Is Anyone Else Struggling to Get Enough Catfood with the Current Supply Shortages we are Encountering?

[vince]

I guess I would have to go to a Butcher shop for that. I never bought Gizzards before, so I never realized it is no longer sold in Supermarkets and is no longer sold in Turkeys. Thanks for pointing this out.

I get gizzards at Kroger's. Often, Kroger packages their giblets differently from the usual poultry in the meat coolers, in a plastic cup like cottage cheese comes in. They don't always have them, but they have them often enough I can make chicken gizzard soup for the cats and me once in a while.

 

[tarasgirl06]

Also, if you feed outdoor cats on a schedule every day as many experts recommend, you can moisten that dry food with water and stir to soften and make a gravy. Some cats love that. As long as they eat it all up, it's okay to do that.

 

[danteshuman]

I’m having trouble the last couple of months of finding my picky cat’s preferred wet food. I still couldn’t order tuna variety pack of fancy feast medley’s when I placed this month’s chewy order on Oct 28th. I guess the goodish news is he likes the more expensive flaked guns in fancy feast naturals.

If you have a tuna loving cat and can’t find tuna wet food in your preferred brand, you can always sweeten an unfavorite wet food with dried shaved tuna. I bought a bag off Amazon almost a year ago. 1-3 teaspoons mixed into a can of turkey or chicken with a big of water gets my picky eater to eat his least favorite wet food (chicken in gravy.)

I got all excited when chewy was selling 24 can trays of 1 of his favorite tuna wet foods that I bought to trays!

Good luck!

 

[betsygee]

MOD NOTE: A couple of posts have been deleted from this thread as being off topic. This thread is about helping our member find affordable ways to feed the cats she takes care of. Let's keep it on topic, folks.

If you're interested in discussing the political aspect of the supply chain issues, and you have enough posting privileges, you can start a thread about it in our 'In My Opinion' forum.

 

[Paul9856]

I buy pouches of wet food for my 3 girls (Belle a scottish fold aged 6, Aza aged 5 adopted from a vets office and Cora aged about 16 months we rescued from the street Aza and Cora are both moggies) As I buy most online from Auchan or Zootovary.com I tend to buy in bulk when there are extra discounts and currently have about 8-9 weeks supply taking up space in my wardrobe but thats fine by me.

 

[Whenallhellbreakslose]

Thank you V vince , DreamerRose W Willowy Antonio65 tarasgirl06 danteshuman Paul9856 margecat maggie101 nartyteek and everyone else for your input. I really appreciate it. I hope others who come across this thread finds helpful tips that they can put to use. It really helps to be resourceful and think outside of the box, especially when you have many mouths to feed and winter being around the corner. I am definitely going to try a lot of these tips. I very much like the Gizzard and broth idea. The tuna shavings ( Benito Flakes) Is a good Topper to entice the kitties to eat food they turn there noses up at. It sort of funny, because these kitties can be just as fussy as indoor cats. If they ate everything indiscriminately, it would make feeding them so much easier. I also give some of the kitties Churrus from time to time.

I am thinking things through. Thanks for the tips. Don't hesitate to leave any more tips or to share more of your experience with the cat food shortages. I live in the North East and I couldn't believe how empty the shelves were in my supermarket and local BJ's . It was a shock. I hope things gets back to normal soon.

 

[danteshuman]

The only other top I have is until this shortage gets sorted out by an extra bag of food now. That way you can transition them for a couple of weeks on 1/2 their regular dry & 1/2 whatever dry food you can get a hold of. If you have to get another dry food or are scraping money for Christmas you can always buy a cheap kitten dry food. A month or two (in their entire lives) of cheap food will not kill or hurt your kitties. Kitten food has more fat sprayed on the outside of it, so your cats are less likely to reject it. You can always get your normal brand of dry food, just in a different flavor to.

& the reason I said to mix the Benito flakes on, is because if I don’t my picky jerk will only eat the top layer ..... then leave the rest!

 

[Whenallhellbreakslose]

The only other top I have is until this shortage gets sorted out by an extra bag of food now. That way you can transition them for a couple of weeks on 1/2 their regular dry & 1/2 whatever dry food you can get a hold of. If you have to get another dry food or are scraping money for Christmas you can always buy a cheap kitten dry food. A month or two (in their entire lives) of cheap food will not kill or hurt your kitties. Kitten food has more fat sprayed on the outside of it, so your cats are less likely to reject it. You can always get your normal brand of dry food, just in a different flavor to.

& the reason I said to mix the Benito flakes on, is because if I don’t my picky jerk will only eat the top layer ..... then leave the rest!

Thanks. I do feed them Kitten Chow this time of year for the high calorie content. They love it! I have also given them Benito Flakes on top of their food and they went nuts over it. I can't believe I didn't think about this before.

Yeah, some cats can be real fussy. I have a bunch in the colony I feed that are that way with certain wet and dry food. Your kitty probably thinks of herself as a Food Connoisseur. She's got her standards. Thanks again for the tips once again.

 

[Bitsy's Mom]

Yes - I’ve had trouble getting certain flavors so have had to buy whatever they had. It’s also taken longer for both my dog and cat food to deliver so they are definitely searching the different warehouses instead of the one closest to me.

 

[vince]

Had to get wet food today. Kroger's was like Mother Hubbard's cupboard. Went to Tractor Supply and was able to get some, but they were all out of Friskies and TSC's house brand.

I'd purchased about three weeks' worth the last time I bought wet food. Boy, a lot has changed in those three weeks! I have another three weeks' worth now. We'll see how things are going in December.

Dry food still seems to be plentiful around here right now.

 

[Whenallhellbreakslose]

V vince There are no Kroger's around here. I was thinking of going for a drive and checking The Tractor Supply which is 50 miles away. I am going to check out some other places along the way. I live downstate which is more populated, so maybe things are much better upstate where it is less populated. Thanks for the tips.
Bitsy's Mom Sorry to hear about the limited flavors and delays in delivering. Is this Amazon, Chewie or another online shopping site? I worry if things get any worse and the demand is too high, that these online shopping sites will be affected too. Hang in there.

 

[Bitsy's Mom]

V vince There are no Kroger's around here. I was thinking of going for a drive and checking The Tractor Supply which is 50 miles away. I am going to check out some other places along the way. I live downstate which is more populated, so maybe things are much better upstate where it is less populated. Thanks for the tips.
Bitsy's Mom Sorry to hear about the limited flavors and delays in delivering. Is this Amazon, Chewie or another online shopping site? I worry if things get any worse and the demand is too high, that these online shopping sites will be affected too. Hang in there.

That was chewy’s that I ordered from. The expensive orijen dry was no problem - but a lot of out of stock on fancy feast and the prices went up.

 

[DreamerRose]

Thank goodness my last order was a month's worth of food. If food runs out before that, I may bake a chicken or a turkey and split them with the kitties - they can have the dark meat, which I don't like. Whole birds come with those nice giblets, too. They can also have the neck if it's not cooked. That will keep them busy for a while.

 

[danteshuman]

I buy Jackie over a month’s worth of food every month. He has 1-2 months worth of food most of the time (maybe not in the flavors he likes.)

But yeah my Chewy order came in 3 boxes and the last box took 2 weeks (tuna medleys.)

 

[moxiewild]

Last week, I visited the Pet Store I normally buy cat food from. In normal times, it was a very well stocked National chain Pet Store. However, last week it looked like this.
View attachment 401704
I also went to BJ's Wholesale (which is very much like a Costco's). The pet food aisle was completely empty of nearly all the canned wet food, I had to buy Meow Mix that comes in cups which goes way too quick.

I feed a lot of outdoor cats, so I rely on the cheaper cat food like Friskies and Nine Lives. All the supermarkets by me are barely stocked with this food anymore. I am getting worried. I am on a tight budget and I have had another cat feeder dump her cats on me. I have confronted her in the past and we had a major falling out. Now I have to worry that at any time she will dump the rest of her cats on me. This is a stressful situation to begin with. The food shortages is the latest challenge to deal with.

I like to ask the members her on TCS, especially those who have a lot of cats to feed whether they are your cats or you take care of community cats. How has the shortages been in your area? Is it mostly the cheaper cat food that is in short supply or have you noticed other brands? I haven't notice a problem with the dry food yet, but is their a shortage of dry cat food in your area?

What have you been doing to deal with these shortage problems? Have you been buying more online? Have you been buying tuna or sardines, or are using something else as a subitute for cat food? How has the kitties you feed been handling the changes?

I also like to discuss winter feeding of outdoor cats. I am very worried over this and need to figure out how to stretch things out. I am feeding a lot more cats than last year and to say it is a challenge is putting it mildly.

I would like to hear from you. Thank you in advance for taking the time to reply to this thread.

I haven’t read the thread, so I apologize for any repeats.

Yes, we have had trouble at both Chewy (auto ship discounts!) and grocery stores (for both our indoor cats and ferals, but I’ll focus on ferals right now).

We feed three colonies. We buy 22oz cans of Special Kitty (Walmart brand), and then a mix of dry with Cat Chow Naturals (original) and American Journey (chewy brand) chicken in a 1:2 or 1:3 ratio depending on current finances.

For our colony that is mostly older kittens - and what the other colonies will get on especially cold days (Texas, so it’s very inconsistent) - we feed Purina ONE Healthy Kitten mixed with either American Journey adult chicken or American Journey kitten chicken. The Purina One is more calorie dense than the Cat Chow. Same thing for AJ adult vs kitten, about a difference of 44 calories per cup.

When we’ve occasionally had to cut costs more, we just feed Special Kitty wet and the cat chow, or only cat chow depending o how strapped we are.

Cat Chow has consistently been available through Chewy (probably the only food we buy there that has), so that’s where we’ve been getting it. It’s more inconsistent at the store.

Special Kitty (and our back up, 9lives) are VERY inconsistent at the store. So basically, whenever we see Special Kitty stocked, we buy them out. I hate doing that, but I hope they’ll get the message that they need to order more! (I’ve left a note before asking them to, lol)

One thing you could try, is tracking down a manger and asking if they can order however much you need by x date. And ask if that’s something you can do regularly to ensure what you want is in stock.

We’ve never been able to find a manager at Walmart, but this is on our to-do list.

You can also go on their website and order food there, to be delivered to your home or your store for pick up. Walmart only sells Special Kitty in store, or else this is what we would be doing. But other foods are available to ship to home or store at most places like Walmart and Tractor Supply.

as far as what we do when we’ve had trouble getting our normal food, we do several things:

1. Buy in bulk (if at all possible). We try to make sure we’re covered for at least two weeks, usually more like 3-4.

2. Don’t let it get down to the last 1-2 bags without starting your efforts to buy more.

3. We keep 1-2 huge bags of the cheapest dry cat food we can get at the store. If it’s nearing the expiration date and hasn’t been used, then we either feed it to the opossums or donate it to the local shelter. If we are strapped on cash and it’s it’s near its expiration, or if we’re out of food, we go ahead and feed it to the ferals. Sometimes I’ll add some scrambled eggs or low sodium tuna or pieces of boiled chicken in there if I can, but only as a protein supplement, not the main food.

I think the back up bag of cheap food probably helps the most or at least offers the most comfort that they will always have a nutritionally complete and balanced food available, even if it’s far from ideal quality.

And I think that’s the important part - if your regular food isn’t available and there’s something else available at your price point, just buy it. It’s most important that they eat.

if you can’t afford “back up” bags, then try feeding the cheapest food you can for a bit until you can afford to buy an emergency stock.

As far as how the ferals react to changes, they haven’t seemed to care, honestly. In fact, I think they like the even junkier foods more, lol. But they never hesitate when food has been changed.

Unfortunately, I have no idea whether they tolerate any food well when it comes to bowel movements and vomiting, though.

For cost savings, try reaching out to manufacturers about free samples and coupons. Let them know about your work with the cats, how many you feed, how much you spend on food. I know Purina is good about sending coupons.

 

[Antonio65]

So basically, whenever we see Special Kitty stocked, we buy them out. I hate doing that, but I hope they’ll get the message that they need to order more! (I’ve left a note before asking them to, lol)

Same here, when I need many cans of some food I would be tempted to buy them out, but I hate doing this, so I usually leave some cans on the shelf, just in case that someone else might desperately need the same food, especially if it's a diet food (renal, intestinal, etc). I'd hate thinking that someone else's cat wouldn't have their special diet meal because I bought them out.
Anyway I let the shop know that Ive bought nearly all the stock, even if the cash register should notice the manager that the supply is short.

One thing you could try, is tracking down a manger and asking if they can order however much you need by x date. And ask if that’s something you can do regularly to ensure what you want is in stock.

The last time I did this, it took two weeks to get the bulk I ordered, though they assured me it was a two-day waiting. Never more!
Next time I will order online.

As far as how the ferals react to changes, they haven’t seemed to care, honestly. In fact, I think they like the even junkier foods more, lol. But they never hesitate when food has been changed.

I agree, after all they eat just anything, from live preys to garbage...

For cost savings, try reaching out to manufacturers about free samples and coupons. Let them know about your work with the cats, how many you feed, how much you spend on food. I know Purina is good about sending coupons.

I did this at the store where I buy the cats' food, I told them I feed a colony, that I've been doing this for years, but it seems they couldn't care less.

 

[moxiewild]

Same here, when I need many cans of some food I would be tempted to buy them out, but I hate doing this, so I usually leave some cans on the shelf, just in case that someone else might desperately need the same food, especially if it's a diet food (renal, intestinal, etc). I'd hate thinking that someone else's cat wouldn't have their special diet meal because I bought them out.
Anyway I let the shop know that Ive bought nearly all the stock, even if the cash register should notice the manager that the supply is short.



The last time I did this, it took two weeks to get the bulk I ordered, though they assured me it was a two-day waiting. Never more!
Next time I will order online.



I agree, after all they eat just anything, from live preys to garbage...



I did this at the store where I buy the cats' food, I told them I feed a colony, that I've been doing this for years, but it seems they couldn't care less.

Special Kitty comes in three sizes 22oz, 13oz, and 5oz. We buy the 22oz because we feed so many cats.

One time we noticed they were out of all the other sizes, so we did leave a few cans. But most of the time, there are still the same flavors left in 13oz and/or 5oz cans when we clear out the 22oz cans.

Did you go straight to the manufacturers like Purina to ask for coupons or did you ask your grocery store?

 

[Antonio65]

Special Kitty comes in three sizes 22oz, 13oz, and 5oz. We buy the 22oz because we feed so many cats.

One time we noticed they were out of all the other sizes, so we did leave a few cans. But most of the time, there are still the same flavors left in 13oz and/or 5oz cans when we clear out the 22oz cans.

Over here (Italy, it's the same in the rest of Europe too), cans come in two sizes, 3 oz and 14 oz, though one brand, Almo Nature, also sells 6 oz cans.
Same for pouches, 3 oz and even 3.5 oz

Large cans, like 35 oz and more, are for dogs only.

Did you go straight to the manufacturers like Purina to ask for coupons or did you ask your grocery store?

I only asked the store.
They do apply some discount to rescue groups and shelters, but you need to prove it with all the papers from the council and the like.
I am alone, and not officially registered as a cat feeder/rescuer, though my colony is registered with the city council and they named me as the colony carer. I don't know if this "status" is eligible for a discount, but I could try, never thought of it.

 

[chaucer]

This is an ongoing issue for me. With seven cats - three my own indoor cats and now four outside ones who come to my carport - both the cost and availability of cat food, particularly the wet variety, have become problematic. I have agonized over not being able to afford to continue feeding the outdoor ones as often. (And I get the raccoons and opossums who eat the dry food I leave out at times for the outside cats, so I feel it gets wasted). But I do continue to feed them just the same, but it's getting much more difficult to afford.

 

[tarasgirl06]

Thank goodness my last order was a month's worth of food. If food runs out before that, I may bake a chicken or a turkey and split them with the kitties - they can have the dark meat, which I don't like. Whole birds come with those nice giblets, too. They can also have the neck if it's not cooked. That will keep them busy for a while.

You can save the water that you've boiled the neck and "parts" in and pour a little in every dish that you feed them, too -- many, if not most, cats love this broth! and it would be good to pour over dry food to increase moisture and palatability, I'd think.