what about feeding cat by dry food !!

Dry pet food is a dehydrated and processed mix of grains, meats, and added vitamins and minerals. Dry foods are typically 30‐60% carbohydrate in composition. What isn’t well known among cat owners is that a requirement for carbohydrates has never been proven in cats (in contrast to dogs and people). Cats are carnivores, and in the wild eat nothing but meaty little rodents, bugs, birds and lizards. Our domesticated cats, on the other hand, are fed mixtures of meat and grain that produce a balanced diet over the long term. Many believe that those grains, aside from providing ‘artificial’ balance, may be contributing to problems in the long run.

characteristic behavior of cats with dry foods :

Cats descend from desert animals that depended on their food to provide needed water.

Their kidneys are adapted to this desert environment to conserve water and concentrate the wastes into the urine. When cats don’t get enough water from food or additional water intake, some feel that cats spend much of their lives chronically dehydrated, which is not good for those kidneys or the rest of the body.

One common problem that seems to respond to more water in the food is the frustrating FUS, now called FLUTD (lower urinary tract disease) or interstitial cystitis (IC). Most doctors recommend feeding only canned food to these cats to increase water going into the body and out through the bladder. Could this be a signal that cats don’t do well on dry food?

Also, many people tend to leave dry food out all the time, leaving their cats to ‘free feed’. As convenient as it may be, this is a potentially harmful practice for the cat! Most cats given food all the time eat more than they should, and this practice is behind a growing epidemic of obese cats. And no, it doesn’t usually work to give them weight loss food free choice!

In addition, free feeding these high‐carbohydrate meals has been suggested to contribute to the rising incidence of insulin resistance and diabetes in cats (Rand, 1998). Since this is a chronic, potentially dangerous problem that sometimes requires insulin injections for the rest of the cat’s life, this is a major concern.

Finally, many people have difficulty medicating their cats, and are forced to mix it in food. It’s much easier to mix medicine in canned food than in dry food. Cats who are addicted to dry food and won’t eat any canned food (a common problem) are a special challenge to medicate!

I was always told to leave food out all the time. Doesn’t this decrease urine pH and prevent lower urinary tract disease?

It is true that eating small meals often lowers urinary pH. And cats are born to hunt

constantly, catching little protein meals throughout the day. Remember, though, that dry food is not a meat protein like a lizard or mouse, and since it contains large amounts of

carbohydrates (and often less fat) than real prey, we are essentially turning our cats into

grazers.

Worse, hunting cats are expending mental and physical activity between kills, and must work hard for those meals. The only exercise our dry food ‘grazers’ are often getting is a jump off the couch!