Cat Food -

[Jan Rebecca]

When I got Satin she had been getting fed Friskies cat food - Tuffy was getting fed kitten Purina One cat food - so I now have Satin switched to the Purina One kitten food (even though she is a cat and Tuffy kitten - I was told the only diff is protein amounts and should be ok since she doesn't have a weight issue) Anywho - now that I've got them both eating the Purina One kitten chow - with no problem, I've started them on Wellness - just little bits of course mixed in, to make the change slowly.

My question is - since Satin is off the Friskies cat food her BM's do not stink nearly as much - does cheaper cat food make them stink more? LoL - I know - weird question but I was just curious or is something else making the change in smell?

AND is it really true what it says on the Wellness cat food bag? That the better food caused less stinky bms and also less shedding? or do they just add that stuff to make you buy it?

[saitenyo]

If my personal experience is any indication, then definitely. I don't know about shedding, but Athena had seriously stinky poo (and soft stool) as some of you guys recall from my first thread on here.

The solution ended up being changing her food. In her case I think she had trouble digesting grain. As soon as she'd been on an all grain-free diet for a little while, she started smelling dramatically better. No more gas, no more horrifically stinky poo. Purina one's not grain-free so I don't know if a grain intolerance is the issue, but it's definitely possible that transitioning them to higher-quality food/adding Wellness to their diet is helping.

[Jan Rebecca]

What kind of food do you feed yours that is grain free?

[saitenyo]

Originally Posted by Jan Rebecca

What kind of food do you feed yours that is grain free?

I rotate a couple different brands/flavors. Mine get Wellness, Blue Buffalo Wilderness, and Merrick.

Blue Buffalo's Wilderness line is all grain-free, dry or canned.

Most canned Wellness is grain-free but it depends on the flavor, so you have to check the labels. I think the only ones that aren't grain-free are Chicken & Lobster, Salmon and Trout, Sardine, and Shrimp & Crab. Their standard dry line is not grain-free, but they make a specific grain-free dry called Wellness Core which I give to my cats in addition to their canned food.

Merrick's Before Grain line canned or dry are all grain-free. Some of their Gourmet Entrees are grain-free. They have quite a few of those and it's been a while since I last looked at them all, but the ones I know are grain-free off the top of my head are Cowboy Cookout, Grammy's Pot Pie, Turducken, and Thanksgiving Day Dinner.

There are a number of other options too that I don't use, simply because they're not readily available in my area. Some that I can recall that are either all grain-free or have grain-free lines are Evo, Nature's Variety, Orijen, By Nature, and Taste of the Wild.

[Susan]

A good diet will help to "improve" the smell and reduce shedding.

[~Siameseifuplz~]

Diet is capable of making a HUGE difference in poop. Willie's poop was terrible on all dry foods, stinky and really loose. On raw it was nearly odorless as well as small and hard. On all wet it's somewhere in between. Neko's on the other hand stays perfect regardless of what he eats. There is a small increase in odor when he eats dry food, but nothing significant.

Coats can also change a lot, food affects the health of the skin (in people too) which in turn will affect the hair. Healthy food means healthy skin which leads to less shedding and dandruff. I don't generally notice a huge difference in my two though, not that I can remember anyways. But in some animals the difference is amazing.
But remember just because it is high quality doesn't mean it entirely agrees with your pets body. For example my two were on Felidae dry food a couple of years ago, they did great on it. The food had some rice but I believe those were the only grains. However when their changed their formula, adding more grains, I switched them to Before Grain, a grain free dry food. However on this food, even after a few months, their poop was disgusting. After asking about it on the forum we decided it might be the large amount of potato in before grain (dry food that doesn't have grains MUST have some other carb to bind the food together, usually it's potato) so I switched them to California Natural which has no potato but has rice. Their poop problem dissapeared. So while the ingredients in Before Grain may be more appealing because they have no grains, they didn't sit right with my particular cat. So you need to find a food that has good ingredients overall, but also has good ingredients for your specific cat.

[Pineapple]

I haven't noticed a smell difference, but I wasn't really paying attention to smell, and my cat was on high quality dry before we switched her to high quality wet (with some dry occasionally for a treat).

What I have noticed is a difference in her coat and how often she urinates. She definitely doesn't shed as much. She also urinates more and her poops are firm. I assume this is good – if she were a human, it would mean she was getting plenty of fluid and having regular/normal BMs. Her poops aren't smelly too often in general.

I feed Evo, Innova (I got a bulk deal online) and sometimes BB wet (if I'm at PetSmart and splurge on a few, little cans). I may switch brands depending on when I need to reorder in bulk and what is on sale, but it will always be high quality.

[MowMow]

Pineapple, where you do buy your Evo bulk online? I just switched to it as well and I prefer buying multiple cases at a time if possible.

Thanks.

[Cats Rule]

Both my cats had problems on dry foods, and even higher quality dry foods, but the better the food, the less problems with smelly BMs/runny BMs they had. Cubby had bad diarrhea when I took him home and the only thing that stopped it was raw meat feeding.

When I took Luke off dry foods a couple years ago, his digestion improved big time. He used to have BMs that smelled so bad (on dry foods) it would make me want to open the windows in the Wintertime.

Smelly BMs are usually caused by cats eating indigestible grains, IMHO. I feed them both raw meats now and I seldom notice any odor form their BMs.