Food allergies/intolerances in cats

[Kathi]

For 3 years I've been trying to figure out what causes my cat Meggie allergy problems. Fortunately, she responds to cortisone shots but I have to give them to her about every 6 weeks.

I started eliminating certain foods. First I eliminated food with eggs, soy and wheat. No good. Then I eliminated tuna and corn. Now I've eliminated fish, turkey and chicken. The vet recommends 1 protein (preferably one the cat is not familiar with,) and 2 carbs. The unfamiliar protein is usually rabbit, duck or venison.

Currently I'm feeding her Natural Balance's Duck and Green Pea Limited Ingredient Formula canned cat food. It's seems to be helping, she doesn't seem to be viciously attacking herself. I've read it can take up to 3 mos. before the offending ingredient is out of their system.

I found it is very difficult to find cat foods without chicken and thought I would have to get a prescription limited ingredient food or do raw but as long as she's eating this food I don't plan to make changes.

I board my cat when out of town a special diet feeding is not an issue.

[indysteel]

I can't remember if Henry's tried Blue Buffalo. Of the premiums, he'll eat some varieties of Merrick and he's so-so about Wellness brand. I tried a can of Innova EVO canned food and he hated it. For better or worse, he prefers the cheaper stuff. I found a good website that provides a breakdown of the nutritional content of most available canned foods, according to both brand and flavor. I mostly go by the protein to carb ratio when choosing. I was amazed at how bad some of the brands I always thought were good for cats are, at least in terms of carb content. Some may disagree, but I'd rather Henry ate a variety of Friskies with an ideal protein/fat/carb mix than a seemingly premium food with too many carbs. But mostly, I just want to eat something that isn't dry food. He's so picky.

[Thorn]

I tried a can of Innova EVO canned food and he hated it.

Interesting...they'll eat the duck, but won't touch the beef or venison. My boy will eat anything (and has the girth to prove it), but when I put down the venison he looked at me as if the plate were empty. Wouldn't even try it.

[Becky]

This is all really good information- thank you all!

I thought that I'd pinpointed wheat as a possible problem....and then I got home and realized that I'd looked up the wrong ingedients list online So now I'm not so sure.... (Speaking of ingredients lists: Holy fine print, Batman! How's a responsible owner supposed to do their homework?)

Thorn, your story resonated with me, and is enough anecdotal evidence for me to keep pursuing this. I'm disappointed that the vet never mentioned food issues as a potential cause for the alopecia to me....but I'm glad that my TE friends have!

[Koronin]

Actually corn is a major allergy issue for cats.

One of our cats is allergic to corn, which sucks because she actually needs a prescription diet which of course has corn in it. (However dealing with the allergies is a lot better than dealing with stones in her bladder). So we have the Royal Canin prescription food. The other dry food we feed is Nature's Variety Instinct. Nature's Variety also has a wet food which all 3 of our cats like. I have one that is exceptionally picky about what she eats and she actually loves Nature's Variety wet and dry foods. However you are not going to find this food in Petsmart or Petco. We actually have to drive 2 hours to a local pet store in Raleigh to get it.

[indysteel]

Hmm; I'll have to try Nature's Variety. The pet store most convenient for me apparently sells it. Thanks for the tip.

[Eden]

Actually corn is a major allergy issue for cats.

I wouldn't really call it an allergy..... it's more like cats just aren't meant to eat grains and veggies.... they are meant to eat critters... Their bodies and digestive systems don't work like a humans (or even like a dog's for that matter) To paraphrase something I once saw, when was the last time you saw a cat out raiding the corn field...

I was unable to get my male (who is a puker) to tolerate raw food, or I'd have gone that route, but 2nd best, I feed mine Ziwi Peak. It is meat, meat and meat... no grains, no veggies period (except perhaps what the critters in the can have eaten - I'd swear I saw a pea in there once or twice...)

[Koronin]

They really aren't meant to eat grains, but they can be allergic to them as well. Our one cat gets itchy bumps from eating any food with corn in it. We really have two choices, an allergy shot (which we'd prefer not to do) or using a waterless cat bath with oatmeal, which helps her immensely.

indysteel, if your local pet store carries, definitely give it a try. For the dry food there are three varieties. Chicken, duck and rabbit. My cats do not like the duck, and do like the chicken. Haven't tried the rabbit yet. There are a couple more choices in the wet food.

[Thorn]

Owner of a gluten intolerent cat here. For 10 years I apparently tortured the poor thing with quality dry cat food. She was an overgroomer -- had basically no hair on her belly and thin everywhere else. Vet said the same thing "psychogenic alopecia".

Reading some posts here had us switch over to canned. The barfing slowed down, but it was when we figured out the gluten correlation that we really got things under control. We started with Wellness, but as more and more cat foods are coming out with fewer unpronouncable ingredients and no gluten, we've branched out.

Turns out we've now removed Wellness from the list as we were having small incidents every now and then. Wellness has some foods with gluten so we questioned line contamination. It is looking like Wholistic Select might also be removed from our list (they have one flavor that has barley). The correlation isn't quite as strong, tho, and the cats like it so, for now, it stays.

But, since consciously trying to keep the gluten out of the diet, the barfing has dropped. It can make for long trips at the cat food store as we read the fine print ingredient on every can.

BTW, if your cat won't eat canned food, there are some gluten-free dry foods now. We've started adding some of the dry back in for days when we're gone all day without any problems.