Cat Food Review

Finding the perfect cat food

We found that the best information and reviews on cat food come from websites written and maintained by people who love cats. About.com's cats guide Franny Syufy includes excellent nutritional information, including dry and canned cat food recommendations based on protein content and other ingredients. Veterinarian Lisa A. Pierson is a proponent of feeding cats a raw-food diet, but her CatInfo.org site maintains a list of high-quality canned foods as well. The subscription-only website PetsumerReports.com provides detailed information on manufacturers and ingredients.

The quality of ingredients in cat food has become more important than ever in many owners' eyes, especially following the pet food recalls of 2007. In most reviews, experts and cat owners alike are interested in the same high standards for cat food as they have for their own diets: an emphasis on high-quality ingredients -- especially proteins -- along with as few preservatives and artificial ingredients as possible.

That said, a new review at GoodGuide.com takes a somewhat contrarian view -- and one that's sure to be controversial among cat food advocates. While GoodGuide.com recognizes the importance of quality ingredients, it places a much higher emphasis on nutritional adequacy, saying that "While pet [foods] attempt to differentiate themselves with various marketing claims about their ingredients, there is considerable scientific debate about the importance that should be assigned to specific ingredients compared to the overall nutritional profile of a pet food. We know a lot more about what contributes to a healthy diet and which ingredients to seek or avoid with human food compared to pet food."

User feedback at retailer and independent websites and discussions at cat-lover forums also provide great insight. However, in many cases these reports focus more on how eagerly a cat ate a particular food than any other factor.

The big question, as we see it, is whether or not pet owners need to spring for the best cat food or spend less on cheaper mainstream brands. According to the data we read about cat food ingredients -- and based on our own research on serving sizes and cost -- there's little question that premium cat foods such as Wellness, Evo and others contain better ingredients than most supermarket brands. Research shows that because the premium cat food contains higher-quality ingredients that provide better nutrition, cats will eat less of it, easing the difference in cost. This is true for both dry and canned cat food.

Supermarket brands like Friskies, Fancy Feast, 9Lives and Whiskas are at the lower end of the cat food price spectrum, while store brands are lower still. Pet owners posting to discussion groups may rave about how their cats gobble up these products, but they are only rarely mentioned when experts recommend the best cat foods. A glance at food labels shows that many -- though not all -- varieties of these foods are loaded with less desirable ingredients such as meat by-products, grains and glutens. This is a far cry from the type of diet that most experts say cats need.

Cats are obligate carnivores, and experts say meat should be their primary source of protein for proper health. Just as for human food, there are regulations regarding the labeling of cat food that can help consumers assess the amount of meat in the food. If a product is labeled "beef cat food," for example, 95 percent of its ingredients must be beef. If it says "chicken dinner" or "lamb formula," the named meat needs to be 25 percent of the ingredients. If the packaging simply states "chicken flavor," the food needs to taste like chicken to the cat, but does not need to actually have chicken in it.