shlanon: Fiber has it's good and bad advantages, don't get me wrong. But for weight loss reasons in cats, it's important to have it fairly low. In my personal opinion 3% or less. But this need to go along with controlled feeding and proper exersize.
While fiber can make them feel fuller, and sometimes lead them to eating a bit less at meal times, and theoretically resulting in weight loss, a lot of the light or weight loss specific formulas add in too much fiber (5-7%) when this happens often times you are loosing valuable protein sources, and increasing the amount of products which the cat can really gain little to no nutritional value from. And sometimes this can result in the cat not loosing any weight at all, and also can lead to the problem of an improper diet, effecting their over all health.
The source of the fiber (carbohydrates) is also important. Using something like white & brown rice or millet is far better then corn products or peanut hulls etc.
About the fiber for the allowed absorbtion of nutrients, it can slow down the fast metabolizm of our cats, and this is a good thing, so that they can absorb and utilize more of the ingredients which are included in pet foods. The fat and Protein content are not the main causes of weight gain in a cats diet.
For any human needing to bulk up for a good exersize or weight lifting diet, they eat foods full of carbohydrates (aka fiber), this is added weight mind you. However, humans are more able to utilize more forms of fiber and more of it then cats. Cats are oblitorate carnivores, not omnivores, and it's best to keep as close to that train of thought as possible diet wise, while making sure they are not lacking any other requirements at the same time.
It's really a matter of how much fiber, the source, and the use for the individual animal that you have to take into account.
PaDunks vet was very smart to include a diet with a good protein source, a lot of vets do not know to do this, due to contradictions in teachings, or lack there of.
I hope this wasn't too confusing for you. I had a very stressfull evening at work tonight (we almost lost some poor little jack russell due to spontaneous and hard seizures, so I am very tired). If you'd like I can give you links to more information and research on this when I can. Or perhaps someone here has some usefull information too.
