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I feed both my girls a raw, prey-model diet, which consists of 10% organs (no more than half of that liver), 10% edible bone (such as small bones from rabbit or poultry) and 80% meat (this includes muscle, fat, skin & fur).

The idea is to approximate the diet that cats evolved to eat - small animals like mice, rabbits, squirrels etc.

I used to feed various commercial foods, but after doing a lot of research, I was really unhappy with all the species inappropriate garbage and filler that was being used - all stuff that cats can't digest, that they get little to no nutritional value from and that are allergenic, like corn, wheat, soy in almost all brands, and fruit & veggies in the more expensive stuff. Things that a true carnivore has no business consuming.

Since I've yet to find a good, affordable source of feeder animals (mice, rats, chicks, quail etc) in Canada, I've been doing "frankenprey" - over time they get the 80/10/10 ratios, but one meal might be all chicken hearts, another might be chicken wings, another might be chopped up beef organs (heart, liver, kidney), another might be a rabbit leg with the skin and fur on. It all depends on what is in my freezer and what they have at the grocery store.

Both my cats are healthy, active and very soft and shiny. Their teeth look good (Clover's very back ones need a bit of brushing but both have very little plaque, and they are mentally stimulated by their food. They're also very well hydrated by eating moist raw meat, their poop and pee smells less and they poop far less - more of what they eat gets digested and used by their bodies.

Neither had any health problems to begin with, but on the raw feeding mailing list I'm on there are a lot of people with cats who have urinary problems, renal failure, diabetes and other chronic illnesses that are well managed by a prey-model diet, so it seems to be all around beneficial. Many also have cats with different needs and issues that do well on the same prey-model diet. Some without teeth require their food to be cut into smaller pieces; some with diabetes require blood sugar monitoring; but no dramatically different diets.

* I found this article recently and after looking at it (and messybeast seems to be a pretty good, reliable resource for information) I'm even more convinced that ditching the commercial cat food was the best decision I ever made. I nearly threw up while reading this:

http://www.messybeast.com/cat-food-industry.htm

If I were going to go back to a commercial food, I'd pick one of the grain free canned varieties and skip the crunchies all together. Evo looks like it's probably one of the best commercial cat food brands out there.

http://www.naturapet.com/search/?animal=cat


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Regarding cat allergies - your friend should look closely at the ingredients of the food she is feeding. Soy and fish can be very allergenic, and cats can be allergic to even something as seemingly innocuous as chicken. She might be well of trying a wet food that is soy, fish and grain -free and that is based on a meat that the cat is less likely to have developed a sensitivity to - rabbit, lamb, venison, duck...

I'm currently feeding my cat Friskies Dental Diet. She doesn't need help with her teeth or anything, it was just a flavor she didn't try yet. razz With Friskies, she likes the Seafood flavor the best. heart

I usually feed my cats the Purina One products. Right now we are trying a new one called Purina One Indoor Cat weight control and hairball control. My cats are very active but their poo does stink pretty badly. Every once in a while for a treat I give them the wet food one cat each. And that is usually the Fancy Feast Elegant Medleys which is a product of Purina. They LOVE them some wet food.

i give mitts and grumbles each 1/3 cup of regular dry science diet in the morning. they love fresh kibble. they don't really finish them. then at night i give each of them 1/4 can of wet science diet minced beef. they usually don't finish them, either. but grumbles gets distressed if she can't find readily accessible food. they just nosh on the food on and off all day.

I feed my cats Science Diet by Hills which is a dry diet and is a specialty brand u would have to get by your vet but it would work well if your cat has a very sensitive stomach like 2 out of 4 of my cats do. For my 2 cats we use a wet diet from Friskies they prefer the seafood kind but they hate salmon.... we feed them about 2-3 cans a day which seems like a lot but really Salem eats about 1-1.5 cans on his own because he is an outside inside cat with no claws and manages to catch fox, squirl,rabbit, and birds.
I have a brand of treats that they LOVE everytime i open the bag i suddenly have furry slippers lol but i don't have any packs right now so next time i buy them i'll put the type in then.

My cat loves chicken mcnuggets. I try not to feed him too much because it will make him sick, but it's hard to do that when he's giving you the "OMG I am starving you have to give me something RIGHT NOW or I will die of starvation" look. xp

Grain free all the way!
However, I'd like to be able to feed my little Poe raw....It's just so expensive!

I stick with "Wellness" grain free stuff. It's a bit expensive, but better for kitty! Also, w/ all the pet food recals, I think I can feel a bit safer with slightly more expensive stuff...