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I have been feeding my cats Wellness Food for four years now.
What I like most is that, like most of the Wellness line, this Chicken and Herring blend is made without grains. Cats are obligate carnivores, meaning they only need meat...in the wild they only get grains in the stomach of prey they eat. If you put grains in food, cats continue to eat until they've had enough protein. So the grain is just added calories for nothing. Since grains are cheaper per ounce, it's a great way to save the manufacturer money, but it's not good for your cats.
In the first year after switching from dried food and lower-quality grain-filled wet food, both my cats lost weight and their fur became softer and shinier. The difference was most evident in my plump, dumb inactive cat; he lost a couple of pounds and went from middle-aged dumpy to sleek and active. He has gotten a lot smarter and is more lively in general.
I also like that this food doesn't have any rendered animal fat or meat byproducts, which are disgusting slaughterhouse waste it is illegal to sell to humans.
As far as how my cats feel, they think this is just okay. They would give it three stars for the smell/taste. They always prefer the cheap stuff, like fancy feast, because it is swimming in rendered fat which smells delicious to cats just like potato chips do to humans. I call it "kitty crack." Cats choose food mainly on smell, not taste, which works great in the wild but not so much with commercial foods where their quality sensor is way off. To get my cats to eat this food at first, I needed to mix it with kitty crack--first only a quarter good to 3/4 kitty crack and gradually building up to 100% over about six months. It's never a good idea to get into a battle of will with cats...first of all, you'll lose, and second it is not safe for them to go more than 24 hours without food because of potentially fatal liver issues.
After the initial break-in period, my cats ate this happily. This is the favorite of both my cats, followed by Turkey/Salmon blend as second favorite. I buy a variety to mix it up nutritionally and to make sure they don't get too fussy. Since they never overeat this, I simply feed them as much as they want...if they ask for more, I give it.
One can is enough to feed one cat per day. This size must be opened with a can opener and stored in between uses. For this reason not as convenient as the 5.5 ounce sizes which you just pull open, but the cost difference over a year is substantial. It's not too much of a pain as on days that aren't too hot I leave this on the counter at room temperature between feedings. If for any reason it's not done by bedtime I put it in the fridge. Cat's digestion is much faster and a bit of bacteria in food is less likely to cause problems.
Cost-wise, these are about $2 a day, and Amazon's price is competitive with big-box pet food stores. When I first started using this, the price seemed prohibitive so I took out the calculator and did a serious analysis. Compared with the Fancy Feast I was buying at a big-box store, per ounce this is a LOT more expensive. But then I realized that since Fancy Feast is packed with grains and junk cats don't need, comparing price by weight isn't fair. I redid the analysis based on daily servings of protein, calories etc. and the two foods turned out identical in cost. It would still be cheaper to feed dried food but if I'm going to go 100% wet the price of this is actually comparable to supermarket foods.
Wellness also sells a Core brand which is even higher quality, but it doesn't come in the larger more economical cans, making it prohibitively expensive.
Note: I read the one star reviews from here. Looks like there have been some quality-control issues with a new plant. I have not experienced this issue...the quality appears the same in the 4+ years I've been buying this. However, I will post if I experience a problem and update my review immediately.
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My cat goes absolutely nuts for Wellness Chicken & Herring!! It is grain free and high quality. I've thoroughly researched cat food and this is the best quality at a decent price.
Buy Wellness Complete Health Canned Cat Chicken & Herring Now
I purchased this cat food after reading glowing recommendations from two or three different cat nutrition websites. One site did offer the caveat that while the quality of this brand was excellent it would not help the cat's diet if he refused to eat it and the reviewer's experience was that some cats would love it and others wouldn't touch it. My cat was somewhere in the middle he didn't love it, but he would sometimes leave it half-eaten and the rest would dry up.
My 8 year old cat is new to canned food he has been fed a diet of 99.5 percent dry food since we adopted him as a half-grown kitten. (The other .5 percent he obtained himself from ferns and the occasional mouse. After reading an article about the nutritional needs of cats, I discovered that our rotund feline was getting too many carbohydrates and not enough protein, and I began adding canned cat food along side his daily bowl of dry food. I have tried a few different brands to find something that suits him.
The Wellness canned cat food (I purchased the chicken and herring formula)has a pate-texture and I think this was my pet's primary objection to it. After trying several different canned foods, I find that he prefers more of a filet in gravy style preparation.
When I first gave this to my cat I simply plopped the chunk of food into his bowl leaving it largely in a solid can-shaped blob. Later, I began to add a half-can of warm water to the bowl and mix it up to make a thinner mush. Using this method, he seems to do fine with it, so I may or may not purchase it again.
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Reasonable price and fast shipping for good quality cat food not widely available in grocery stores. This is their favorite of all the Wellness flavors. I have had some of the same issues with dented cans in shipping that others have complained about. No idea who works in the Amazon packing warehouses these days but they are indeed sloppy. No major damage done to date, though, so it doesn't impact my rating for the product.
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I've been feeding Wellness canned food to my cats for several years now and have been delighted at the improvements it helped make to their overall health. However, this is a pricey product and of late, they have been putting less of the product in the cans. The difference is being made up with additional liquid.
I'm a sculptor and a gourmet cook so I have a good eye for proportion, volume, and density. The four servings I make by dividing a 12.5 oz can four ways are now smaller in size and my cats are demonstrating the change. Where before, the servings were generous enough that they didn't always finish them, now they finish the servings quickly & spend the time between meals looking for more food (stalking human meals, garbage cans, etc.)
I called to complain to the company and was told there was no change in their recipe and it might just be the difference between manufacturing locations (east coast versus west coast). "The buyers on the west coast like a fluffier product" was the answer as to why the food in the can is so much softer now. I can't blame the poor call rep who, no doubt, had a script to stick to, but BULL. You can still say the recipe hasn't changed while packaging the cans with less food and more liquid. It amounts to the same thing -I'm getting cheated as a consumer and my cats are left feeling hungry after their meals. I'd certainly prefer to pay a bit more per can if their costs are increasing than to have my cats pay the cost.
I'm currently looking around for a alternative no grain, low carb canned food. Considering that several pet food companies have proven to use deceptive practices in recent years, maybe the solution is to give in and start making their food myself.
