Soulistic Fans - Please read this!

[sevenwonders]

On one of the other threads in particular, several people were raving about Soulistic wet food.

I understand why - it is cheap and naturally, most cats will LOVE it because it has lots of seafood.

When I read that it was only around $10. per case,

I went to Petco's site to check it out as a possible wet food for my Ferals.

The problem from what I could see is that every variety I found on the website consists of seafood as the main (and often second) ingredient. Sure, our Kitties will love it, but are you aware of the dangers of feeding them so much seafood? Someone posted a link in another thread to an article which lists 8 of those dangers.

I love seafood as much as any Kitty, but I only eat it a few times per month,

and I only feed it to my kitties no more than once per week.

For me, the most disturbing dangers are:

The risk of Mercury poisoning;

Increased risk of UTI's, crystals, and stones;

Increased risk of Kidney Disease;

Known link to Hyperthyroidism.

I'm not suggesting that you eliminate seafood completely,

but I would strongly advise against feeding it to your Kitties on a daily basis.  

 

[bastetservant]

My 15 year old foster, Halo, only likes chunks of meat in gravy. So I have Soulistic pouches in his food rotation, as well as several other brands of meat chunks in gravy type of food. Soulistic pouches do have two flavors of chicken, with no fish. You're right, they do have a lot of fish. My cats usually only get fish once a week (Saturday night - party night ). Since I never feed my cats beef, the flavors of Soulistic that I buy are limited to these two chicken ones. I wish they had a turkey one.


Robin

 

[Draco]

There's Chicken & Pumpkin in gravy, and Chicken Dinner in gravy.. no seafood in either one. I order by bulk on amazon.com of these two flavors only (orange can, and green can)

 

[sevenwonders]

Thanks for the info - good to know that they have 2 options without fish in them!

Now, Amazon (somehow) doesn't mention how many cans you get for $9.61,

but it says 3.2 lbs, so do these cases consist of Nine 5.5 oz cans?

 

[ldg]

SevenWonders, I see from this post http://www.thecatsite.com/t/241893/vet-said-the-cats-need-all-canned-food-is-bologne#post_3180331 that included on the menu for your cats is Wellness Core dry food?

If you're using the original formula, the ingredient list is as follows: http://www.wellnesspetfood.com/product-details.aspx?pet=cat&pid=23#ingredients

Deboned Turkey, Deboned Chicken, Chicken Meal, Whitefish Meal, Herring Meal, Peas, Turkey Meal, Potatoes, Chicken Fat (preserved with Mixed Tocopherols), Tomato Pomace, Natural Chicken Flavor, Flaxseed, Cranberries, Chicory Root Extract, Choline Chloride, Salmon Oil, Vitamins [Vitamin E Supplement, Niacin, Beta-Carotene, Vitamin A Supplement, Thiamine Mononitrate, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, d-Calcium Pantothenate, Riboflavin, Vitamin D-3 Supplement, Vitamin B-12 Supplement, Folic Acid, Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C), Biotin],Minerals [Zinc Proteinate, Zinc Sulfate, Iron Proteinate, Ferrous Sulfate, Copper Sulfate, Copper Proteinate, Manganese Proteinate, Manganese Sulfate, Sodium Selenite, Calcium Iodate], Taurine, Mixed Tocopherols added to preserve freshness, Dried Kelp, Yucca Schidigera Extract, Dried Lactobacillus plantarum Fermentation Product, Dried Enterococcus faecium Fermentation Product, Dried Lactobacillus casei Fermentation Product, Dried Lactobacillus acidophilus Fermentation Product, Rosemary Extract.

Even though turkey and chicken are tops on the ingredient list, the bulk of the protein is coming from the chicken meal, whitefish meal, herring meal, and turkey meal. Given your concern about fish, I thought you might want to take note of this. Turkey & Chicken have water, and ingredients are listed in order of weight. This link http://www.bornfreeusa.org/facts.php?more=1&p=359 provides excellent information. Scroll down to "Meat is the first ingredient claim" under "Marketing Magic" in the Pet Food Industry Secrets section.

 

[sevenwonders]

Hi LDG, thanks for mentioning that - I do appreciate it.

Thanks for the link too - that is a very detailed and informative article. The "Selecting a good commercial food" sheet referenced in the article is valuable as well.

While researching Grain Free foods, I noticed the fish meals in Core, EVO, and Wilderness, but since the meals were down on the list, I was (as they intended) thinking that the majority of the protein was coming from the first two or three ingredients.

Fortunately, I'm also switching them to mainly wet food, but I'm still researching Grain Free dry foods to try to find something affordable with ingredients that I feel good about and can feed them more often (no fish.) Any recommendations?

 

[ldg]

Before switching to raw, I fed wet only food for over a year. I was using Before Grain, Instinct, EVO, and some flavors of Wellness. They didn't like the high-end foods at first, they didn't have many familiar "palatability" flavors in them. :lol3: You might want to PM otto - she's done a LOT of work on the subject. She also avoids carageenan (I believe it's in all three of the above but don't remember) and veggies. (Cats don't even have the needed digestive enzymes to process carrot and pumpkin, etc. into Vitamin A. Both just add fiber, which most cats don't need either). FYI, cats have no requirement for carbs or starch, so "grain free" is often a bit of a misnomer, because those carbs and starches are replaced by peas and potatoes or whatever. At least in the Instinct cans, there aren't many, and they're not blended in so they're easy to pick out. :lol3:

Had I known then what I know now about cat food, even the high end stuff, I wouldn't have bothered going to canned from kibble and canned. I'd have gone straight to raw. My holistic vet encouraged it. The funniest thing of all is that in the end, this is going to cost less to feed them. :lol3:

 

[sellfirst]

They also have tuna and talapia which is freshwater fish and has no mercury risk.It is also the lowest phosphorus of any catfood we could find which is the leading cause for crystals.Buy at petco on reorder and its 8.76 a case.

 

[aloveofcats]

I can't even tell you how relieved I am to find this thread. My little 1 1/2 year old Sir Edison just had a urinary tract blockage removed. He is a long-haired domestic - possibly Norwegian Forest Cat - and has never had problems before. The only thing that changed about any part of his life is that two weeks ago Petco ran out of the green can (Chicken with gravy) Soulistic cans, and I picked up their Turkey with Gravy (a new flavor - red can with blue accents) instead.

I'm just now realizing that this "Turkey with Gravy" has tuna as the second ingredient like you stated. He is the happiest, healthiest cat ever, and this was quite a scare. I will never buy any other Soulistic than the green cans, although now it won't be his main meal, but I will mix it with the urinary tract health food he was given by the emergency vet clinic.

Thank you so much - we've been trying to figure out what happened for days and days, and this seems and feels like the most obvious reason he had a blockage. His x-ray showed no other build ups or stones, so it's recent and I fully believe it's because of the food with so much tuna in it.

So grateful to you!!

 

[artiemom]

Yes, Soulistic has added a few new flavors to their line. I was delighted to see the lamb and the duck. But very disappointed when I looked at the 2nd ingredient. It was either the novel protein or fish.....not for me

 

[jennyjenny]

My cat had surgery a few weeks back and I have tried every food I can think of but she only likes the Soulistic in the brown pouches (all have fish). She'll eat the broth from the chicken, but not the chicken itself. Does anyone else have any food suggestions that are the same consistency as the brown Soulistic pouches? At this point- I'd rather she be eating than not eating at all so I'm not taking away the one thing I've found that she can easily eat.

Thanks a million.

 

[missmimz]

My cat had surgery a few weeks back and I have tried every food I can think of but she only likes the Soulistic in the brown pouches (all have fish). She'll eat the broth from the chicken, but not the chicken itself. Does anyone else have any food suggestions that are the same consistency as the brown Soulistic pouches? At this point- I'd rather she be eating than not eating at all so I'm not taking away the one thing I've found that she can easily eat.

Thanks a million.

Have you tried the BFF Weruva packets? I agree, if all she'll eat is fish based then that's what you have to go with. The good news is that when you buy higher quality foods they are usually tested for things like mercury. Weruva claims they test regularly and use smaller fish whenever possible. 

 

[lisahe]

This may not work for your cat, @JennyJenny, but our cats loved Soulistic's new chicken dinner in gelee (this one!) when I tried it out on them last week. It is what Soulistic promises: a combination of pate and shreds, but the pate part was light. It's different from any of the other foods we've fed them. Maybe your cat would like the novelty of it, too? And maybe some of the other new Soulistic foods are similar? The chicken dinner ingredients are great--I think it's the only one of their truly new foods that doesn't have fish!--and the carbs are nice and low. It does have three gums, which I know bother some cats.

Another option might be TIki, which is more expensive per can but pretty meaty/fishy, with shreds. It's very healthy food. I'd also recommend Weruva's Cats in the Kitchen cans: our cats love their various chicken flavors, which contain shreds. We don't feed them fish very often so we limited those mostly to chicken, chicken/beef, and chicken/turkey, but they've loved the several flavors with fish (there's one with tuna and salmon that they adore) that we've fed them.

I agree about Weruva's BFF packets, which do at least mix tuna and some sort of meat so they're not just fish. It looks like Soulistic's new packets with tuna are pretty similar. Not a surprise since Soulistic and Weruva are the same company.

 

[jennyjenny]

Thanks for the advice! I will check them out. I do make sure I get the varieties that are tuna and turkey or tuna and some other meat that's not fish. I believe there is one that's made with two kinds of fish.

I haven't tried the pate and shreds yet! I'll have to pick some of that up the next time I'm at the store. I didn't even notice that one there.

I appreciate the advice so much.

 

[lisahe]

I haven't tried the pate and shreds yet! I'll have to pick some of that up the next time I'm at the store. I didn't even notice that one there.
 

They just started selling them at our Petco. (I live in the Portland, Maine, area...) There are lots of new foods (most of them, unfortunately, with fish) so maybe you'll find something your cat will eat.

I also noticed that Soulistic now sells some foods in little cups: the chicken foods look like they're a little lower in carbs than their closest counterparts in the original line. And yes, Soulistic does make foods with multiple kinds of fish.

Good luck!

 

[Kat0121]

 
They just started selling them at our Petco. (I live in the Portland, Maine, area...) There are lots of new foods (most of them, unfortunately, with fish) so maybe you'll find something your cat will eat.

I also noticed that Soulistic now sells some foods in little cups: the chicken foods look like they're a little lower in carbs than their closest counterparts in the original line. And yes, Soulistic does make foods with multiple kinds of fish.

Good luck!

All 3 of my kids love the Soulistic Good Karma (shredded chicken) and the Harvest Sunrise (GK with bits of pumpkin). I don't buy the regular fish varieties. I tried a couple of cans of the newer line of the lamb and duck and the texture of those was horrible. They were very liquidy, like someone added a good amount of water to a pate and mixed it in. They did not like those at all and I almost had a mutiny on my hands. They got dumped and I had to give them something else. Most cat foods aren't what I'd call appetizing looking (the GK and HS just look like chicken so they aren't bad) but these were pretty nasty. 

I have 1 very picky eater, 1 sort of picky eater and 1 EXTREMELY picky eater. 

 

[lisahe]

 
Most cat foods aren't what I'd call appetizing looking (the GK and HS just look like chicken so they aren't bad) but these were pretty nasty. 

The chicken dinner in gelee was pretty icky-looking, too! I couldn't believe how much the cats liked it.

 

[Kat0121]

 

The chicken dinner in gelee was pretty icky-looking, too! I couldn't believe how much the cats liked it.

Yes it is. I grabbed a few of them by accident once because the can looks a lot like the Harvest Sunrise. Ew. Mine ate it but they didn't like it as much as they like the ones in the broth like gravy. That gelee is gross 

 

[lisahe]

 
Yes it is. I grabbed a few of them by accident once because the can looks a lot like the Harvest Sunrise. Ew. Mine ate it but they didn't like it as much as they like the ones in the broth like gravy. That gelee is gross 

But not as gross (to my human mind) as the Aromatic Chicken in the original Soulistic line, which our previous cat loved. That gelee stuff is super-gross! (It also reminds me of aspic meat people tried to feed me when I lived in Russia... I just couldn't eat that stuff!)

 

[Kat0121]

 
But not as gross (to my human mind) as the Aromatic Chicken in the original Soulistic line, which our previous cat loved. That gelee stuff is super-gross! (It also reminds me of aspic meat people tried to feed me when I lived in Russia... I just couldn't eat that stuff!)

That's the one I got. The gelee is like rubber and it was hard to mash up with a fork. I was annoyed because that can looks a lot like the one that the Harvest Sunrise comes in. 

The gelee reminds me a lot of Jello molds that were popular in the 70's here in the US.  Want some?