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Hari

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Hello, I'm new to this forum and I need some help with my new kitten.

To put it shortly- I don't know anything about cat/kitten nutrition. I own two dogs, one eats the best dog food on the market and the other eats raw, better than any dog food there is, but my cat....I just don't know what to feed her !
I went to the store and looked at ingredients on bags of cat foods, and lots and lots of them, first ingredient was Ground Corn Meal, or something like Chicken By-Product. From my experience with dogs, both of these as first ingredient is very bad, but is it true with cats also? Even the big brand cat foods had some kind of meat by-product 'meal' as the first ingredient, and of course the corn meal.

Can I get some suggestions on what to feed my kitten? She's 5-6 weeks old, a little too young to be leaving momma and littermates, but mom cat had stopped feeding babies, so the owner just weaned them to kibble and gave them away.

Any help is appreciated !!
 

thegreystalker

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What are you feeding the mama cat? I've been told that if the kitten still needs formula, you should buy a commercial formula from a pet shop.
 
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Hari

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I don't own the mama cat and she is an outside cat but friendly not feral at all, the owners let her roam around the neighborhood. I honestly don't know what they've been feeding mama cat. I know they weaned the kittens a little too young and too abruptly, mother cat was engorged with milk for around 5 days, that had to be painful.

Penny(kitten) has been eating kibble for a week now and doing fine on it, I guess, she's been going to the bathroom regularly, but should I still be feeding her formula ?
 

Kieka

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For now I would get some KMR and wet kitten food. Make a slurry by making a small amount of the KMR and mixing in the wet food. That would be the food for the next two weeks. As much and as often as the kitten wants to eat but you want to offer it food 4-6 times a day. For the wet food, any kitten specific food with meat in its first few ingredients and no/low grains will do.

As the kitten gets older (8-12 weeks) reduce the KMR until it is just wet kitten food.

In terms of long term, yes the by products and grains aren't good for cats. Unlike dogs; cats are obligate carnivores so they need high amounts of proteins. Their bodies also don't process some things that dogs can because they lack the enzymes in their livers to do so. Ideally you want more than 40% protein and less than 10% carbs. There isn't a whole lot of research into cat nutrition (at least compared to dogs) so there is a lot of judgement calls and research you will have to do. Also, commercial foods rarely fall in the ideal range for dry foods but slightly better with wet foods.

For example, cranberries are debatable. Some say they are good for urinary health. But cranberries have a chemical similar to aspirin (which cats cant have) and an acid cats bodies can't break down. Then there is the stereotypical fish which cats may like but in reality too much fish can be harmful because of mercury levels. You also have (formerly) well regarded companies like Orijen, Acana and Tikicat who change formulas and/or factories and the quality of their product has gone way down. SO you have to read each label and pay attention to each bag. Gotta love commercial pet food companies.

Most cats have a low thirst drive so a wet food or raw would be best. We have a really active forum that can help you navigate raw feeding if you want to go that route. If you already raw feed one dog it might be an easy switch for you.

Raw & Home-Cooked Cat Food

If you want to go wet or dry just be careful of labels. There is also dehydrated options like Ziwipeak. It's probably enough to make your head spin at this point.
 
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