Kitty likely has IBD -- diet recommendations?

[Owlie]

Isis P. Kitty can be a bit of a piggy if she's stressed. I have tried to get her to eat canned food, but she doesn't like it. (I'm not sure she's aware that it's food. She'll eat it if I mix it up with her dry food and feed it to her in chunks like a treat. I think she believes that real food is dry and crunchy.) She also doesn't care for meat, unless it's steak. So she gets Blue Buffalo dry food and lots of water.

[zoom-zoom]

Isis P. Kitty can be a bit of a piggy if she's stressed. I have tried to get her to eat canned food, but she doesn't like it. (I'm not sure she's aware that it's food. She'll eat it if I mix it up with her dry food and feed it to her in chunks like a treat. I think she believes that real food is dry and crunchy.) She also doesn't care for meat, unless it's steak. So she gets Blue Buffalo dry food and lots of water.

Ha, we had cats growing up who wouldn't touch canned. Now we're having a hard time getting our boys to eat dry at all. They've all decided that they much prefer "mooshy food." It's interesting to see how much less water they are drinking now, too.

[indysteel]

Our 13-year old loves dry because that's what he grew up with. It wasn't until he started to have some urinary issues that I realized that canned was better. But he doesn't understand that while he can graze on the dry, he has to eat the wet on command. So, he'll only eat a tablespoon at a time and sometimes not even that. It can be frustrating. Our younger cats loves canned, so I'm glad to have developed their palate for the stuff at a young age, but they still love dry, too. Interesting, though, two of the three cats really don't like premium canned food (like Blue Buffalo or Innova). While I'd be happy to pay more for higher quality, they prefer the cheap stuff. So, that's what they get.

Prowl sounds like an interesting option. Out of curiosity, once it's rehydrated, can it sit out at room temperature for long or does it spoil?

[zoom-zoom]

Interesting, though, two of the three cats really don't like premium canned food (like Blue Buffalo or Innova). While I'd be happy to pay more for higher quality, they prefer the cheap stuff. So, that's what they get.

Ours are stupid. They all seem to get bored with foods fast. We have to rotate a few things (Authority canned, Iams canned, Friskies canned--they like the Friskies best, probably because it's like junk food). None of them have much interest in dry, anymore.

If I end up starting to cook things for them I think I will probably make several different "stews" and freeze small portions so that they're eating different things.

Dang, I don't put this much effort into what WE eat!

[Becky]

Prowl sounds like an interesting option. Out of curiosity, once it's rehydrated, can it sit out at room temperature for long or does it spoil?

Nothing edible lasts that long in our house, so I've not had the opportunity to find out about spoilage To be safe, I would treat it like canned food and not leave it out for too long.

[zoom-zoom]

Just got the results from a stool sample dropped-off at the vet's office. Thor has no signs of parasites or other infection, so it's looking increasingly likely that IBD will be the diagnosis. The vet is gone until the weekend, so I probably won't hear from him until Sat. or Mon. to figure out what the next step is. I know he had wanted to try their cat-specific probiotics, too.

Interesting thing. I stopped by PetSmart to look at food and found that they have a new natural store brand (Simply Nourish)...all ingredients that I would eat and it was located in the aisle with all of the super premium brands like Blue and Wellness (but for about 2/3 the price). I bought a bag of one of the dry varieties (the canned were not a bad price, but I didn't like the amount of packaging--each can was inside a little cardboard sleeve...wasteful). Turkey is the main ingredient + steel cut oats, sweet potatoes, cranberry. I realized it was their brand when I got home and opened it and saw that the pieces were shaped exactly like their Authority brand (which we had been feeding our cats, until they all decided they were too good for dry and would only eat canned).

I opened the bag and they went nuts. I put a bit on top of their existing dry food (that they are barely picking at, now) and they inhaled it, picking around their old food. Cats are dumb.

[westtexas]

So, the only way to definitively diagnose IBD in cats is to do an intestinal biopsy. Before you jump to that, I would recommend a GI panel. I'm sure your vet has one available where you live, but if he's got the time, have him send it to the GI lab at Texas A&M. I have found that most older cats are very low on their cobalamin levels and simple B12 injections on a weekly basis for a while has cleared A LOT of their issues up before we jumped to invasive surgery. If you are ok with injecting your cat at home, most vets will draw up the 6 doses you need for you, I certainly would! B12 also acts as an appetite stimulant for some of these guys too.

As far as good goes - grain/soy free and low-carb are what I suggest. Often, those foods that leave out corn or soy just fill the diet full of wheat or another plant-based protein. Cats need animal protein, and plant protein is far from equivalent. The food I feed my kitties is EVO (www.evopet.com), which is the lowest carbohydrate dry food out there on the market. Keep in mind with these low carb, high protein foods that the initial cost up front is significantly higher than with other brands. BUT they are WAY more calorically dense - often twice as much as other major brands - so make sure you read the back of the bag carefully. Most kitties need about 180-220 kcal/day, depending on their frame size, which in EVO is about 1/3-1/2 cup per day. The canned food I like best is Wellness CORE, which is the lowest carb canned food out there too, I believe. Sometimes IBD is more of a carbohydrate maldigestion issue than the ingredients themselves.

HTH.

[zoom-zoom]

Thanks! A GI panel does sound like the best next step, though he already seems in love with this new PetSmart brand "Simply Nourish" food. I like the ingredients...it's still mostly meat and no corn. The vet suspected that some of his diarrhea issues could be related to canned food and the start of his diarrhea did sort of coincide with us starting canned foods. Our old, late female got to where she couldn't easily digest dry and when we switched her to canned the boys went nuts for it. Eventually it got to where they turned-up their noses at dry, entirely. It was love at first bite with this new food, so we'll see if that makes a difference. Thor definitely seems brighter-eyed and less on-edge, today. Perhaps he's back on the road to his usual old behavior of eating and napping and eating and napping. Lately he'd been harassing us for food, sleeping less, and tense (for him).

It makes sense that the more nutritionally dense the food, the less a cat has to eat to be satisfied. That works for us, too. The better I eat, the less I eat. If only healthy stuff could taste like junk food...I am a major junk food junkie!

If we ended up having to give him B12 injections I'm not sure if we'd be able to do that ourselves. Our female was such a doll and so tolerant of shots, but Thor is really strong and does not deal well with that, at least not at the vet's office.