Natural Balance offers grain free dry cat food. Their grain free dry dog food is excellent.

Jan2

I'm not a dry feeder either, but I DO keep a grain-free, moderate carb dry on hand to use as treats (okay, bribes). If your cats are sensitive to grains, then "low grain" is as bad as high grain. Other carbs may be problems too, so test before you travel.

Some will tell you that cats eat lots of fruits and vegetables and grains in the wild because they get those things in the stomachs of their prey. It's likely that some ingestion of carbs occurs in the wild, but the proportion is vastly less than is present in any dry foods on the market.

Dry foods need carbohydrates to act as the paste that keeps those kibblies together. Otherwise the dry food would be a gritty meal instead of nuggets. The blueberries and acai and sweet potatoes and whatever else are not distinguished by your cats as being special in any way, as they won't gain any particular benefit from these. Grass is probably the best vegetable to put in cat food because it's a mechanical aid to digestion. So is anything with fiber. Hence, the expensive berries. They sound healthy and good to us humans so are a great marketing tool.

I dislike feeding high carb diets to my cats but the dry food they get for bribes seems to settle easily without causing gastric issues. I tried several and settled on a moderately priced dry that's a "limited ingredient" food. I use Natural Balance Limited Ingredient Duck & Pea for the kibbly bribes. They love it. There are plenty of choices for dry foods that have no grains. I'd like the NB to have less of a carb load. Some other dry are lower in carbohydrate so good luck finding the right one for your cats.

Bear in mind that your cats may have an undesirable gastric response to the dry food while you're away. As treats, my lot do well. When I'm off on business, Husband often gets lazy and gives them dry food for a meal-which leaves them with astounding gastric issues.

Off topic, but aren't Maine Coons great?

I'm have no idea if it would be acceptable to you, but I have really liked Royal Canin dry food since I started feeding it to my cats a few years back. My old CRF cat (who insists on eating dry food as well as wet) has done very well on one of their formulas for the past 5 years while having kidney disease that entire time.

I just looked at their website and they do have a special diet 33 for cats which seems to be geared towards cats who don't digest starches well. Not sure if that might help you or not, but thought I'd throw it out there for you to decide.

EVO dry (reg and weight mgmt version) is grain free.

Hi I know this was a few years ago now but I'm suffering the same thing with my little ragdoll and was wondering if you found a solution? The only thing he can eat is ID wet tins but he is always starving on them where as dry food fills him for longer but doesn't sit well with his stomach. We've tried the dry food version of id, advance, royal canin and science diet. Curious if you were able to find something? Thanks

A cat is biologically designed to eat meat… ALL dry foods, grain-free or not, have a LOT of carbs (as someone already discussed above) or else it would not be possible to make a kibble out of the ingredients (my hopes is that with technology eventually we might be able to create a low carb dry food someday for cats). But until that day happens, some cats just have not 'learned' to tolerate the carbs in dry foods (and really not surprising since their GI tracts are not designed to deal with carbs)and will need to be fed low carb canned foods (note that some canned foods even have high carbs)… the more surprising thing to me is how many cats do 'tolerate' dry foods (I read some expert nutritionist's descriptions that 'tolerate' is a better word than the phrase 'do well on', since, in their opinion, no cat really does well on high carb diet.. .they just tolerate it). I have no good answer for the feeding of cats while you are away… what do you do with your dogs? Most have someone come over and feed them while you're gone, and I think the same will have to be done for cats that do not tolerate improper diets.

mix the wet with the dry for a week or so and then just gradually remove the wet entirely. There is a big divide on how or what cats should be fed and each side has valid points for their perspective. I had cats I fed only wet food to and they lived to be 22 and 19 years old but after seeing what it did to their gums and teeth, I don't necessarily agree that this was the right approach; I just learned the pros and cons after it was too late to switch them. Not only is it extremely expensive, but I think there are some valid reasons hard food is needed too. As mentioned by others you want to stick with something high in protein low in carbs. Meals actually have more protein than fresh meat due to water content, so if you read a label and it says salmon, salmon meal, the meal is good. I also only feed our cats food made in the USA and locally sourced. Some examples would be Fromms which is an excellent food as is Holistic Select, and maybe Taste of the Wild.

I know this is mainly an old post too, but with a recent question. My cat gets a combination of dry food and wet food. I give Rocket Nutro Natural Choice Grain Free Duck and Potato dry food and Nutro Natural Choice minced chicken canned food. This I just give a little bit two or three times a day. He is thriving on this combination. He is 13-1/2 years old and very healthy. I don't think grain free cat food was available when the original poster asked his/her question. This food is made in Tennessee.

Thanks for that very informative post, harebelle! I finally realized how people are hoodwinked into the "grain free" cat and dog food market! Carbs are carbs...I doubt potatoes are better than wheat or rice. I have a dog, I have not delved into the raw feeding world yet but I do realize it is more natural and would be beneficial for both cats and dogs. As for my dog, she cannot eat any of the grain free dry foods that I tried to give her, they gave her awful digestion issues if you know what I mean :)

I don't know anything about cats and quite terrified of them (don't take it personally) : -)