27/10/2024
Before you read this next passage, please note that I am not a nutritionist and I have just researched about cat food.
As you can probably imagine I get to see a lot of cats.
One of the biggest challenges for owners and an area that owners ask a lot about is food and “are my cats underweight” or “overweight”.
To me, its more about what are you feeding your cats in terms of protein and understanding how protein in a cats diet will affect muscle mass and degeneration.
Cats are Obligate Carnivores – that is, one that depends entirely on meat because their diet requires nutrients that are only found in
animal flesh.
Recent studies have shown that adult cats that did not consume a diet consisting of at least 40% protein lost lean body mass over time.
Some feline diets are 30-38% protein, and diets at this level will result in loss of muscle mass over time.
Poor-quality protein, or protein that is less digestible, will result in faster loss of muscle mass than high-quality protein.
Senior cats need increased protein levels because as they age their digestive efficiency reduces - cats of 12 or more years of age should be fed a diet containing nearly 50% protein where adult canines (Dogs are omnivores) require only 12% and humans just 8%.
Put simply put into the perspective of a cat’s natural diet, a mouse—when measured on a dry matter basis – each mouse contains approximately:
• 55% protein
• 45% fat
• 1-2% carbohydrate
I’m not suggesting that we all go out and bag ourselves some mice but take a look at the packets of cat food.
The nutritional value is listed on all packs. Look at the analytical constituent’s section and look at the protein level. In order to get like for like between wet food and dry food there is a basic formula to use:
Find the Moisture (max) percentage and Crude Protein (min) listed on the pet food packaging to perform these calculations:
• Subtract the Moisture percentage from 100. This will give you the percent dry matter of the diet.
• Divide the Crude Protein by the percent dry matter of the product.
• Multiply the result by 100. This will give you the percent of protein on a dry matter basis.
Canned food example:
Canned Food A has the following listed on its label:
12% crude protein
78% moisture
Calculation:
100 – 78 (moisture) = 22 (dry matter of the diet)
12 (crude protein) / 22 = 0.545
0.545 x 100 = 54.5
The percent protein of Canned Food A on a dry matter basis is 54.5%
Dry food example:
Dry Food A has the following listed on its label:
37% crude protein
12% moisture
Calculation:
100 – 12 (moisture) = 88 (dry matter of the diet)
37 (crude protein) / 88 = 0.420
0.420 x 100 = 42.0
The percent protein of Dry Food A on a dry matter basis is 42.0%
In this example, it is important to note that by reading the label without considering moisture content, it appears that Dry Food A contains significantly more protein than Canned Food A.
However, Dry Food A actually has 12.5% less protein than Canned Food A.
Sounds complicated? It isn’t really, but it is thought provoking and at the end of the day we just want our cats to be healthy and happy.
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