Most people believe that you should feed your cat with both dry food and wet food. Each type of food has its own benefits and disadvantages to consider, and that’s why there’s a belief that by feeding your cat with both types of food, you will be able to compare and contrast their advantages and disadvantages.
To understand how wet and dry food affect your pet, let’s discuss the way they affect your cat’s body, the benefits and the side-effects.
A Dry Food Only Based Diet
Dry sustenance is way easier to manage and set up. Most people go for it because of how convenient it is when it comes to feeding your pets, and the fact that it can help sharpen their teeth and improve their mandibular strength is one of the reasons why vets recommend it.
But there are also many things to consider. For example, this type of food is well known for being overly dry. It only contains about 10% of water, and it’ll make your cat start drinking water like crazy to try to keep its body hydrated.
If you give your little buddy a dry cat food-based diet, he or she will be more prone to suffering from kidney diseases and urinary complications. Although your kitty can fix this by drinking enough water, there are too many occasions where it won’t drink enough water to overcome the dehydration, and that’s why canned food is also added to this type of diet to avoid your pet from getting sick.
Still, it is way more convenient than canned food because dry food is less prone to spoiling. If you work and have to leave your cat alone most of the time, dry food becomes the perfect ally because you can just leave it there for your pet to eat without any worries. Place a couple of bowls filled with water, and it’ll be the perfect companion for them.
Adding Wet Sustenance to Your Pet’s Diet
Believe it or not, canned food contains up to 75% of water, making it pretty great to fulfil your cat’s daily liquid quota. It is also more easily added to a diet because it seems tastier to cats.
Of course, wet sustenance can be challenging to manage, it spoils quickly, and if you are not careful about it, it can get your little buddy sick in no time. Although changing to wet food might seem like a hassle (especially if you’re preoccupied with work), it is necessary so that your cat can be healthy.
If you take the challenge of feeding your cats with both types of food, they’ll remain healthy and strong; without you having to worry about any urinary complications.
Making the Transition Can Be Tough, But Possible
Did you know that dietary changes can stress cats and stress can actually affect how food benefits their bodies? If you are not careful enough, it may cause a wide variety of side-effects, so be cautious about it. If you want to avoid this, I recommend making changes bit by bit, slowly adding a new type of sustenance little by little.
Here is another advice you can follow when making the transition, but overall, you should be looking to understand your cat, so you get to know what it likes and dislikes.
Some Kitties Are Picky Eaters
The main reason why people give up doing the transition from dry to wet sustenance could be because their cats are picky eaters. If your buddy is one of those, you’ll have to spend some extra bucks picking different brands to see which one tingles your buddy’s belly.
When changing your cat’s diet, try new things every time to see which one works better. Some people like to give their cats dry food first and then followed by canned food once they are hungry. Other cats like to eat a combination of the two at the same time.
As I said earlier, it depends on each cat and how they like to eat things. That’s why you should pay attention and try different brands if possible.
Remember to be patient about it and take things easy. Let your kitty have some time to adapt and make sure to provide it with enough water during the process.
Signs of Dehydration
Always make sure to look out for signs of dehydration. Some common signs include rapid, heavy panting, drowsiness, and really dark urine.
If you can, try to always provide your cat with enough water to go by each day. If untreated, dehydration can bring a lot of harmful side-effects that can harm your cat’s health. Thankfully, it is difficult for your cat to reach this point, especially if your kitty is not the exercising type. Although most cats are like that, some cats like to go out on an adventure and hence, they may need more water to drink.
If you see that your cat does not drink water, you might as well try to change to a canned food diet to keep it hydrated and healthy.
Not a cat but dog owner? You should check out Visionary Pet for their range of low carb ketogenic dog food products!