What to feed a non-diabetic cat?

[Cini Mini's Mom]

Hi, Cini Mini is the reason why I am here at this forum and he is doing wonderfully on the tight regulation protocol and eating only low carb canned food.

I have two "civvie" cats, Tabasco and Honey who are not diabetic. Honey is 15 years old and in very good health, and Tabasco is almost 3 years old and is the baddest cat ...errr...in very good health.

I have been feeding Tabasco and Honey the rest of the Purina DM dry that I bought for Cini Mini and they eat canned food as well but I am wondering for a young cat and an elderly cat if they really need the restricted carbs like Cini Mini does?

Once the dry food runs out (which shouldn't be too much longer) I may go to all canned for them. I did see on Binky's Dry Food page that there's one dry diet that's 8% carbs - Innova EVO Cat & Kitten. What's the opinion on feeding that as a dry?

 

[ohbell]

Have you considered raw? I have transitioned 2 of 3 girls onto 80% raw (rest is low carb from Binkys list) - following Dr. Lisas recipe. Otherwise, Lil (Ittle) Sista eats what Sugar Bean eats... Low carb Ittle Sista is about 5-6 months old and she LOVES raw foods. Wish I would have known and started Bean out when she was little as well as my Civvie Slappy.
Good luck and keep us posted

 

[Carl & Polly & Bob (GA)]

Cathy,
If it were me, I would not feed any of the kitties dry once that bag runs out. Check out Dr. Lisa's site:
http://catinfo.org/

After reading that, I will never buy dry cat food again. With non-diabetics, it isn't really carbs that is the problem, but low-carb is better for all cats. Dry food is kinda like playing russian roulette with all sorts of health problems.

Carl

 

[Cini Mini's Mom]

Thanks, Carl.

I was glancing through it and although I don't have the time to make food for the kitties I did pick up a few good tips on feeding the canned. I didn't think about freezing ahead of time and then leaving the frozen canned food out during the day.

 

[squeem3]

Your non-diabetics can eat the same food as your diabetic :smile:

Dry food is a no-no, even for diabetics. Dry food is one reason why so many cats end up diabetic in the first place. Eve a low carb grain free dry food like EVO isn't great. Now there are people here who do feed dry food to their non-diabetics beause of various reasons and they try to keep the diabetic away from the dry food as much as possible.

You can buy commerical raw pet food at most pet stores now. It does end up costing more than making raw food yourself using a recipie but maybe that is an option. You could even do a sort of homemade raw by using your own store purchased meats (or from a raw food pet supply place) and adding a pre-mix such as TC Instinct to the cut up meat so that the end result is nutritionally complete for your cats.

 

[Cini Mini's Mom]

Hi squeem3.

No worries on the diabetic cat being able to get to dry food. The diabetic cat has been blind since birth and the dry food is in two locations that he would not attempt to make a jump. He's a mountain climber and will go from one sure spot to the next but a sheer jump from the ground, which is easy for any sighted cat, he's never been able to do.It's in two places in the house and he can't get to either one.

And yes, the non-diabetics do eat the same canned food as the diabetic cat but one of them (the younger one) refuses to eat all varieties of canned food that I put out. So, I leave the dry out for them so they have a choice in case they don't like what's on the canned food menu.