Six diseases caused by dry cat food: switch to canned or homemade now!
Cancer, digestive problems like chronic diarrhea, kidney failure or disease, urinary tract disease, diabetes and obesity are the main diseases that could be eliminated by feeding your cat moist, canned or homemade cat food.
Dry cat food may be convenient and inexpensive, but the time and money you save may end up costing you more to keep your cat healthy. Recently, more and more studies show that dry cat food is too full of grains and fillers to be considered healthy for your cat. A common mistake that vets and common people make is to treat your cat like a little dog. A cat's physiology is completely different from a dogs. What works for dogs, kibble with a bowl of water, does not work for cats. Cats are carnivores, unlike dogs, cats can't be healthy with a lot of grains and fillers in their food.
Here are six diseases that have been directly linked to dry cat food:
1. Cancer - intestinal cancer in cats is a huge problem that could be solved if only people didn't feed their cats dry food. Stomach cancer is also a very common diagnosis for cats that are fed a primarily dry cat food diet. The processing of the grains creates toxins like acrylamide and others that have been known to cause cancer.
2. Digestive problems - people (vets included) seem to think it's normal - cats and digestive problems go hand in hand - but it doesn't have to be that way. Chronic diarrhea in cats, vomiting, bloody stool in cats, are all caused by the poor nutrition in the dry cat food. Those symptoms, chronic diarrhea in cats and vomiting are just your cat's body trying to eliminate the toxins and unhealthy food quickly. The dry cat food is essentially poisoning your cat and the cat's body is reacting by trying to get the poisons out.
3. Obesity - cats are not meant to be fat. I know the media portrays a funny image of big, fat, lazy cats, but it's no laughing matter when your cat starts getting other weight related illnesses and your vet bills go up or your cat dies. Basically, there are too many carbohydrates in dry cat food. The little cat's body can't process all that starch and it turns directly to fat. If you have a fat cat and you are trying those dry cat food "weight-loss" formulas and they just aren't working, try switching to canned food, your cat will eat less and will get better nutrition, the weight will come off.
4. Kidney disease in cats - Cats are not big on drinking water, think about it, in the wild, cats get most of the moisture they need from the animals they kill and eat. The blood, meat and organs all contain moisture so it is rare that cats need to get a drink. So here we go feeding cats dry food with very little moisture and hope they drink enough to compensate. It just doesn't happen, so cats are dehydrated, stones and kidney disease develop more often than it should.
5. Urinary tract disease - closely linked to kidney disease in cats - not enough moisture in the food causes inflammation and disease. Just feeding your cat canned food, even non prescription canned food protects your cat from Urinary Tract Disease.
6. Diabetes - high carbs in people and in cats causes diabetes. Even the so called "low Carb" formulas are still too high for your cat. All dry food requires starch to make it dry and the processing makes it like "candy" for your cats rather than nutritionally sound meals. So feeding your cat dry food is like feeding them candy all the time and we all know that no one can live on candy alone!
Please, for the sake of your cat's health and for your pocketbook, start feeding your cat canned or homemade food. You'll save money in the long run and improve the quality of your cat's life. Read about Duke, a cat whose life was saved by switching from dry cat food.
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My name is Melanie Walters and I love cats. I've started this blog to... You can read more about me and this blog in my "About Me" section.
What a load of rubbish your article is. I don't have the time or inclination to pen a huge reply, but here is what concerns me about your one eyed, alarmist article:
- "dry food causes stomach cancer". Which types? I just need to know, because as a veterinarian, when I am advising people on health, this is important. I need the proof too.
- "A common mistake that vets and common people make is to treat your cat like a little dog" - no actually I am well aware of the differences of the species.
- "people (vets included) seem to think it's normal - cats and digestive problems go hand in hand" - no actually I spend my professional life trying to solve these issues, rather than convince people it's normal.
- "Obesity...blah blah blah" - obesity is caused by too many calories, not enough exercise. This can happpen with dry food, canned food, home prepared, whatever. Just another example of the rubbishy information that the internet has spawned.
- "The dry cat food is essentially poisoning your cat and the cat's body is reacting by trying to get the poisons out" BULLSH1T. Just plain bull. Airy fairy waffle from someone who got their knowledge from the back of a ceral box.
- "start feeding your cat canned..." - yep, and vets will be so busy pulling rotten teeth out we won;t have time for all the cats 'poisoned' by dry food.
Cat owners beware. There is a reason why information on the internet is free.
Cameron (a well qualified vet)
Hi Cameron.
You are a vet? Cool. Perhaps you can tell me from what clinic you are from and what university did you study from. Because from your comments you sound more like an idiot rather than a well qualified vet.
Start commenting properly and perhaps I would look at you as an intellectual. But until then, you sound like that moron who has an attitude problem that I keep bumping into on my foray in the online gaming scene.
I am a cat owner and I have been warned. I have read numerous sites and some specialist have commented that dry cat food is a major source of diseases in cats. Look at the way these food are processed. Logic alone would dictate that its bad. For a vet not knowing... hmmm are you sure you are a vet?
Even then ... Who are you to dispute? And you are not THE authority in pet care. Grow up or go away. You are going to cause a lot of pets to die.
Hi Cameron,
While your swearing and emotional answer discredits your argument, you do bring up some points that I’d like to address. I still remain adamant that dry food is dangerous and causes the six diseases I mentioned.
Dry cat food contains grains as fillers and to help the kibble dehydrate. That is a fact that you nor the cat food industry can deny. Poisons applied to the grains is what caused death and disease among several cats in the spring 2007. But aside from that fact, cats do not easily metabolize grains. This, as a vet, you should know. You can’t feed what is essentially birdseed to a carnivorous animal without having some kind of negative reaction. No cat that ever walked this planet harvested grains and ground them up and ate them. Humans did that, and then fed it to cats in the form of dry cat food.
A cat’s body was designed to eat freshly killed animals, bones, sinew, internal organs and all. A cat’s body has not evolved to accept grains as a food source. These grains are causing cats to develop the diseases. If there were a way to make dry cat food without the grains and fillers, perhaps the result would be different, but as yet there is not and cats are suffering and their owners are suffering.
But I can understand your emotional response to my article. I have threatened your livelihood by making people think about what they are feeding their cats. I suppose dry cat food is single-handedly keeping you in business. Pet owners have to come to you to ‘cure’ the diseases caused by the dry cat food you say is ok for cats to eat. That must add up to a pretty good income. And you know that people will pay the price for the tests, medicine, check-ups, and treatments because they love their pets.
Clearly there is a rift forming in Veterinary Medicine between those who truly care about cats by recognizing that dry food is dangerous, and those who are trying to profit at the expense of innocent lives and the people who love them by saying it is ok to feed your cat dry food. I take it you are in the later category, Cameron Fay, a vet who is trying to profit at the expense of innocent lives. In contrast, there are several vets out there who support my point of view and were an integral part of my research:
Dr. Lisa A. Peirson, DVM
Dr. Shawn Messonnier, DVM
Dr. Jean Hofve, DVM
Dr. Hofve is North America's Leading expert in cat nutrition. Read her article “Why Cats Need Canned Food”
To address your concerns about pulling cats teeth please read “Does Dry Food Clean Teeth?”
Thanks for your comments Cameron. You have confirmed that some vets don't always look out for the best interest of cats. You are a prime example of why cat owners need to know this information. I will continue my research and continue to get the word out about cat health and nutrition.