Since someone mentioned Tractor Supply too though... I would look at their wet food. They have a store brand called 4health that has some grain free options. I feed some of those flavors to my cat as well. It's actually much cheaper than the ProPlan.

 

[maggiedemi]

A lot of people here feed Fancy Feast Classics and Friskies Pate too, if you don't mind buying supermarket brands of wet food.

 

[Kieka]

Okay, thanks guys! So is it okay to just stop the dry food cold turkey and switch to the wet after I adopt him if he's quite happy to eat it, or do I need to keep offering a little dry so that the transition is more gradual? I'm used to pet mice who need to have their food gradually changed over in order to avoid diarrhea, lol. I can't quite figure out if cats are the same or not. I mean, they're obviously completely different animals XD

There would already be a switch from the shelter to your home. I would just offer wet food from day 1 and see how it goes (have a small bag of dry on hand). If it turns out you have a kibble addict then you can do a slow transition from dry to wet.

Just don't get too worried about a little loose stool as he adjusts to the new diet. It should pass in a week or two once his system adjusts.

 

[Artistwolf]

I know you said you have limited options for foods that fit your feeding choices and your budget... May I ask exactly what you are looking for in a food?
We seem to have similar budgets as I also feed some of the True Nature food. Since someone mentioned Tractor Supply too though... I would look at their wet food. They have a store brand called 4health that has some grain free options. I feed some of those flavors to my cat as well. It's actually much cheaper than the ProPlan.

My requirements for food... are complicated XD I posted a list of foods with over 50% protein, 20-40% fat, and less than 10% carbohydrates on the "best wet foods" thread. I basically want to stick with that, although if that's not possible I'll be okay with any relatively high-quality wet food. I'd like to stick around the price of the Pro Plan stuff. That other option sounds really good though! I'll have to look into it.

A lot of people here feed Fancy Feast Classics and Friskies Pate too, if you don't mind buying supermarket brands of wet food.

I'm pretty good with Fancy Feast as a sort of handy resort, but they haven't got quite the nutritional composition I'm looking for. But if I find that that's really going to be much easier for me, then I'll definitely consider it.

There would already be a switch from the shelter to your home. I would just offer wet food from day 1 and see how it goes (have a small bag of dry on hand). If it turns out you have a kibble addict then you can do a slow transition from dry to wet.

Just don't get too worried about a little loose stool as he adjusts to the new diet. It should pass in a week or two once his system adjusts.

That makes sense. Thank you so much!!

 

[lisahe]

Artistwolf, you might want to check with the shelter to see what they feed the cats: some, like the one where we adopted our cats, have fairly set menus. Our cats' shelter even sent us home with a baggy of the dry food they'd been eating and a few cans of Friskies pates. Our two didn't eat a lot in their first couple days at our house, despite having been severely underfed in their first 10 months -- that seems to be fairly typical, from the shock of moving -- so even though I planned to get them off dry food very quickly, I was glad to have some of what they were used to, plus the Friskies, which is extra-stinky. The smell came in especially handy because the cats got the typical post-shelter upper respiratory infection shortly after we brought them home! Beyond that, most cats love Friskies pates.

Once the cats were eating well, we started cutting back on their dry food. It took a month or so to wean them off it.

Personally, I wouldn't order up a case of one kind of food without knowing if the cats would like it. Beyond that, I was glad we had a huge variety of wet foods on the shelves, left over from our previous cat. (She was elderly and sick, so didn't want to eat and I bought just about everything for her to try. I had several dozen types of food!) Having the selection of foods made it easy to try new foods, with varying meats and textures, out on the new cats. Lots of people feed a variety of wet foods because cats tend to get bored with their foods. As others have said, it's fine to feed multiple kinds of canned food.

One more "personally" note: Nutro Natural Choice is a brand that lots of cats, even picky ones, seem to like, and I think it's a good value since there are no vegetable matter fillers. Several of Nutro's foods -- minced chicken, sliced turkey, and chunky chicken loaf among them -- don't have carrageenan. Or fish. There aren't (m)any commercial cat foods that are 100% ideal so I see a rotation of varied brands and protein as a good way to minimize the intake of non-optimal ingredients in a cat's diet.

One final thing: there is a way to make our cats eat just about anything. Sprinkling some dust from Pure Bites chicken or turkey treats on the food will even entice them to eat cold leftover canned food from the refrigerator.

 

[Artistwolf]

Artistwolf, you might want to check with the shelter to see what they feed the cats: some, like the one where we adopted our cats, have fairly set menus. Our cats' shelter even sent us home with a baggy of the dry food they'd been eating and a few cans of Friskies pates. Our two didn't eat a lot in their first couple days at our house, despite having been severely underfed in their first 10 months -- that seems to be fairly typical, from the shock of moving -- so even though I planned to get them off dry food very quickly, I was glad to have some of what they were used to, plus the Friskies, which is extra-stinky. The smell came in especially handy because the cats got the typical post-shelter upper respiratory infection shortly after we brought them home! Beyond that, most cats love Friskies pates.

Once the cats were eating well, we started cutting back on their dry food. It took a month or so to wean them off it.

Personally, I wouldn't order up a case of one kind of food without knowing if the cats would like it. Beyond that, I was glad we had a huge variety of wet foods on the shelves, left over from our previous cat. (She was elderly and sick, so didn't want to eat and I bought just about everything for her to try. I had several dozen types of food!) Having the selection of foods made it easy to try new foods, with varying meats and textures, out on the new cats. Lots of people feed a variety of wet foods because cats tend to get bored with their foods. As others have said, it's fine to feed multiple kinds of canned food.

One more "personally" note: Nutro Natural Choice is a brand that lots of cats, even picky ones, seem to like, and I think it's a good value since there are no vegetable matter fillers. Several of Nutro's foods -- minced chicken, sliced turkey, and chunky chicken loaf among them -- don't have carrageenan. Or fish. There aren't (m)any commercial cat foods that are 100% ideal so I see a rotation of varied brands and protein as a good way to minimize the intake of non-optimal ingredients in a cat's diet.

One final thing: there is a way to make our cats eat just about anything. Sprinkling some dust from Pure Bites chicken or turkey treats on the food will even entice them to eat cold leftover canned food from the refrigerator.

Thank you so much! That's some really good stuff to know. I'm not at all sure where I'm getting my cat from yet (the shelter nearest my new house is actually closed for quarantine "until further notice" ), but when I'm there I'll be sure to ask them what they feed! Do shelters tend to free feed or feed on schedules?

So what did you do to wean them off of dry, might I ask? Just offer some wet food alongside a gradually decreasing amount of dry food?

Hm. The problem is, I'm not sure how many types of food I can go running out for should I need at, as Petco is quite far away from me. Maybe I should start out with offering basic supermarket foods like Fancy Feast and Meow Mix until I he's off of the dry completely? But then I worry that he'll become addicted to those foods and not like the higher quality foods I present to him later. Ugh, this is hard.

Ooh, Nutro sounds really good! I'll definitely have to check it out. I couldn't find nutritional composition info on that online so I didn't really even consider it. But it sounds really nice and high-quality. I wonder if I could order a mixed-flavor pack of it? That way, is have food I approve of but also a variety. I'll go have a look on Chewy.

Ooh, thanks for the tip! I think I'll go buy some of that just in case then...

 

[Artistwolf]

So I just found out that I'd been looking at the wrong food all along; I actually wanted the one in sauce and it's quite a bit more expensive So I'm thinking maybe I should just go with Fancy Feast. I can get it at the local supermarket, it's a lot cheaper, and it's still relatively healthy. Maybe I'll change over to a better brand later, but for now, I think it would be better for transitioning from dry to wet food.
Thanks for all the help, you guys!

 

[lisahe]

Artistwolf, here are answers to your questions:

-The shelter where we adopted our cats seemed to leave small dishes of dry food with cats to eat at any time, plus they fed wet food on what seemed to be a feeding schedule. (We happened to come in during the wet food feeding: it was so funny to hear dozens of cats slurping away in unison!)

-We weaned off dry food, which we initially free-fed (our cats, don't forget, were seriously underweight), by first limiting it to only nighttime but leaving out a large bowl, then gradually feeding more wet food in the evening and reducing the amount of dry food in the bowl. Toward the end, there was just a small dry food garnish on the bedtime wet food.

-Nutro is very decent food and our Petco has a good selection so you might want to buy a few types when/if you go! Unfortunately, I don't think Nutro sells variety packs.

-You could do a whole lot worse than Fancy Feast pates! The big thing is that it's very low-carb. And, yes, Fancy Feast and Friskies are very good foods for transitioning a cat: they're stinky and palatable, to cats anyway! Plus they're priced right for getting started, when you have no clue whatsoever what your cat might like to eat!

 

[Artistwolf]

Thank you so much for that information, lisahe! I like the way you handled that transition. I hope my cat's shelter will have fed at least some wet food! Alright, I will be sure to check out Nutro when I'm at Petco then
That's what I decided earlier. At least for now, it sounds like a good plan! I'm not really sure why, but I've always preferred Fancy Feast over Friskies—somehow it looks more like proper cat food and Friskies looks a little junkier to me, but hey, I'm sure it's just as good, lol. But yes, I've noticed the carbs are low so that's really nice!