What should I feed my Cat?

Jan 26, 2014 by Dr Marcus Brown    No Comments    Posted under: Tips & Advice

We always get dietary questions. One of the most common is “Does dry food make cats fat?” “Is canned food better for cats than dry?” With everything about diet, there is never a simple answer.

Dry food has the advantage for those of us that live with cats that it has preservative and can be left out without fear of spoilage. Canned food on the other hand does not have preservative and does not do well once the can is opened. One of the basic facts is that canned food is calorically harder to over feed than dry food. Most cats need between 200 and 250 kcal/day. Most 5.5 oz cans of cat food have 195 kcals.

Many dry foods have upwards of 550 kcal/cup. A 1/2 cup of food looks like very little to most people’s eye. Dry is extremely easy to overfeed. Cats like the texture and taste so they will eat whatever is put in front of them. Getting twice you daily caloric need is an easy way to gain weight.

Cats naturally spend a lot of energy to get their calories. Mouse has about 50 kcals and cats eat anywhere from 4-5/day. It takes a cat about 5 tries to catch a mouse. Once they do, nap time. The process starts again. Pretty exciting life don’t you agree?

Now lets go inside to a cozy apartment. There is an over abundance of food and no work or stimulation to acquire it. Makes for a great recipe to gain weight. There are certainly other differences between canned and dry, but I am only looking at the caloric aspect at this point.

Whatever method of feeding you choose, remember the calorie count. Try to get your cat 5 or more small meals per day. Technology and automatic feeders can be your best friend. If you choose to feed dry, use a measuring cup. If canned is easier, you may want to consider a feeder so that your cat can get a mid day meal.

One very important criterion is to monitor you cat’s progress. Be sure and ask you veterinarian for more details and help for your cat’s specific nutritional needs.

Dr Marcus Brown

Dr. Brown, founder of the NOVA Cat Clinic and co-founder of the NOVA Cat Clinic, received his Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree in 1986 from the University of Illinois. Currently the medical director for Alley Cat Allies and is an active supporter in local, state and national feline organizations such as: American Veterinary Dental Society, American Association of Feline Practitioners, American Veterinary Medical Association and American Animal Hospital Association. Dr. Brown also contributed the creation of the Association of Feline Practitioners’ 2009 Wellness Guidelines for Feline Practitioners.

Dr. Brown enjoys continuing education and regularly attends seminars and conferences across the country focusing on the advancement in feline veterinary care. Dr. Brown also utilizes on-line discussion groups and veterinary networks to assist the clinic in maintaining the highest level of care and providing the newest treatments available in feline medicine.

NOVA Cat Clinic
923 N. Kenmore St.
Arlington VA 22201

Phone: 703-525-1955
Fax: 703-525-1957
Email: novacatclinic@gmail.com

Website: http://novacatclinic.com/
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Feline Sense and Scents-ability: Taste and Smell (Part 2 of 4)

Mar 31, 2013 by Dr Steven Bailey    1 Comment     Posted under: Tips & Advice

If you missed it: Feline Sense and Scents-ability: Hearing (Part 1 of 4)

Cats rarely chew on plants, compared to dogs, because the main draw that plants provide is their sweet sugar content. Cats not only fail to taste sweet things, they also deal with sugars poorly in other ways – among other things, they lack a sugar digestion enzyme that both dogs and people have called “glucokinase” which helps break down sugars inside the cells.

Because cats can’t taste sweets, they don’t really “enjoy” sugary snacks the way we would. The inclusion of carbohydrates in cat food has become a very “hot topic” in feline nutrition – while corn and other carbohydrate sources, blueberries, kelp and cranberries may contain many beneficial nutrients, cats likely do not appreciate the flavor, and in some cases it is not certain how well they digest these ingredients.

Most cats prefer canned diets in which the first several ingredients are meat-based. Canned food is better for cats than dry diets because it contains a high water content (about 80%), which helps maintain a lower urine specific gravity (less “stuff” in the urine), which helps protect the kidneys and can help prevent urinary crystals and stones. Most of the cats that we see at Exclusively Cats Veterinary Hospital who are urinating outside the box and have bladder stones or uncomfortable crystals in their urine are eating a dry-food-only diet.

Something else to note – cats do not like bitter taste any more than people do. If you use baking soda in your litter box as a deodorizer and your cat starts eliminating elsewhere, you might stop adding the baking soda to the box. It is quite bitter in taste, and while cats don’t eat litter, they do groom their paws after using the box, so can associate the bad taste of the baking soda with using the litter!

In 2005, a study was done that discovered the entire cat family is lacking the gene for tasting the flavor “sweet”. They have taste buds in that region of the tongue, but they do not function. Cats do taste salty, sour and bitter. Their favorite tastes are salty and sour. Some cats are drawn to “sweet” foods, but it is likely the fat content vs. the flavor that they like.

Their sense of taste is much duller than ours as well – where a human tongue has over 9,000 taste buds, a cat has only 473! The cat may make up for this lack of taste buds with the small Jacobson’s organ at the front of its mouth – a “vomeronasal” organ which is slightly different than either smell or taste. You can see the ducts leading to this organ in the roof of your cat’s mouth behind the upper incisors. The organ sits right at the front of the mouth and connects to the nasal passages. Snakes, elephants and horses also have this organ, among other animals. Humans, it seems, do not have a working vomeronasal organ. To use it most effectively, the cat passes air over the front of the tongue and then touches the tongue to this sensory organ to deposit pheromone molecules there. You can see your cat using this organ when it wrinkles its lips, opens its mouth and slightly sticks its tongue out when “smelling” an area where it finds an interesting smell.

With 200 million odor-sensitive cells in its nose, compared to a human’s paltry five million, a cat’s sense of smell is much more sensitive than ours. However, they don’t hold a candle to a dog’s smelling ability. Dogs have between 149 million and 300 million receptors. Still, smell is one of a cat’s more important senses. Because smell is so important to cats, a stuffed up nose can be extremely detrimental! If a cat can’t smell his food, he is highly likely to turn his nose up at it. Conversely, a scented litter that we find to be pleasantly fresh-smelling is like drowning in perfume to a cat’s sensitive schnozz.

Dr Steven Bailey

Dr. Steven J. Bailey founded Exclusively Cats Veterinary Hospital in 1992. He obtained his Bachelor of Science and Doctorate in Veterinary Medicine from Michigan State University in June of 1986. After graduation, Dr. Bailey practiced emergency medicine for 8 years prior to establishing Exclusively Cats. Dr. Bailey is one of two veterinarians in the state of Michigan and the only veterinarian in Southeastern Michigan that has been board certified by the American Board of Veterinary Practitioners as a Feline Specialist (ABVP). His special interests include complicated medical/surgical cases as well as critical care, advanced dentistry, and behavioral medicine. Dr. Bailey is an active member of the American Association of Feline Practitioners (AAFP), American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), he is a current council member of the Southeastern Michigan Veterinary Medical Association (SEMVMA). He is also an Associate Editor of the Feline Internal Medicine Board on the Veterinary Information Network (VIN), invited member of VMG #18 (The only feline exclusive Veterinary Management Group) and MOM’s group (Macomb/Oakland Management Group). In his free time, Dr. Bailey is an avid kayaker (some may even call him “obsessed”) and an instructor in both canoe and kayaking sports. He also enjoys running and spending time with his family. Dr. Bailey and his wife Liz have 2 adult children, Christopher and Kayla, 3 cats, Tic Tic, Sapphire and Lacey, and one dog, Charlotte.

Exclusively Cats Veterinary Hospital

6650 Highland Road

Waterford, MI 48327

Phone: 248-666-5287

Fax ‎206-333-1135

ecvh@exclusivelycats.com

Website: http://www.exclusivelycats.com

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The SKINNY on FATTENING Food

Sep 22, 2012 by Dr Elyse Kent    15 Comments    Posted under: Tips & Advice

Obesity is the most common health problem in our pet cats. One of the reasons is the TYPE of food being fed, not necessarily the number of calories. Cats are desert creatures and are true carnivores. In nature, cats eat mice, birds, reptiles, and bugs to build a healthy diet. Dogs and people are omnivores, meat and plant eaters.

Cats are unable to properly digest carbohydrates. Most dry foods have high carbohydrate levels due to the grain that is required to form the product.

A young healthy cat should be eating a diet similar to his wild cousins – one that is high in protein, high in fats, and low in carbohydrates. A mouse is composed of about 40-45% protein, 40-45% fat, and only 3-5% carbohydrates.

High carbohydrate diets may cause obesity and health problems.

Carbohydrates cause overproduction of insulin, increased hunger, and weight gain. There are health concerns related to this weight gain, not the least of which is diabetes. A cat with a high carbohydrate diet often has a flakey coat (some owners think this is dandruff) or some may be greasy. Overweight cats often are not able to groom as well, sometimes culminating in poor bathroom grooming behaviors. Weight can affect your cat’s joints causing them to forgo jumping, or they may be less willing to play.  It is not uncommon to have an obese cat newly diagnosed with diabetes who can be converted to a non-diabetic state just by altering the diet. The key is to significantly decrease the carbohydrate content in their diet and begin a slow weight loss program.

Cats are desert creatures and in nature derive a large portion of their water from the food they eat.

Canned food has a much higher water content than dry food. Cats should be encouraged to drink fresh water daily, with the use of kitty fountains or running water taps, to properly dilute their urine.

There is little evidence to suggest that dry food plays a significant role in maintaining oral health.

The research suggesting that dry food is better for oral health was done on dogs, not cats. A cat’s jaw does not go side-to-side as a person’s would, so there can be no true chewing. Cats use their teeth in the wild to catch and tear their food, and in the process mechanically clean their teeth. The food pieces are then swallowed whole.  Commercial dry kibble is throat sized, so our domestic cats have little opportunity to rip and tear into their food!

Canned foods have much lower levels of carbohydrates because they lack the grain needed to process the dry kibble. There are many good commercial brands of canned foods available. If your cat does not like canned food, there are a few brands of dry kibble that are lower in carbohydrates.

During your cat’s physical exam pre-existing medical conditions, sex, breed, and age are evaluated to allow us to make specific diet recommendations for your cat.

MYTH BUSTERS – Canned food is NOT fattening. Most brands of dry kibble do NOT help the teeth.

Dr Elyse Kent

Dr. Elyse Kent graduated from Michigan State University College of Veterinary Medicine in 1980 and completed an Internship at West Los Angeles Veterinary Medical Group in 1981.

In her early years in practice, Dr. Kent began to see a need for a separate medical facility just for cats, where fear and stress would be reduced for feline patients. In 1985, in a former home in Santa Monica, Dr. Kent opened the only exclusively feline veterinary clinic in Los Angeles, Westside Hospital for Cats (WHFC). Along with other forward-thinking feline practitioners from across North America, Dr. Kent founded the Academy of Feline Medicine in 1991. Through the efforts of these practitioners, feline medicine and surgery became a certifiable species specialty through the American Board of Veterinary Practitioners (ABVP). Dr. Kent became board certified in Feline Practice in the first group to sit for the Feline exam in 1995. She certified for an additional ten (10) years in 2005. There are now 78 feline specialists in the world. Dr. Kent served as the Feline Regent and Officer on the Council of Regents for 9 years. She is currently the immediate Past President of the ABVP, which certifies all species specialists. She also heads up a task force joining certain efforts of the ABVP with The American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA). She currently serves as a Director on the Executive Board of The American Association of Feline Practitioners.

The present day WHFC facility opened in 2000. It was the fulfillment of a vision for a spacious, delightful, state of the art, full service cat medical center that Dr. Kent had dreamed of and planned for over many years.

Westside Hospital for Cats
2317 Cotner Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90064

Phone: 310-479-2428

Website: http://www.westsidehospitalforcats.com/
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