Article - Sales Of Fresh Pet Foods Increasing

[LTS3]

Forget kibbles: US sales of fresh pet food are soaring

just some news up in the increasing popularity fresh and raw pet foods Has anyone tried those pet food subscription services that do customized diets?

 

[Totsy]

That's an interesting article. I saw just two "recipes" on the NomNomNow site, both of which had fruits and veggies in them. I wouldn't use them for my cats, but I can understand the appeal. I'm picturing households awaiting their NomNomNow and Blue Apron boxes, people and pets pacing back and forth waiting for the delivery person. Modern life!

 

[Azazel]

This is exactly why the kibble companies are panicking and trying to shut down real pet food companies (e.g., Rad Cat). They are scared. And they should be.

 

[daftcat75]

If canned food manufacturers would just make sane recipes without stupid, crazy inappropriate grains, fruits, vegetables, starches, and gut-wrecking gums and thickeners, there wouldn't be such a huge opportunity for raw. But even raw does it wrong with their reliance on fruits and vegetables and their overly high bone percentage. I'm still waiting on a commercial boneless option besides the homemade or premix route.

 

[Azazel]

If canned food manufacturers would just make sane recipes without stupid, crazy inappropriate grains, fruits, vegetables, starches, and gut-wrecking gums and thickeners, there wouldn't be such a huge opportunity for raw. But even raw does it wrong with their reliance on fruits and vegetables and their overly high bone percentage. I'm still waiting on a commercial boneless option besides the homemade or premix route.

True, the raw pet food companies also have their problems because they try to save costs by loading foods with bones and veggies. This is why I miss Rad Cat so much and have resorted to making all of my own food.

 

[daftcat75]

I want to make Krista's food but I'm tired of her rejecting batches I make.

I don't think she likes the turkey from Hare Today. Or if she does, then she just doesn't like any of the premixes or recipes we've tried except EZ Complete. But EZ Complete has digestive enzymes and she always looks like it's her that's being digested (pained scrunch-faced crouching) whenever I give her digestive enzymes.

The only homemade that's been a hit with her is duck meat I can no longer get affordably. The "local" (about a 3 hour errand) raw food coop used to carry these duck meat burgers. It seemed I could do no wrong with the recipe or the premix as long as I used this meat. But now to get that meat, it would cost me more in shipping: $91 for S/H on $75 worth of meat. I just may do it just this once (that's 5.5 lbs or 5 x 18 oz) because she has a birthday coming up. Her 15th! I think between that and the last tub of Rad Cat in my freezer, I might be able to give her one or two raw meals a day long enough to find something affordable and sustainable. I don't want to bust open that last tub if there's nothing to offer her after that's done.

 

[maggie101]

I wanted to put my cats back on wellness core since it has no fruit or veggies but the price has increased

 

[Azazel]

I wanted to put my cats back on wellness core since it has no fruit or veggies but the price has increased

Doesn’t wellness core have cranberries, potatoes, kelp, etc.?

 

[maggie101]

Doesn’t wellness core have cranberries, potatoes, kelp, etc.?

True, but not nearly as much fruit and veggies as other brands. Besides we all need cranberries including cats! It doesn't have peas,chick peas,zuccini,yellow squash,corn,wheat,soy,carrageenan,blueberries,apples,

I used to buy them Wellness Core Pate Chicken, Turkey & Chicken Liver and wc
turkey/duck

 

[Azazel]

True, but not nearly as much fruit and veggies as other brands. Besides we all need cranberries including cats! It doesn't have peas,chick peas,zuccini,yellow squash,corn,wheat,soy,carrageenan,blueberries,apples,

I used to buy them Wellness Core Pate Chicken, Turkey & Chicken Liver and wi turkey/duck

I think it’s a fine brand as far as cat foods go, because, as you say, pretty much all of them have some kind of unnecessary additive, but I will have to disagree that cats need cranberries!

 

[maggie101]

Helps them poo

 

[GaryT]

Does anybody have experience with "Blue Ridge Beef" raw beef. It comes in 2 pound tubes frozen. I go thru about 1/4 of a tube a week with Theo. He LOVES it! No fruit or veggies in this. May have ground up bone.

 

[Azazel]

Helps them poo

Well, we will have to agree to disagree. We really have no evidence that cats need cranberries. What we do know is that they are obligate carnivores who do well with very little dietary fiber in the wild and that cranberries aren’t a natural food source for cats.

Cats are very different from humans. Humans may need fiber sources such as cranberries to poo. Cats don’t necessarily need to poo as often as humans and also don’t need to have bulky poop.

 

[daftcat75]

I've cleaned up enough cranberry-tinged vomit to know that Krista certainly does not need cranberries. And definitely not whole cranberries like what's in Instinct. Cranberries are my pet peeve. If I see a food that's including cranberries, I know they're not really serious about feline nutrition.

 

[daftcat75]

Does anybody have experience with "Blue Ridge Beef" raw beef. It comes in 2 pound tubes frozen. I go thru about 1/4 of a tube a week with Theo. He LOVES it! No fruit or veggies in this. May have ground up bone.

Those chubs of meat aren't always supplemented, e.g. not a complete and balanced cat food. If you're just feeding him meat from a tube that doesn't have the right balance of nutrients, you can cause nutritional deficiencies in him. For starters, raw meat without bone is going to need calcium supplementation or you'll slowly wreck his bones and teeth.

I looked at the Blue Ridge website. Kitten Mix is the only one that looks close to balanced but I'm not sure if prey model still requires supplements. The rest will need some supplementation. The easiest would be either EZ Complete for boneless or Alnutrin either with or without calcium depending on whether it has bones. But you have to add liver to Alnutrin. Fortunately, beef liver is pretty easy to come by.

 

[GaryT]

Those chubs of meat aren't always supplemented, e.g. not a complete and balanced cat food. If you're just feeding him meat from a tube that doesn't have the right balance of nutrients, you can cause nutritional deficiencies in him. For starters, raw meat without bone is going to need calcium supplementation or you'll slowly wreck his bones and teeth.

I looked at the Blue Ridge website. Kitten Mix is the only one that looks close to balanced but I'm not sure if prey model still requires supplements. The rest will need some supplementation. The easiest would be either EZ Complete for boneless or Alnutrin either with or without calcium depending on whether it has bones. But you have to add liver to Alnutrin. Fortunately, beef liver is pretty easy to come by.

He also gets dry "Taste of the Wild" Venison & Salmon grain free as well as their canned version. I also give him some beef, duck, Rabbit, or chicken pate (Purrfect Bistro). He gets a serving of each on his plate and he eats all of it by the next morning. I wash his dishes every day. Maybe that is why he is a Wildman! LOL

https://www.petco.com/shop/en/petco...ct-bistro-grain-free-rabbit-pate-wet-cat-food

 

[daftcat75]

There's also the ratio of calcium to phosphorous in his food to consider. I'd feel more comfortable if you either fed the raw, unsupplemented meat no more than 10% of his total diet (1 oz raw meat to every 9 oz of nutritionally complete food), or you took the extra time to balance it with a premix. Or at the very least, add a calcium supplement.

 

[LTS3]

Does anybody have experience with "Blue Ridge Beef" raw beef. It comes in 2 pound tubes frozen. I go thru about 1/4 of a tube a week with Theo. He LOVES it! No fruit or veggies in this. May have ground up bone.

The Blue Ridge chubs are ground meat with ground bone. A few varieties do have organs or are just ground meat. The beef one is just ground meat. Products | BlueRidgeBeef

You need to add in supplements to make the Blue Ridge a complete diet. Here's a thread: Supplementing Blue Ridge Chubs The ground meat only products can have a product such as EZComplete or UStew added to it.

I no longer feed Blue Ridge. One of my cats oddly developed acne from eating it

 

[She's a witch]

I actually keep finding smaller, local companies that do the food similar to Rad Cat (so I keep hearing, as I wasn't here when they were operating) and I'm wondering, maybe this is the case as well in different parts of States, especially in the bigger cities like LA and New York? My source of knowledge is small, independent chain (10 shops in the city) of pet store and they know everything what happens in the raw food world across the State. I'm happy about this as I've almost transitioned one cat to commercial frozen raw but I insist on variety, seeing here what happened to all the cats left without Rad Cat (that name is disturbing to me btw ).. So I keep giving them more brands, hoping that the other cat will find something she likes too.
Therefore I have a question... Is this food decent? It's raw lamb (and my girl likes lamb and I haven't come across it before in raw food), Darwin's:
Natural Selections™ Raw Cat Food:
Ingredients:
Free-Range Meat and Organs (98%): Lamb Meat, Lamb Heart, Lamb Livers
Trace Minerals and vitamins (2%): Dicalcium Phosphate, Calcium Carbonate, Tomato Pomace, Taurine, Sea Salt, Magnesium Proteinate, Inulin, Choline Chloride, Vitamin E, Zinc Proteinate, Thiamine Mononitrate, Manganese Proteinate, Iodine, Folic Acid.
Marine Oils (Under 1%):Fish Oil 18/12 EPA/DHA (Derived from sea-harvested wild Sardines)
It seems they use synthetic minerals which in my case might be good, because my girl dislikes something in commercial raw (although she eats raw muscle meat without supplements with huge pleasure) so it might as well be the upgrade from canned. They say they follow AAFCO rules.

 

[GaryT]

The Blue Ridge chubs are ground meat with ground bone. A few varieties do have organs or are just ground meat. The beef one is just ground meat. Products | BlueRidgeBeef

You need to add in supplements to make the Blue Ridge a complete diet. Here's a thread: Supplementing Blue Ridge Chubs The ground meat only products can have a product such as EZComplete or UStew added to it.

I no longer feed Blue Ridge. One of my cats oddly developed acne from eating it

I may cut back a bit on the raw beef. I cut the 5 pound chub into 4 equal chunks when it is partially thawed. I put 3 back in the freezer and thaw one to feed for maybe 4 days. I break the chunk into 4 pieces and he gets most of one of the pieces (chunck cut into about 1 inch thick slabs) a day. So maybe 3 tablespoons. I mix his "Angel's Eyes" powder into the beef. Maybe cut this in half? He also gets a quarter can of the pate and also quarter can of the canned "Taste of the Wild" venison & salmon. He has access to dry TotW all day. He doesn't eat all of the dry (he eats about 1/4 cup a day). With all of this, isn't he getting a good balance?