While Huck likes Purina ONE, he has also been known to eat light bulbs, bottles of bleach, and 20 rolls of Colbert paper. But he has done very well on the ONE.

Yeah, my 9.5 pound, 2.5 year old cat is 'fat' according to Banfield (the vet at Petsmart). Now I have to pay for $18/bag low-cal pet food. I won't bring up the $300 teeth cleaning that they are trying to sell me on...

Kirkland Signature dog or cat food from Costco is what I always suggest to pet owners who are trying to save money. It's really unbelievably cheap for something with no corn or meat byproducts. I buy grain-free food made by a Canadian company at their one company-owned factory in Alberta with primarily domestically sourced ingredients, but obviously not everyone can afford that.

Does anyone know of any cat food brands that were NOT contaminated with melamine a couple years back? My future MIL's cat died because of that, and my fiance and I plan on getting 2 kittens in a couple months.

We've been making dog food for a couple of months because our dog has some allergies. I read about it in some books so I would know about ratios and what not to feed. We basically get sale meat, frozen veggies and dried legumes and brown rice in large quantities. She loves it and we save a little money, the bonus is that we rarely throw away food now because most of it can be tossed in the dog food

@Illiterate?EmailMeForHelp_GitEmSteveDave:
Impressive. If I eat it, will my eyes glow blue, too?

Do not attempt BARF without consultig your vet. Especially a raw diet for cats--their needs are even more tricky than dogs.

Also don't skimp on your pet's food--better food means better health means less vet visits. Provided they're not on a prescription diet, I strongly suggest looking into pet foods that do not contain wheat (filler), corn (filler), Soy (filler), or bone/blood meals (also more filler). Any meat by-products is also the sign of an incredibly cheap food. When you switch foods, slowly wean them off of the old kibvble and onto the new kibble.

Blue Buffalo, Innova, Wellness, Chicken Soup For The Soul, EVO, Nutro... all good quality food. They may seem more expensive per pound than regular food like Purina or Alpo or Meow Mix, but it's cheaper for two reasons: your pet will eat less without the filler, and they'll be less likely to need the vet.

Don't sell your pets short!

I fed my dogs the purple bag from Fleet Farm! I think it was Sprout brand. It wasn't the cheapest product out there, but they enjoyed it and it was reasonably priced. And yes, I say fed as in past tense because they have both passed. The last one just two days ago. Anyone need a few pounds of unused kibble? (no-the food didn't kill them. smarty pants.)

@Marissa Hoftiezer:

I feed strays with the Kirkland Premium cat food. It really has surprisingly good ingredients. It's made by Diamond which is a pretty reputable manufacturer. It's less than half the price I was paying before. I go through a lot of food so it's nice to find a good quality feed at such a low price.

@linkura: Anything without wheat as a filler should be fine. I strongly suggest Innova and Wellness.

Most of the cheap brands use corn and other fillers which isn't all that great for your dog. My dog use throw up a bunch when on Purina, now she eats Natural Balance, Blue Buffalo, etc., which have actual meat listed as the first ingredient and use real grains (oats, sweet potato, brown rice), not "meat meal", or a grain meal.
$40-$45 for a big bag may seem like a lot, but it lasts a couple of months; I really don't mind paying what amounts to a fourth of my cable/internet bill a month to keep my dog alive and healthy

My cat is a picky eater and her original owners gave her some expensive-can-only-buy-at-the-vet cat food mainly because their other cat needed it.

I switched her to [www.orijen.ca] and she's been doing great on it... none of the problems the other owner's had ever popped up (though I think it was their kids stressing her out; she's a scaredy cat).

OMG those dogs are the cutest.

@ShyamasriPera2: note: this isn't the cheapest stuff, but it's cheaper then the vet supplied stuff.

@cc82: They eat so much less of it too, so it's barely any more expensive than the cheap brands. And thankfully their good ingredient choices meant BB/Natural Balance were not involved in the melamine issue.

I like Blue Buffalo myself. Don't have a dog at the moment, but my rats get their venison lower protein kibble as a supplement and they go insane for it.

We feed our cat only high-protein, meat-based, low- or no-starch filler foods. She loves Castor&Pollux Organix brand and the Orijen line. Cats are carnivores, and feeding them rice and veggies or other carb-heavy fillers is bad for them. We tried to skimp once, buying a "high protein" food from Trader Joe's - it was not truly high-protein, and she gained a pound in a month. Yes, her food is expensive, but we buy in bulk and hopefully will pay less in vet bills due to obesity and other digestive disorders.

If only the little princess wasn't so picky about her food.

It really makes a difference in vet bills if you spend a little extra to feed your pets a good quality food. We have used Wellness and Eagle Pack (they get both wet and dry food) for years and our cats are VERY healthy and have gorgeous coats. Cats fed good food also don't shed as much, and their, um, little box smells better.

Wet food tends to be better for older cats who could develop kidney disease and male kitties who could get life-threatening UTIs.

@calquist: only 9.5 pounds? Both of mine are over 12 pounds each and they have been deemed healthy by the vet. She can feel their ribs just fine and there isn't any sign of wheezing or anything. I just use the Purina Indoor formula, since you know, they just sit around in the sun patches all day instead of maybe doing some laundry or dishes or cleaning their own litter box.

@dorastandpipe: You could see if your local animal shelter needs it. I just took all the toys my cats won't play with and all my old towels and blankets to my local Humane Society. I also got a tax deduction for my donation.

We use Iams for our 7 year old dog... but I think the dog prefers grey squirrel with a side of whatever roadkill she can find, followed by whatever she can catch in the fish pond. Actually, a rather smart and interesting dog.

I strongly suspect we buy the overpriced gourmet food for our pets to satisfy our needs, not our pets needs. As a result of this the makers of pet foods are raking in the money hand over fist.

@Ratty: My pup had a nasty bout of Colitis last year. We switched to a smaller brand food from Eukanuba (which had been bought out and promptly changed the formulation). My wife get's her cat's food form the same company. I don't remember the name off-hand, but we get it from Pet Supplies Plus. No filler crap in it. Not only that, it's a bit more concentrated so you get less poop in your yard than if you feed them whatever store brand (Purina, et al)

@ShyamasriPera2: Cats are jerks sometimes when it comes to food. I had one that, when we switched his food, decided he would prefer to hunt birds and subsist off of them. This is after he did that totally cat thing where they sniff the food, sneer snobbily, then look at you and meow like "Seriously?"

@ShyamasriPera2: Yeah, I feed a mix of Orijen and Acana Grasslands, another food made by the same company. The cat and ferrets LOVE it and have amazing coats. And when I wrote to the company to say nice things about it, they asked me to send pictures of my pets. Aww.

THIS IS HORRIBLE!!! Obviously Consumer Reports doesnt know jack about pet foods... I'm calling this article SH!T because its totally off...

I really think you guys at Consumerist should put more thought into this... Theres plenty of proof supporting a quality diet for your dog... I dont know anything about cats, but Dogs can live longer healthier lives with quality food...

If YOU can eat well, why cant your pets?

The article stated "fillers" are myths lol... Yeah, good luck feeding your dog Corn and by-products... I'm gonna take that as a quality article... SCREW YOU consumer reports... Thats just bull...

@Ratty: Nutro (both their Natural Choice and Max Adult lines) are not recommended by Whole Dog Journal because Natural Choice breaks the rices down into ground rice, rice flour, rice bran, etc... to make the animal protein appear higher on the ingredients list and Max Adult starts with chicken meal but then has 6 other items/fillers listed before the next animal protein.

Blue Buffalo, Innova, Wellness, and Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover's Soul are all on the recommended list.
I feed my dogs California Natural (also on WDJ's recommended list) which has the shortest list of ingredients of dry dog foods.

My dog and cat eat better grade food than I do. Cat gets Blue Buffalo, my dog used to eat Castor&Pollux but just stopped eating eat, switched to Eukanuba New Zealand venison and he's been doing great. Nutro made him so sick and gassy. I will not skimp on my pets. I will eat bread and water.

@rockasocky: When we adopted our cat we tried to gradually move him to organic food, he will only eat meow mix or friskies. I guess for him the more crap in it the better

@GreatWhiteNorth: Honestly, if your only experience with "gourmet" food is Iams, I'm not surprised you think that. That stuff is 99% advertising and 1% actually better than its competitors.

I stick with Iams for my 2 cats and 3 dogs. Their teeth are immaculate, the poops are smaller, and I wind up saving $$$ because I don't have to feed them as much, although I find that Americans tend to overfeed their pets.

My cats are self regulating in terms of kibbles so its just a matter of keeping food in the dish, but I keep track of their weight.

3 dogs. 100 lb Labrador, gets a scant 2 cups of Iams senior per day. The two others, each about 35-40 lbs each get 1 cup. They are all fairly sedentary, but none are fat and could actually be fed a little less, because of they get into the garbage on occasion and whatever the cats happen to knock onto the floor.

@linkura: The Nutro brand food (58% less stool odor - the cat needed that) we use wasn't recalled. We feed our cats dry food only though.

To be fair, plenty of pets have lived long healthy lives with commercial kibble that contains corn, by-products etc. Some people choose to eat healthier than others and make similar decisions for their pets

@rockasocky:

Oh yeah, she's a snob... in fact I think I gave up my apartment the moment she set her paw in it.

She's still trying to kill me in my sleep (pawing at my throat)...

@locakitty: It depends on the cat's body type, but I'll admit 9.5 lbs isn't big. I have one cat who never weighs over 10 pounds, and definitely isn't fat. My other cat weighs 15 pounds, and even though I'd like to see him lose a couple, the vet says his weight is just fine based on his bone structure.

@calquist: If your cat has significant plaque buildup (you'd see it yourself), it may be necessary to anesthetize them and more or less chisel it off. It sucks, but it really can be unhealthy for the cat. Try to limit the amount of soft cat food or treats you give them since hard cat food helps keep plaque from building up.

@JeanStork: Steady on there! It's hardly Consumerist's fault that the information out on the net is incorrect. Much of it is coming from vested interests.

You're not making a good case when you use wild attacks and poor punctuation. Calm down and provide some information.

Don't skimp on your pet food.

I have two cats. One of them self-regulates, but the other does not. When we realized this we went to controlled amounts of food and looked closely at the portion sizes.

I encourage you to look closely at the portion sizes suggested by vets and the portion sizes on your cans of food. We found that the cat food cans suggested larger portions than the vet.

Don't skimp on the food. Just make sure that if you're regulating the food you have double checked the quantities since the people who make food, well, they want to sell you more of it.

@JeanStork: The article did NOT state that fillers are "myths."
It emphasized that there is no official definition of "fillers," so any food can claim to be filler-free and it doesn't mean jack.
They were not advocating feeding your dog crap. Please read carefully and respond thoughtfully.

We switched our dog to Canidae and it made a big difference. She had chronic shedding problems and bouts of GI issues that went away with the food change. She is unbelievably picky though. We gradually changed her over to the new food but she would dig through it to find the old food. She did eventually start eating it after we fed her some as treats.

Look into the food ratings various groups do. Some of the better brand name foods don't rate well on actual nutrition while some are very high on the nutrition ratings. Expensive doesn't always equal good.

@Illiterate?EmailMeForHelp_GitEmSteveDave: I was hoping this would spawn a "show pictures of your pets thread," although it would be even better to upload them all to our flickr pool so we can use them for later posts.

@dorastandpipe: Sorry for your loss. And the animal shelter is a good idea for the leftover food.

I have raised 3 Jack Russell Terriers on Nutro Natural Choice Lamb & Rice dry dog food. They all free feed and have been happy, healthy, and active. Khaki (the mostly white terrier) is 14 and still going strong.

In terms of cats the food does matter. Ask any vet. Some of them are out to sell you something expensive from their own store, but in the case of my vet she doesn't even sell food at her practice.

We used to feed our cat Meow Mix and the vet told us it's like feeding your cat McDonalds all day every day. And we wondered why she was 16 lbs.

I feed my four Merrick's Before Grains. It isn't cheap, but I feed them LESS food because it's nutritionally dense (no cheap fillers that run through your dog and end up as huge stinking piles of shit). Their coats are shiny, they don't smell "doggy" (no dog smell in the house), and their poop is small, and neutral-smelling. A couple of times I've stepped in dog shit, tracked it through the house and only realized I'd done it because I saw it. That was annoying, but it's my fault for not picking it up.

My dogs (an 11-year old fox terrier, a 10-year old shepherd mix, a 5.5-year old chow mix and a 4-year old chow mix) have never been to the vet for anything other than an annual rabies shot or an accidental ingestion (enter one chocolate bunny and one funky squirrel). I figure the great food is money well spent!

I always tell my adopters to buy they best they can afford. If you can't afford grain free, try corn free. If you can't afford corn free, at least make sure corn isn't the #1 ingredient. Whereas we can indulge in a guilty meal full of "bad" ingredients and make up for it by eating well at other times, our dogs primarily eat ONE food at every meal. If that food is of poor nutritional quality, then eventually that is evidenced by health and behavioral problems. Sure there will always be some one who says, "I fed my dog Ol'Roy and he lived to be 20." That happens sometimes, but it's not a gamble I want to take.

@consumerfan:
+1

@chiieddy: Some Nutro foods were, though.

@Marissa Hoftiezer:
Source?

@MentallyRetired: Nutro is still leagues better than what most people end up feeding their dogs and is a tep in the right direction from Purina, Ol Roy, etc. It's not near the top of my list and my rats won' get it.

My wife is more of an expert on this but my understanding is that Cats are obligate carnivores, originating from the Middle East.

Their natural diet is raw meat. No fish. No vegetables. No rice.

If you read the labels on tinned cat food, you'll see that 99% of them have ingredients you either wouldn't eat yourself or ought not to feed your cat.

Here's an example:
[www.iams.com]

Meat Broth - no indication of which meat or what else is in the broth
Chicken By-products - would YOU eat a Chicken Kiev made from this?
Tuna - fish
Wheat gluten - filler
And a whole load of additives

That doesn't mean you can't feed cats tinned food and/or fish at all. Cats LIKE fish, they just don't NEED it.
We treat tinned food as fast food and raw meat as a staple. And we choose tinned food that contains no filler and no tuna.

@GreatWhiteNorth: Hardly. if you'll notice, the cheaper food like Purina and iams is marketed with healthy people food advertised as ingredients. it appeals to the sensibilities of the owner and not to the nutrition of the animal. Giant pictures of meat and vegetables on the bag? That's not what the pet needs. Feeding your pet a vegan/vegetarian diet is also appealing to the owner and not the animal. But feeding a quality kibble that is minimally processed and contains food, not filler, is what's good for the pet.