Cat Food Questions

Cat food questions: these community members discuss overweight cats, transitioning to adult food, and choosing the best kibble.

Dry Cat Food 9 Year Maine Coon

Peggy in Iowa asks: What is the best dry food for my 9 year old Maine Coon? He's been on Blue Buffalo indoor adult hair ball control.

Reply:
Hi Peggy,
There are many high-quality act food options on the market nowadays!

Blue Buffalo is a good brand. Some others that come to mind are Orijen, Wellness CORE grain-free, Wysong.

At our house, we are currently enjoying Stella & Chewey's raw blend. This is by no means a complete list!

Since there isn't one best kibble out there, I like to recommend getting to know a few high-quality brands, getting to know cat food ingredients, and seeing what your Maine Coon loves and thrives on.

Hopefully our community members will share their favorite foods here in the comments. This is always one of the most important cat food questions!

Comments:

Food Choice
by: Stanley Liveingston

Stanley is not quite 6 months old yet, and wants to eat just about you put in front of his nose.

I am feeding him Blue Buffalo Kitten formula kibble and at the end of dinner, he licks off my plate.

For treats he gets 4 Whole Hearted Soft Turkey Nibbles split in half every day. If it falls off the counter while I am cooking.. It is fair game !!

Now my last coon was real sensitive to PH in the water. Too low ph would give him kidney stones, too high of PH and I got crystallines in his Kidneys.

Doing Ph tests proved successful for me. Chrystal Springs was to low PH 6.0 and Arrowhead was to high PH of 7.0++ The perfect PH was Niagara Spring water which was 6.5-6.8 He seamed to do real good on that water.

Cat Food Questions:

We feed raw to our 3 thriving Maine Coons. The benefits are huge.

Yes, a little more expensive but I save on vet bills over the long haul. Yes, it took education and I’m always learning.

There are some easy ways to start with ground turkey and an additive. I started out with My Natural Cat and followed their recipe video. This was recommended by a breeder.

We’ve since graduated and use My Pet Carnivore, Hare today Gone tomorrow and local coops. Dr Karen Becker has tons of educational articles and videos.

Betting the cat with teeth issues would thrive. I would feed very small portions throughout the day to help with her stomach problems.

Just my 2 cents from someone that feeds about 500lbs of pet dogs and cats for 15 years now.

Spent almost 5 years researching and being scared of raw. Wish I hadn’t waited so long! Tons of great education out there now on raw.

Best MC food choices
I agree with comments below about nutrients being destroyed in kibble mfg. protein is denatured, vitamins and probiotics destroyed, and must be artificially added back to meet AAFCO survival standards (which are very low).

In fact, if it weren’t for the flavorings sprayed onto kibble at the end of the manufacturing process, a cat or dog won’t even eat it.

Add to that the fact that a Cat’s natural diet is ~80% water and kibble is ~10-12%, and being descended from desert cats who have no thirst drive (no bodies of water to drink in the desert), and you can see why cats are chronically dehydrated and more than 30% will suffer from kidney disease.

Cats should eat raw, rehydrated freeze dried raw, and/or human grade canned food only. (I feed kibble as a treat only since they are by shelter rescues and engrained when kittens. They love it.)

But given the choice, they prefer the raw I make them with Know Bones or TC Feline supplement premix.

Cat food
My cat likes Royal Canin and it's a vet-recommended brand. I’ve actually heard that Blue Buffalo isn’t a very good choice, so that’s worth keeping in mind.

Not able to chew and throws up so so much
My beautiful Coon, was born with a teeth problem. She is now 9 and has hardly any teeth at all. It is so very hard for her to eat. I've tried all types of food.

She has problems with throwing it up constantly. I have two main coons. The other one doesn't have this problem. They eat from elevated bowls and I use wet and dry.

They both drink lots of water. She just has so many problems, with throwing all her food up. Is there any help or advice, on this site? Thank you so much.

Maine Coon Food
by: Denis

Since 2004 all of our Maine Coons have been fed with Royal Canin for Maine Coons along with other wet food. They started out RC Maine Coon for kittens and then progress to the adult food.

Royal Canin
I feed my also 9 year old MC male royal Canin Maine Coon dry food - about 1 cup per day, and have just recently added a 1/4 cup of Royal Canin (this has really helped him with vomiting up fur balls and having trouble with the solid ones that they can get) fur ball food.

He also has some wet food for brekkie, but grazes all day. I live in Australia so not sure where you are and what food you can get.

Freeze-dried

by: Mary
Kibble is burned to the point that no nutrients are left in it. It isn't good for any cat or dog.

If you want something dry for your cat buy a raw
Freeze-dried food such as Dr Marty's Nature's Feast. It contains no additives.

It contains all the protein, vitamins and minerals your cat needs. I feed it to my Maine Coon cat. He loves it and is very healthy per his vet.

Coonie kibble
by: Chelle
We use wet and dry N & D (Natural & Delicious). Made in Italy excellent quality.

Peeps is Overweight

Don in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania USA shares:

I Picked up Peeps at the local SPCA.

They said she was there for about 8 weeks. They were feeding her Science Diet. She is big and she is 5 years old. My question is whats the best diet for her.

Comments:

Peeps
After 5 years of eating the same food, I imagine you will need to make this change gradually.

I suggest looking up the appopriate calories on line for a healthy female maine coon at 5 years of age.

For myself, i would then slowly lower the amount of calories /day. Feed both dry and wet every day. Controlled feedings. Smaller amounts more often. They are likely not to feel hungry when fed often.

Females are genuinely smaller than males. Then you can look into changing the food to a more affordable healthy choice (i believe grain free is better)and introduce that slowly as well. I am not a vet, but that's what I would start with. You can also check with your vet.

Of course. In the end it's your choice. Let us know how things are going.
Good luck

Games
by: Nelson
We've bought the freeze-dried chicken, liver, salmon, etc. (one ingredient), and then made a game out of it.

When he gets the zoomies, we throw the food around the house and he goes into hunting mode. So he's getting exercise and eating something healthy & natural.

He approaches me whenever it's time to play by arching his back. It's the easiest game in the world and it's fun! He loves chasing the "prey" up and down the stairs. And it will help your Coonie to lose weight while also bonding.

Peeps
Hi, so glad she is with you. I've adopted a male Maine Coon rescue and consulted with our wonderful vet with cat food questions regarding his diet.

My best advice is to go for quality food. It will cost more but, our fur babies are worth the investment.
Leigh, in Carlsbad, CA

When Do You Transition to Adult Food?

Nelson in Nashville asks: Tintin is 14 months. Coonies are considered kittens until 24 months? He's been eating exclusively canned kitten food, grain-free. So when do you transition to adult food?

Also: what do you do about his nails? Do you clip them, get them groomed? Or has anyone gotten their Coonie declawed? If so, how did it go?

Tintin

Tintin has scratched my wife's face while she's sleeping a couple times. Trying to play with her hair. Not bad, but now he's stronger so we worry a little. She's even banished him from the bedroom, although he stopped sleeping with us a couple months ago.

Reply:
Hi Nelson, the common rule of thumb is to move to adult food at around 12 months of age. But it is also sometimes advised to wait until 18-24 months for larger breeds, which Maine Coons are.

Since this is health care related advice, I would recommend giving your vet a call. This is the kind of thing they are usually happy to answer over the phone.

As for declawing, no we don't recommend that here. Most, if not all, Maine Coon breeders require new owners to sign a contract when bringing home a new kitten which includes a stipulation never to declaw them.

Visit our section on cat declawing to learn more and see what other Maine Coon owners have said about it.

We do advise regular nail clipping as a regular part of grooming, though. If Tintin hasn't been used to having this done, he may or may not appreciate it. But hopefully he'll get used to it!

I have always found success with simple, inexpensive guillotine style clippers. Another popular option is a product called Soft Paws claw covers. These require some patience and dexterity to apply, but they can be handy.

It sounds like his behavior is active and playful (not aggressive) which is normal for an adolescent Maine Coon. Is he neutered? If he isn't, yet, I'd consider it even more normal.

All the best as Tintin grows!

Comments:

Declawing - NO
Please do not declaw your fur babies. Once upon a time I believed it was o.k., and then I learned the truth.

Declawing your cat is the equivalent of cutting off the top of your finger from the first knuckle - it is not just a nail that is removed!

I was horrified when I learned what I had done to someone I loved, and from that day forward I vowed to that I would NEVER allow that to be done to another cat, and that I would share what I learned with everyone I could.

We currently have 2 cats in our home, they both have all their claws -- giving them somewhere they can scratch was the key to keeping them from scratching on furniture.

About the declawing
No hate! You don’t really understand, but declawing your cat isn’t good at all! Especially with Maine Coons.

It’s better to use clippers, and cut the claws. But NEVER declaw your cat, it’s like cutting till the knuckle off.

And it hurts the cat badly, sometimes the cat will live with pain for the rest of their life.

So what i think you should do is maybe buy clippers and cut your cats claws, or go to a vet/groomer, and let them cut your cats claws. Hope this helped! Bye!

Cat Nails
by: John
You're not just taking the claws off when you de-claw a cat, you're cutting their fingers off.

Do your own research before you chose to harm your sweet feline. If you can't deal with a cat's natural instincts, pick another type of pet. Vets should know better than to perform such a harmful procedure.

Declawing
by: Catherine

It is against the law in Maryland to declaw a cat.

Fifteen years ago I adopted a cat. He was a feral cat. He shredded my arms and legs within the first couple of weeks.

I was going away for a week and the cat sitter was very scared of him. I took him to the vet to have the tips put on. He ripped them off in seconds and since the doctor put him down on floor all hell broke loose.

You could hear him scream for miles when we tried to catch him. I was told I had two choices, either declaw him or put him down as he was dangerous.

I had him declawed and a nerve got damaged on one and he would sometimes limp. I lived with guilt the rest of his life. Eventually he became my baby. He passed away a year ago and I still miss him.

Tintin
by: Sylvia Dudley
Clippers are the best thing to use, but they are better started when they are a bit younger.

Food wise my furry gang are on dry food and they all do well. Make certain it’s a good brand.

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