What kind of food is better for a cat: dry food or canned food?

Answer 1

Canned food is a must. My sister fed her cat dry food only, and the poor thing wasn't getting enough liquid in its diet. It drank all the time. Then it stopped urinating. It turns out that most dry food raises the urine pH. The cat had developed crystals in its urine and had to have an $800 surgery because its kidney were failing. The vet told her she had to at least feed it SOME canned food to avoid future problems.

Answer 2

HOLY CRAP! I can't believe all the ignorant people out here. I'm appalled but not shocked.

DRY FOOD DOES NOT. DOES NOT. DOES NOT. CLEAN THE TEETH!

And canned food does not rot the teeth.

There are good and bad varieties of both. But in the end, CANNED FOOD IS BETTER. Or I should say WET food is better.

It will keep cats properly hydrated which does NOT happen with dry food because cats don't drink enough water. Canned foods are typically lower in carbs, and being obligate carnivores, cats need to eat high protein, low carb diets.

Now, I couldn't care less if I get best answer - but I DO want you to believe me and the few others who know what they are talking about. Look at the links I've provided and read the answers for yourself. Don't believe the morons who based their "facts" on word of mouth.

I want to add that IMHO it's ok if you feed half dry and half wet (just not mixed together). The dry serves no purpose for the cat but sometimes owners find it more convenient for various reasons, or maybe the cat is just super finicky or whatever. But I feel that so long as the cat is getting some canned, it's not so bad.

Answer 3

There is some dispute about that. The kibble food is what I use, less messy. But I use a really good brand with no grains and a higher meat protein content and higher quality ingredients. It's Evo no grain. It would have the same essential vitamins and minerals as their canned food. A grocery store canned food would not be as good as these high quality other brands though, so be careful what you feed either way. You want a food that's closer to 50 percent meat protein with less fillers such as corn, and wheat. Personally, I think rice and barley is okay, but... Corn and wheat has been known to cause skin allergies, digestive disorders and obesity in cats AND dogs. Dogs need more grain than cats, however since they are omnivores and cats are carnivores. I used to feed my cats Science diet lamb and rice or chicken and rice but it still has some corn in it so I switched when they were recalling petfood, just to be sure.
I think a combination of both dry and canned would be the best actually, but I don't feed canned.

Answer 4

Boy did you get some horrible answerd here


Nutrition since there are so many bad things out there is very important to your cat’s health
Contrary to what you may have heard; dry foods are not a great thing to feed a cat.
Please read the label on what you are feeding? What are the ingredients? Do you know what they mean? Is the first ingrdiant a muscle meat like chicken or meal or other things?
http://www.catinfo.org/#Learn_How_To_Read_a_Pet_Food_Ingredient_Label
Dry foods are the number 1 cause of diabetes in cats as well as being a huge contributing factor to kidney disease, obesity, crystals, u.t.i’s and a host of other problems. Food allergies are very common when feeding dry foods. Rashes, scabs behind the tail and on the chin are all symptoms
The problems associated with Dry food is that they are loaded with carbohydrates which many cats (carnivores) cannot process them. Also, Most of the moisture a cat needs is suppose to be in the food but in
Dry, 95% of it is zapped out of dry foods in the processing. Another thing, most use horrible ingredients and don't use a muscle meat as the primary ingredient and use vegetable based protein versus animal. Not good for an animal that has to eat meat to survive.
You want to pick a canned food w/o gravy (gravy=carbs) that uses a muscle meat as the first ingredient and doesn't have corn at least in the first 3 ingredients if at all. Fancy feast is a middle grade food with 9lives, friskies whiskas lower grade canned and wellness and merrick upper grade human quality foods. Also, dry food is not proven to be better for teeth. Does a hard pretzel clean your teeth or do pieces of it get stuck? http://www.felinefuture.com/nutrition/bpo_ch4a.php

Please read about cat nutrition.
http://www.newdestiny.us/nutritionbasics.html
http://www.catinfo.org/feline_obesity.htm
http://maxshouse.com/feline_nutrition.htm#Dry_Food_vs_Canned_Food.__Which_is_reall

Answer 5

Hi Nick...WHOA! Both Rune Amok, Ken and Cat provide the best information and supplied excellent links to substantiate their findings.

When cats eat raw meat in the wild they get hydration from the fresh meat juices as well as some roughage from the animals who are natural herbivores so in essence a quality canned food product would be better if someone wasn't comfortable to feed a raw diet.

We are have been exposed to so many commercial ads regarding dry food for cats, but in reality it's the manufacturer's who benefit rather than the cats. Cats are not naturally designed to eat dry--the products were designed for convenience for the owner.

Here's another link The Truth About Dry Food": http://www.blakkatz.com/dryfood.html

Answer 6

Well, I just brought my cats into the vet about an hour ago. He asked me if I fed my cats dry or wet food. I mostly feed them dry and occasional wet food for a treat. He told me that dry food can cause urinary blockage, but if I didn't see any problems, continue feeding them the dry food. I think they both have their positives and negatives. Whatever you choose keep your cat in check:)

Answer 7

With my cat I always have some dry food out, and as a treat once in a while ill give him some canned food.

Answer 8

Canned food is much better than dry food. Especially if you feed a high quality, grain free canned food (such as Wellness or Innova).

Cats are obligate carnivores and should eat a diet of MEAT—not grains and by-products. Read the ingredients on a bag of dry food, that will tell you which food is better (hint: corn should not be a part of a cat's diet).

The three key negative issues associated with dry food are:
1) type of protein - too high in plant-based versus animal-based proteins
2) carbohydrate load is too high
3) water content is too low

I used to believe that dry food was better. Then I spent a fortune on vet bills treating my cats for diabetes, CRF, and other health issues that could have been avoided if I had been feeding them a better diet. On dry food only, they both needed dental cleanings by the age of four, and one of my cats had to have 4 teeth removed when he was only 3 years old! (So much for the claim that "dry food is better for their teeth"!)

My vet completely supports the wet food diet that my boys are on (and she told me that most vets push the food that the pet food companies want to sell because the big pet food companies donate a lot of money to vet schools, conferences, etc).

If you feel you must feed dry food, choose a GRAIN FREE food like Serengeti or Wellness Core.

Please read the links on feline nutrition that I've provided, I think you'll find them to be very helpful. (The first two are written by vets.)

Answer 9

Canned is better. Cats eat raw meat i the wild and raw meat contains juices that hydrate them. So about 50% of water wild cats get comes from their food. Dry food has barley any moisture. It's very unnatural and cuases cats to drink more water. If you can't feed all canned, at least give dry in the morning and canned in the evening. Some excellent wet foods include Wellness,EVO,Innova,Merrick,and Wysong.

Answer 10

This Is An On-Going Question, The Answer Is Really Both:

A carnivorous diet is comprised of primarily protein and fat from animal tissue. They have teeth designed to tear flesh and a short and simple gastrointestinal tract, one suited for digestion and absorption of a concentrated, highly digestible diet. Dry foods typically contain 35-40% carbohydrate. Carbohydrates are nearly absent in the cat's natural diet. The cat obtains small amounts of carbohydrate through the stomach and intestines of her prey. Commercial dry foods, however, may contain as much as 45% - 50% carbohydrates.