Just How Bad Is Tapioca Starch?

[ty3535]

Enzo FINALLY found a good he liked that didn’t aggravate his IBD (Nutro perfect portions turkey & turkey liver). I guess the universe is conspiring against me because for the 4th time in the past year, a good he likes gets a new formulation. I was already hesitant because it has guar gum (I’ve resigned myself to the fact that all canned foods will contain it or carrageenan). They are now adding tapioca starch. Is it so unhealthy that I should look for a new food? Or is it just “not great” but also not harmful? Thanks!

 

[EmersonandEvie]

It just adds unnecessary carbs to their diet. How far down the list is the tapioca?

 

[ty3535]

It just adds unnecessary carbs to their diet. How far down the list is the tapioca?

It’s listed as the 12th ingredient. I guess from what I’ve read the issue seems to be that it affects glucose levels since it breaks down as a simple sugar? Honestly there is so much conflicting info I have no idea what to believe. I just reallllly hope I don’t have to find another food

 

[Sally395]

Oh, I'm so glad you brought this up. I don't have an answer, but I was wondering the same thing...

 

[darg]

It's so far down on the list that unless the cat is having tummy issues again, personally, I don't think I'd worry about it as long as he is still liking the food.

Not all canned foods have gums. I feed Rawz and Stella and Chewy's and some Hound and Gatos. The Rawz is gum free. Now, the S&C does have some agar-agar as does the Hound and Gatos. I figure the agar-agar, if it's really anything to worry about at all, is probably a bit better than Carageenan.

 

[EmersonandEvie]

It's so far down that, to me, it sounds like they are using it as a type of binder. If he eats it readily, give it to him. Life's too short to worry about a food being 100% good for you or your cats. If he enjoys it and everything else looks alright, I wouldn't worry.

 

[lisahe]

You might try calling Nutro to see what they say about the carbs for that food. If the tapioca's that far down on the ingredient list, the carbs may be okay but it's sometimes hard to say! I say that because remember that another Cat Site member called Nutro about Nutro Natural Choice minced chicken, our picky cat's favorite food, and it ended up having carbs over 20% dry matter, apparently just from the gums. That food is just a very occasional treat these days!

Tapioca seems to be a tricky one since it's used in varying amounts so I always try to check something, be it the manufacturer or the catinfo.org food charts. I keep carbs down for our cats and try to avoid tapioca as much as I can since it's totally unnecessary for cats, just empty calories.

 

[darg]

That Nutro food, with the Tapicoa in the ingredients, appears to be listed in the Cat Food DB. It lists the carbs at 2%.

 

[ty3535]

Thank you all so much!! I feel a lot better, and I’ll contact Nutro just in case the carb % changed with the new formula. As long as it’s not a drastic uptick in carbs I feel okay feeding it to him now. Thanks so much again!!

 

[lisahe]

Thank you all so much!! I feel a lot better, and I’ll contact Nutro just in case the carb % changed with the new formula. As long as it’s not a drastic uptick in carbs I feel okay feeding it to him now. Thanks so much again!!

Yes, definitely give Nutro a call. Some of the data on Cat Food DB are pretty weird -- I remember some Weruva where the Cat Food DB figures didn't even resemble the numbers on Weruva's charts! And you're so right about the possibilities of new formulas.

I'd love to hear what they say if you don't mind posting what they tell you. Our cats love some of Nutro's foods and the turkey food we used to feed them seems to be gone.

 

[maggie101]

I feed my cat Maggie perfect portions because its low carb, high protein, high fat. I have wondered about the tapioca. Let me know if you call or email nutro. I have emailed other companies about their food and gotten a quick response

 

[ty3535]

I emailed them this morning but haven’t heard back yet. I had to call them before this most recent formula change and they were really helpful, so if I don’t hear back by tomorrow I’ll call and post what they tell me. Thanks again for all the input!

 

[ty3535]

Yes, definitely give Nutro a call. Some of the data on Cat Food DB are pretty weird -- I remember some Weruva where the Cat Food DB figures didn't even resemble the numbers on Weruva's charts! And you're so right about the possibilities of new formulas.

I'd love to hear what they say if you don't mind posting what they tell you. Our cats love some of Nutro's foods and the turkey food we used to feed them seems to be gone.

If the turkey you previously fed was pate in a small 3oz can, they’ve discontinued that and replaced it with the perfect portions. Enzo doesn’t seem to tell a difference between the two and he’s ridiculously picky.

 

[lisahe]

If the turkey you previously fed was pate in a small 3oz can, they’ve discontinued that and replaced it with the perfect portions. Enzo doesn’t seem to tell a difference between the two and he’s ridiculously picky.

The one they really liked was the sliced turkey but I think I used to feed the pate sometimes, too. I'll have to look into the perfect portions since Nutro Natural Choice cans have always been foods the cats would gladly lap up. Thank you for the tip!

 

[maggie101]

Yes, definitely give Nutro a call. Some of the data on Cat Food DB are pretty weird -- I remember some Weruva where the Cat Food DB figures didn't even resemble the numbers on Weruva's charts! And you're so right about the possibilities of new formulas.

I'd love to hear what they say if you don't mind posting what they tell you. Our cats love some of Nutro's foods and the turkey food we used to feed them seems to be gone.

I have started using petcare rx. Some of the canidae pure is discontinued on chewy but I found this site after lots of searching. So far no problems after 2 shipments. I do not like the new canidae adore!

 

[ty3535]

I called Nutro and they gave me the carb info on the new formula and I’m hoping someone can help me out with what the numbers mean because I’ve never been quite sure what “dry matter basis” is.

These are the numbers:
Carbs as fed is 0.77
Carbs on a dry matter basis: 3.08

If someone could tell me how the carbs in this stack up against other foods, or if this seems to be a not-too-crazy number I’d really appreciate it! Also, my experience with Nutro customer service was excellent again. Thank you for any help!

 

[ty3535]

In an incredibly bizarre turn of events, I went to catfooddb to compare the Nutro ingredients they had listed (it hasn’t been updated since 6/2018) and I almost can’t believe it. The “new formulation” is just the old formulation that they replaced like 6 months ago!! I thought surely there must be an error, but nope. I compared the “new” formula ingredients on chewy to the ingredients listed on the “old” formulation 3 times, just to be sure. And yep. Identical match!

 

[lisahe]

If someone could tell me how the carbs in this stack up against other foods, or if this seems to be a not-too-crazy number I’d really appreciate it!

3.08% dry matter carbs is nice and low. I generally try to keep our cats' foods under 5% but make a few occasional exceptions, usually in the 10-15% range (though sometimes with some gravy drained), though that infernal Nutro minced chicken is something around 20%, which is so ridiculously high that I still wonder if they miscalculated!

"As fed" is what you get when you open up the can. "Dry matter" is what you get if you open up the can and remove all the water from the contents. Since wet foods have so much water, the dry matter figures are always much larger than the "as fed" figures.

Cat food labeling can, indeed, get pretty bizarre! A Petco employee told me a few months ago that he was expecting some label changes from Nutro just because they hadn't had any changes in a while. It's funny that you found a mention of a new formula but no new formula... a year or two ago, I found that Tiki had changed their formula for a food multiple times but never made any mentions. We even had cans with multiple formulas (and similar "best by" dates) in our cat food cart! And I found all different labeling on various sites. This stuff can get so confusing! And it shouldn't: all people want to do is know what they're feeding their cats.

In any case, thank you so much for posting that information! It's good to know.

 

[ty3535]

Thank you so much this makes much more sense! I’m also glad to hear the 3.08% is low.

The label thing gets crazy! And Enzo has IBD and food allergies in addition to ingredients I would just really rather not feed him. I’m still sort of shocked that the “new” food is just the “old” food! And I never would’ve known had I not referred back to the catfooddb. Thanks so much for your explanation it was super helpful!