BUTCHERS CLASSIC TINNED FOOD ? HOW GOOD IS IT PLEASE ?

[Cussypat1974]

I love when I find Butcher's tins! The cats love them, and they seem to thrive on the stuff. I have found them at the tesco near college (an hour away) so I stock up every week now.
When my dog Jack was alive, he could tolerate Butchers dogwood tins. The hills prescription stuff never worked (had a HUGE battle with Hill's over it!). Jack had very bad crohn's disease and as it developed, his system became ever more delicate.
I now use butchers when a cat here has a bout of diarrhoea, rather than hills ID. It had worked just as well so far, to sort them out.

As regards vets and food companies, it depends on the vet. My old vet used to literally chase em out of his premises lol. He HATED them all, especially Royal Canin, who employed aggressive marketing campaigns and offered vets here in Ireland weekends away to promote their foods.

My current vet stocks Hills and Burn's. I have an issue with hills (lol) but I find Burns very good and quite reasonably priced. My current vet also is looking into finding cheaper options for customers wih diabetic animals and for weight control etc, but space to stock multiple brands is in short supply as it is a small clinic.

Not all vets are evil money-grabbers, basically. Not many are as old school as my old vet, but there are certainly vets out there who want to offer the best options to all their patients at an affordable price. My vet cares about her patients, so wants it to be as easy as possible for the owner to give the right food for the condition.

[JulieJulie]

A few people have mentioned avoiding fish varieties - Crewella mentioned a link with cystitus - I've never heard this before. The Home Bargains ones are often the fish varieties.
Does anyone know what the link might be?

I moved my lot onto Butchers after reading the research for my poor little calichi cat. It cut right back on the vomiting piles around the house so we've stuck with it! They also get raw food (pre-packaged for cats) mixed with GAIL sometimes plus Royal Canin bix (only cos we get a discount!)

[JulieandBarney]

Hi Julie,

I am not too sure, but if I give my fella any form of fish at all, he has dreadful sickness and vomits his entire stomach contents within minutes of eating it....strangely enough, he is just recovering from a bout of cystitis !

I stick to chicken now !

x

[Crewella]

I'm just being super-careful with the fish because Daz had struvite crystal sand and so many blockages along with the cystitis - I so nearly lost him. I do occasionally feed him fish now, but I keep it to a minimum:

Generally speaking, the basic diet recommendation for the average cat with urinary tract issues is a high protein/low carbohydrate canned food with added water.

Taking it one step further, look for one that is low in phosphorus - either below ~1.0-1.2% dry matter (not 'as fed'), or below ~250-300 mg/100 kcal.

Protein, carbohydrate, and phosphorus content (mg/100 kcal) are listed for many canned foods on this chart.

Unfortunately, it would take me far too long to keep up with the new products on the market so if you want to know the specifications of the food you are feeding, please see the Contacting Pet Food Companies section on my Commercial Canned Food page for dialog that you can use when calling them.

When considering water versus phosphorus content, as noted above, the water issue is the most important but if you are really worried about crystals (even though they are not an abnormal finding in cat urine as discussed below), pick a diet that is low in phosphorous.

Phosphorus is a general indicator of the calcium and magnesium load of the diet. If a diet is low in phosphorus, chances are it is also fairly low in calcium and magnesium since all of those minerals are high in bone material and if a diet is low in phosphorus, it is probably low in bone matter.

Note that fish tends to be high in phosphorus because fish comes with its own bones so stay away from fish.

The above is from here:

http://www.catinfo.org/?link=urinarytracthealth" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[JulieandBarney]

That is so helpful, thank you so much Crewella, especially as Barney is just recovering from a bout of cystitis... I have always mixed in plenty of warm water with Barneys food, even though I feed him wet food, he laps up the water happily when mixed with the food and the link you provided gives a fantastic explanation as to the importance of water in a cats diet, particularly in cats prone to bladder problems..

[Crewella]

You're very welcome - I know how helpful I found it!