Food for sensitive stomachs?

[saitenyo]

My younger lynx point siamese mix, Athena, has had soft stools and bad gas since the day we brought her home (at 4 months). I was hoping it was just the food the shelter had her on (Natural Balance dry), and that it would improve once we switched her over to our food (which we did gradually obviously) but she's been on the new food (Blue Buffalo Healthy Growth for Kittens, dry) for over a month now and has shown no improvement.

We did take her to the vet pretty early on in this process, and they ran a stool test for parasites, which came back negative. We were given medication (Metronidazole I believe?) just to be safe. She finished her medicine and didn't really show any signs of improvement, so at this point we're thinking it's probably diet-related. She's in great health otherwise, just has very mushy, very smelly poo.

I've been told by a few people that siamese/siamese mixes can be prone to digestive issues/sensitivities? Does anyone have any experience with this or specific food recommendations?

Ideally I'd also like to introduce a nice amount of wet food into her diet (as our other cat gets). At this point I'm thinking about putting her on a combination of Wellness canned kitten formula and some kind of grain-free dry food. The only grain-free dry food I've been able to find locally is By Nature, but I may check some other stores for Wellness CORE. Does anyone have experience with either of these?

Any advice is welcome!

[Ducman69]

1) No matter what I tried, while Wesley was perfectly fine, Buttercup had soft poops on Blue Buffalo Chicken Kitten dry food. Finally during troubleshooting, I transitioned her off to the rest of the Purina One I had, and poops went back to normal. I then thought maybe coincidence and finished the big bag of Blue Buffalo w/ her and back to soft, then when finished went to Wellness Kitten Chicken and was fine again.

So it could be an allergy to an ingredient that just so happens to be in BB.

2) Go to amazon and grab some Purina FortiFlora. Its a delicioso powder that kitties love, and even though its just a probiotic it seems to work great for soft stools in many cats. Some have raised concerns that it contains meat byproducts though, so other probiotics could be tried as well, but I personally had a great experience w/ FortiFlora given when antibiotic treatment gave soft stools.

My cats liked the Wellness kitten formula chicken wet food, but even though they are still technically kittens, I just didn't see a big difference in the adult vs kitten formula, and so now transitioned them to regular Wellness Chicken formula. Its still more nutritionally dense with more protein than many competitors kitten formulas, and its available in 12.5 oz cans on Amazon which saves big time on those 3oz kitten cans.

[saitenyo]

Yeah, I'd really love to transition them to adult food whenever I can. My older cat, Apollo (he's 8 months), is giant already and just devours those tiny 3 oz cans. I keep reading so much mixed info on that. Some say there's no need to feed kitten-specific food, some say 8 months is fine, some say wait until they're a year old.

Here's another question I just thought of...would food gulping cause stomach upset?

Athena's belly has been a bit overly round for a while, which is another reason I was worried about a parasite like giardia, but she definitely tested negative for that.

I spoke to her foster at the rescue, and she told me Athena had to be force-fed with a tube for a little while because she was extremely ill and starving when they found her. She was pretty (almost unhealthily) skinny when we adopted her, and while she looks much much healthier now, I'm wondering if she's eating her food too fast? Could it be she's still reacting to her earlier malnutrition?

I am hoping just switching off the BB will help. A few google searches have suggested other people have had similar problems with their chicken formulas for whatever reason.

[Ducman69]

I think they are both right.

Kittens just need good nutritionally dense food. For the cheap brands, you only get that with their kitten formulas, and the adult formulas have less protein/fat and more fillers. With the quality foods, the difference is negligible. I put the Wellness stats back to back from their website, and its nearly identical. I think Wellness just knows that many shoppers are specifically looking for "kitten food" for their kitten, and if they didn't label some of their cans as such, they would lose those sales for no good reason. The other alternative is some manufacturers of quality food label it "for all life stages".

Food gulping I know for a fact causes throw-up, but I hadn't heard of it causing diarrhea.

If the blitzkrieg food attack is really bad, this is well reviewed to slow their roll:

Amazon.com: MultiVet SlimCat Food Distributor Ball, Blue: Kitchen & Dining

Amazon.com: MultiVet SlimCat Food Distributor Ball, Blue: Kitchen & Dining

They just tap it with their paw to get the food out. I got two of em, they worked, but I stopped using it when I got them onto Wellness dry. They must not like the taste as much, as they eat it much slower. They used to inhale Purina One.

[saitenyo]

I should probably watch her next time she eats, to see if she is gulping. If so, I may look into that distributor, thank you!

And to clarify, she doesn't have outright diarrhea (thankfully). She had it once but I think the culprit there was she managed to drink some milk from my cereal bowl that morning.

It's dark, normal color, just soft. Kind of like toothpaste. We always have to clean her bottom off afterward. And it smells pretty bad in comparison to our other cat's.
And her gas is...room-clearing.

[furryfriends251]

Is there any reason you want/have to feed dry food? Wet food is so much better for cats. If you are willing to put a bit of extra work into what you feed them you should feed them a raw diet. Go over to the special raw feeding subforum on here if you have any raw specific questions (more raw feeding people will see the topic there).

Here are some things to read about what to feed a cat or kitten:

Feeding Your Cat: Know The Basis of Feline Nutrition
Species-Inappropriate: The Dangers of Dry Food (there are many other articles on that site as well that are great to read)
The Truth About Dry Cat Food from Blakkatz
Benefits of Raw (as well as the rest of the articles on that site)

Personally, I do not like FortiFlora (nasty ingrediants), and would much prefer something such as Holistic Select - Digestive Aid - Holistic Transition. Cats LOVE the taste of that as well; but it much better for them.

A article more specific to problems like runny stools: Answers: Add More Fiber or Switch to a Raw Diet?

[saitenyo]

I've researched raw, and not ready to make the switch at the moment. Honestly my ideal goal for their diet is just variety. That's a philosophy I try to live by in my own diet, and feel the same basic principles about the benefits of a varied diet would apply to other living things as well.

I've heard so much conflicting information about which diet is most beneficial that I figure feeding them a variety of things will at least cover all my bases. Kibble for crunch enjoyment, tartar control, convenience on the occasional day we're not around, financial benefits, and canned for the moisture/protein content.

I'm definitely not opposed to supplementing their diets with additional meat, and may end up doing that.

Is there a significant benefit to raw over cooked meat added to the diet? I admit I'm also slightly paranoid about not preparing a raw diet properly and making my cat sick because of it. I've little meat-preparation experience myself (I don't eat it) and while I can obviously learn, I obviously don't want to make any mistakes that could cost my pets their health. For example I have absolutely no idea how you tell when meat has gone bad. It all smells foul to me, even when fresh.

[koobe]

I do not know too much about BB, but I would suggest not to give Wellness kitten if she already has soft poo. Cheetah came from the shelter with a long report. I did not read through it since the volunteer told me he was healthy and needed to feed Wellness kitten formula twice a day.
Cheetah had soft poo for the first week, and I called the shelter, the shelter said Cheetah has been having dirrahea when he was on Wellness kitten.
Wellness kitten is a very dense formula, and not all kittens can take it. I removed Wellness kitten from Cheetah's diet and he was fine then. When I gave him again at 8 months old, he was fine too.

[koobe]

Originally Posted by saitenyo

I've researched raw, and not ready to make the switch at the moment. Honestly my ideal goal for their diet is just variety. That's a philosophy I try to live by in my own diet, and feel the same basic principles about the benefits of a varied diet would apply to other living things as well.

I've heard so much conflicting information about which diet is most beneficial that I figure feeding them a variety of things will at least cover all my bases. Kibble for crunch enjoyment, tartar control, convenience on the occasional day we're not around, financial benefits, and canned for the moisture/protein content.

I'm definitely not opposed to supplementing their diets with additional meat, and may end up doing that.

Is there a significant benefit to raw over cooked meat added to the diet? I admit I'm also slightly paranoid about not preparing a raw diet properly and making my cat sick because of it. I've little meat-preparation experience myself (I don't eat it) and while I can obviously learn, I obviously don't want to make any mistakes that could cost my pets their health. For example I have absolutely no idea how you tell when meat has gone bad. It all smells foul to me, even when fresh.

I feed raw too, I believe in variety too, so I feed my cats different types of meat, chicken, turkey, pork, quail, beef and lamb. I am a new cat owners (1 yr), so I can't tell the benefits in a long run. But my cats are very energetic, they have white clean teeth, and their poos do not smell at all.

I am afraid of messing up my homemade raw too, so I feed them 1/4 to 1/3 of commercial raw. I always look at their poos to see if they are in good shape (LOL) and of course vet check ups too. But if you can't tell if the meat has gone bad, that might be a problem.

[Ducman69]

Originally Posted by koobe

Wellness kitten is a very dense formula, and not all kittens can take it. I removed Wellness kitten from Cheetah's diet and he was fine then. When I gave him again at 8 months old, he was fine too.

Hmmm... it doesn't seem that dense. Its not like EVO which is like 50% protein, where I had heard some people had issues due to it being so rich. Label says: 36% protein, 18% fat, 3950kcal/kg for Wellness Kitten.

Thats actually less protein per weight than a lot of competitors. *shrugs*