Consumersearch.com conducted a comprehensive research on cat food including wet and dry cat food. Many cat food products
available at the supermarket contain little essential nutritional value and many undesirable ingredients. As your cat grows older, it is wise to pick the right cat food that will help your feline companion build a healthy, long lasting life. Here are the best foods by
category:
- Best canned cat food, but expensive: Wellness Chicken Formula
- Best-value canned cat food: Natural Balance Ultra Formula
- Best supermarket canned cat food: Fancy Feast Flaked Fish & Shrimp Feast
- Best dry cat food, but expensive: Wellness CORE
- Best value dry cat food: Natural Balance Ultra Premium
Top Canned Cat food:
- Natural Balance
- Nature's Logic
- Weruva Paw Lickin' Chicken
- Dr. Foster and Smith
- Halo's Spots Stew for Cats - Original Flavor
- Wellness Chicken
- Newman's Own Chicken and Brown Rice
- Evolve Natural Canned Chicken Formula
- Innova EVO
- Merrick
- Wysong Chicken Au Jus
Concerns about store brand Canned Cat Food:
(both premium and low-priced mainstream brands)
Premium brands such as Science Diet's canned cat food contain by-products, corn starch, corn gluten meal, soybean meal and wheat flour. Iams has some healthy choices, but certain varieties of can food also contain by-products.
Nutro's canned food does not contain corn, wheat or soy, and by-products, but the company has been involved in a controversy where a significant number of complaints and illness reports were raised by consumers.
Lower-priced mainstream brands have serious ingredient issues. 9Lives and Friskies contain meat by-product and poultry by-products which are not desirable for a cat's diet.
Fancy Feast Flaked Fish & Shrimp Feast and a few other Fancy Feast canned cat food contain no wheat, corn, soy, gluten or meat by-products, but not all Fancy Feast products are consistent in ingredients. Some such as Flaked Salmon & Ocean Whitefish Feast contain wheat, soy, corn, gluten and meat by products, so carefully reading the label is crucial when purchasing their products.
Top Dry Cat food:
- Innova EVO
- Wellness CORE Dry
- Wellness Complete Health Salmon
- Natural Balance Ultra Premium Cat Food
- Innova Dry Cat Food
- Evolve Dry Cat Food
- Nature's Variety Instinct Dry Cat Food
- California Natural Chicken and Rice
- Timberwolf Serengeti Chicken & Salmon Feline Diet
Concerns about Store Brand Dry Cat Food:
Many brands such as Nutro Natural Choice Complete Care and Eukanuba have gotten mixed reviews because though some Nutro products do not have by-products such as the chicken meal, they still contain certain undesirable ingredients such as corn gluten. Eukanuba had good reviews in the past, but the current ingredients have raised questions because the food contains by-product meal, corn meal and corn grits.
Science Diet Optimal Care Original also has raised consumers' concerns over the quality of their dry food. It lists many undesirable ingredients such as by-product meal, ground corn, brewers rice and animal fat.
Low-priced brands such as Purina Cat Chow and many of its varieties contain poultry by-product meal, corn meal, ground whole wheat, corn gluten meal, soy flour, brewers rice and beef tallow as main ingredients.
Sources:
http://www.consumersearch.com/cat-food
http://cats.about.com/od/catfoo1/tp/tpcannedadult.htm
http://cats.about.com/od/dryfood/tp/premdrycatfood.htm