LT here. Well, this is a topic I love to talk about because I have a Big Appetite! In fact, singing, sleeping, and eating are my favorite things! Nothing like getting up in the morning – hitting the box – and then cracking open a can of wet food! During the day I like to keep some dry food handy for snacks and then crack open another can of wet food before hitting the box and fading off to la-la land! Then I dream of singing, sleeping, and eating until I wake. It’s a beautiful circle of life!
So, let’s get to this review. I, of course, spent a lot of time trying each of these foods (very important) to make sure I liked them. And I did like them all. But, the taste is important but I know the humans that work for me want to make sure I am healthy (to you cats – if your human does not care then get a new human). So the ingredients do matter!
I do want to give a shout-out to All About Cats – Mallory Crusta does a great job in her article about the best healthy cat foods – so check it out! Mallory really goes for quality – which is a good thing and humans should always put that first. Remember, there is no amount of money that is too great to spend on a cat! She also has the best budget cat food as well because there are lots of cat loving humans that have tight budgets.
I could go on for hundreds of pages about cat food but let me hit the highlights and try to make this blog useful for you cats and humans.
Small cat food is big on flavor! Mallory mentions they use “human-grade” ingredients (when I have time I actually have my humans make food for me at home and then they can have the left-overs). Smalls food is delivered frozen and you can subscribe for ease of making sure you have a good supply on hand. Let it thaw before feeding your cat although I do like a cat food sickle now and then on a hot day.
For you cats with a gourmet pallet and humans that have some bang – try Ziwi Peak. It’s made in New Zealand so here is a shout out to my Kiwi friends! Now this food is packed with ethically sourced proteins and provides lots of nutrition. It’s even got some green mussels in it – very cool! Mussels for my muscles! The flavor is fairly exotic and I have no problem enjoying a can of Friskies so some of you cats may take a few meals to get used to the high-quality ingredients!
I care a lot about my fellow creatures so I do like it when a cat food maker uses ethically sourced ingredients. One that does that is Open Farm. I really enjoyed the taste and most of my friends did too! I also like the fact that Open Farm uses pumpkin as an ingredient. I believe that the more balanced a diet is the better – even though I am a carnivore.
Speaking of a balanced diet, another manufacturer is Raised Right Pets. Again, some fruits and veggies are included while still maintaining the protein that carnivores like me and my friends need. Quality is key here again – just looking at the food when opening the can lets you know it is high quality.
Mallory covers the high-quality cat foods very well. But let’s consider the brands that most see when they go into a grocery store or Target or something along those lines. Petfoodratings.org does a good job of reviewing a variety of cat foods – some expensive and some not so expensive. Cat foods like 9 Lives, Friskies, and Fancy Feast show up on here. I must admit the number of stars and the price seems to match for the most part.
For me, I recognize quality but I do like the brands that most cats eat and I have eaten those most of my life. Believe it or not, I am a Friskies and Fancy Feast Fan (is that too many “f’s”). Maybe I’m a junk food cat but I get lots of exercises so I do stay in shape. There is a dry food that I have tried and like a lot. It’s called Canidae Pure. I see that it gets 4 stars and only has 2 dollar signs (the chart goes up to 4) – so it’s not too expensive. It is great to have a bowl of that around – if you are a cat that controls yourself. There is another Canidae type of food that also gets 4 stars. I really like their bags too and they are trying to be sustainable – not easy or cheap to do – good job!
Again, I could write a book on cat food. My humans are always trying to give me something that I like. I’m pretty easy to please and I do like a treat now and then. Food is very important so take a look at the various websites to see the results of the research. But make sure your cats get plenty of exercise – humans, you must have the right environment! Having some cat toys or just some string we can chase is good. Remember if you play with us it is less likely we will shred your curtains, socks, and knock heirlooms off your shelves!
Stay cool,
LT
