How many cans of wet cat food do you feed your cat a day? Thoughts on Sheba brand?

[Anonymous]

Our vet recommended we go to wet cat food. Our cat likes Sheba but my friend said that it’s essentially ‘McDonald’s for cats’. Idk, ingredients look fine to me, no grains.

Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

In our extensive experience with cats--30 years, currently have 4--the bigger issue is finding brands and flavors your cat will eat. One of our cats will not eat wet food, period, and one is extremely finicky about flavors. The other two have rejected healthier brands, only like Fancy Feast (some with veggies though) and Sheba. Maybe precisely because they're the McDonalds of fast foods. But even there, some are healthier than others.

[Anonymous]

You can try healthier brands and see what your cat will eat. Of course budget is a factor too so ymmv.

Here is some info to get started:
https://www.reddit.com/r/CatAdvice/comments/114bym6/healthiest_wet_food/

[Anonymous]

I have 2 young cats and they get, in total, 2 5oz cans of wellness complete and 2 3oz pouches of wellness shreds each day. They also get about 1/3 of a cup of dry food each day.

It feels pretty expensive, but they eat it.

[Anonymous]

Kirkland (Costco) pate. It’s actually really healthy stuff. I give two entire cans a day to one cat who is very old and has allergies to many grains and proteins. She eats no hard food, teeth not good. Vet put her on some prescription food that was $150 a month, but this Kirkland Pate actually is better for her.
My other cats eat hard food from Costco, sweet potato and salmon.
I know someone who joined Costco just for the cat food! No lie.

[Anonymous]

I told my vet that my cat only eats fancy feast. She said her 13 year old cat only eats Friskies. And both of those are better than dry.

That said, my cat eats a mix of wet and dry. She's small (8lbs), and gets 1/2 can in morning and 1/2 can in the evening. And dry kibble to snack on. She's incredibly picky, so I sometimes have to mix kibble in with the wet to get her to eat it, but it's better than strickly dry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Kirkland (Costco) pate. It’s actually really healthy stuff. I give two entire cans a day to one cat who is very old and has allergies to many grains and proteins. She eats no hard food, teeth not good. Vet put her on some prescription food that was $150 a month, but this Kirkland Pate actually is better for her.
My other cats eat hard food from Costco, sweet potato and salmon.
I know someone who joined Costco just for the cat food! No lie.

Ha, Costco / that’s funny!

My vet said wet was better for weight loss or maintenance. I’ve always done hard food so the cans are new to me.

[Anonymous]

Interesting. For dogs the dry food is better.

[Anonymous]

I had a cat who just utterly refused wet food.

My current cats, one loves only Fancy Feast and the other one used to eat it as a kitten but has been turning up her nose to it. Then the Fancy Feast loving cat swoops in and is getting chubby because she steals food.

[Anonymous]

Agree with the Costco rec. my older cat also likes Tiki Cat.

[Anonymous]

My cats go crazy for Sheba and Fancy Feast, and will barely touch the healthier stuff. If I give them something better, they sniff at it, maybe take a bite or two, and then follow me around the house complaining at me until the next mealtime.

I have found that I can mix the healthy stuff and the junky stuff 50/50 and they'll eat it. Kind of like hiding spinach in the mac and cheese, I guess?

They get one can a day, split into two feedings (morning and night). That's for both of them. They also have dry food sitting out to graze whenever they want. They do eat a healthier dry food, Hill's science diet.

[Anonymous]

Our young adult cat goes through 2/3 of a 5oz can a day. If we offer more, there's lots of food left over. Even this way, he sometimes doesn't finish.

We give 1/3 in the morning and 1/3 in the evening. He ate more wet food as a kitten.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our vet recommended we go to wet cat food. Our cat likes Sheba but my friend said that it’s essentially ‘McDonald’s for cats’. Idk, ingredients look fine to me, no grains.

Thoughts?

My girl got so fat on Sheba.

We eventually switched to a prescription food. She feels and looks better, but it took two years of “dieting”.

[Anonymous]

I have picky cats, one hates wet food and eats prescription dry because of digestion problems. The other only eats wet and only one specific type of fancy feast. She’s also got terrible teeth from the wet food, so I’m not convinced that wet is definitely better than dry. The cat who eats only dry food has great teeth.

[Anonymous]

My beloved "soul cat" died of cancer two years ago. She ate only wet food like Whiskas and Sheba. I didn't realize it was the McDonalds of cat food, and felt soooo guilty after learning that. Also, it is ultraprocessed food, and I can't imagine eating only ultraprocessed foods is good for any living creature?

So now I have a new cat, and she eats two "real meat" meals a day, usually something like cooked chicken for one meal and then cooked salmon or cod for the second meal, or maybe cooked steak (whatever we're eating). Sometimes she has some scrambled egg for breakfast. All of this is free-range organic chicken/eggs, wild sockeye salmon or wild cod, or grassfed organic beef, the best of the best.

But in addition to the two "real meat" meals she gets a day, I also give my cat a handful of dry Applaws food to ensure she gets whatever vitamins it is fortified with. I read that eating a little crunchy food is good for keeping their teeth healthy, so vitamins and dental care.

Last week I caught my dh chopping steak for the cat in her bowl, so I consider our whole family to be crazy cat people now.