I believe the hate stems from the cat food listed above. Our cat had a chicken allergy which caused him to lick/pluck the fur from his belly raw.. switched to the Whitefish recipe and within a month it all grew back…

I’m so happy I really am I sit here and look at Chase he’s 8 years old and he already has a blockage issue and has to take miralax twice daily quarter teaspoon. But I mean I have thrown some Blue wilderness in there here there but this morning he literally devouted and actually and he’s not much for chicken unless there’s chicken liver in it. And I just wanted to be as healthy as possible I mean well first he’s a certified therapy pet emotional support animal and he is very special he’s gotten me through so much so many times without him I don’t know what I do so thank you for the feedback

Thanks for sharing that valuable info with our readers, FL!

Veterinarian here! You should only compare diets using % Metabolizable Energy. Expressing a diet’s profile on a “% metabolizable energy or % ME” basis tells you what proportion of the calories in that diet are contributed from protein, fat, and carbohydrate. Comparing diets on a ME basis is the only way to fairly compare dry and canned commercial diets to each other and to home-cooked diets since it levels the playing field in terms of fiber, ash, and moisture contents (these 3 components make up the mass of the diet but in highly variable amounts among different diets, and don’t contribute calories).
The protein, fat and carbohydrate content of diets can be obtained from label information, or guaranteed analysis (GA): crude protein (measure of protein), crude fat (measure of lipids), crude fiber (measure of non-digestible carbohydrates), ashes (estimation of minerals), and moisture (measure of water). These are reported as % as is (grams /100 grams of food).

There is no value reflecting digestible carbohydrate content, so you estimate this by subtracting crude protein, fat, fiber, ashes and moisture from 100.

Label information is provided as minima (crude protein and fat) and maxima (crude fiber, ash, moisture) rather than average values. However, unless you have more detailed data (Typical Analysis), you need to estimate the values from the GA. Since these are given in terms of maximums and minimums, you are making some assumptions, but you can probably get in the ballpark
Many labels do not include ash in the GA, since it is not mandatory, so this is another source of error (it is better to get this value from the manufacturer if possible)
Crude fiber on a pet food label is not useful (its not the same as ‘dietary fiber’ on human food labels), and that this grossly underestimates the true fiber content of the food. This overestimation is especially true for diets with more soluble fiber, including those formulated as “chunks in gravy” type textures
All analytical limitations, particularly those of crude fiber mentioned above, are accumulated in the “carbohydrate” fraction, which usually overestimates starch due to soluble fiber being included here.
The modified Atwater factors used to estimate the ME provided by the macronutrients assume standard and homogeneous specific digestibility and bioavailability, therefore, energy content and calorie distribution estimated with these values can have additional errors. Some companies that provide % ME values for diets use more accurate values for protein, fat, and carbohydrate based on digestibility trials in dogs and cats.

Yikes! It might be worth re-checking the feeding guidelines on the food and discussing with your vet how to safely get your cat back to a healthy weight. If you’re looking for low-carb options, there are some recommendations here: https://cats.com/best-cat-food-diabetic-cats

Hi Alan, great question. It may be due to the levels of minerals in the food—these will sometimes act like tiny pieces of metal and cause sparks in the microwave.