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Wysong doesn't contain any added taurine, which is an essential nutrient for cats.
A few things worth noting on this I think:
I'm assuming you mean the Archetype freeze-dried. Just looked it up and sure enough that one doesn't have added taurine. (I haven't used this product much. I bought some once and Amber liked it a bit but lost interest really, and she'd only eat it dry anyway. I went for freeze-dried Dream Treats instead. Certain other Wysong products do contain added taurine.) But, guaranteed analysis shows 0.9% taurine which is higher than in some foods where taurine is added back in.
Meat in the right quantities from the right parts contains taurine naturally. Taurine is typically added to cat foods because it is lost during the high heat processing of the meats and/or it doesn't contain enough organ meat. If the food were raw and contained enough organ meat taurine would not need to be added. This is the case with Archetype it would seem since it starts raw and is not heated very much (max 122 degrees or something like that).
Interesting side note: try finding taurine supplement that is not from China. It's almost impossible. If a pet food company tells you none of their ingredients are sourced from China, you should specifically ask them about taurine supplement and see if that still holds true. Lots of other supplements often come from China as well, and the manufacturers tend to conveniently not include those in their definition of "ingredients", or, they use their US-based supplier as the source, ignoring the fact that that supplier gets the stuff from elsewhere. Taurine is one that's very difficult to get from any other place, if that concerns you. Personally I live with it for the moment, just assuming most of the foods I use have Chinese-sourced taurine.
FWIW Amber's current food is a meal of canned chicken and fish (tuna/salmon), right now usually from Tiki Cat, and a meal of dry mixture of Wysong Epigen, Epigen 90 and Nature's Logic (all chicken-based). Nature's Logic is interesting to note along this line of discussion because they choose to make their entire product line without synthetic supplements. You won't find taurine listed in their ingredients, canned or dry.
Yes, lots of doctors say this. And lots of doctors say that dry food is perfectly fine. The people on THIS forum, generally side with the doctors who say dried food = evil.
The people on THIS forum convinced me to wean my cats more toward wet food, but since my cats *do* drink water (some more than others), a dried food of good quality is acceptable to me, in small quantities.
On the other hand, I had two cats prior to my current, who lived to be 18 and 17 respectively. They both ate almost exclusively dry food, both had hearty thirst drives, and were active and all their blood work and checkups came up normal and healthy all the way til their last year each. Putting one down after the other after having lived with each for 17+ years was heartbreaking for me, but I don't think for one moment that I did anything to contribute to their death. Most wet-food cats don't live that long, OR are that active when they get that old.
"Most" wet food fed cats don't live as long or stay active when they get old? Where do you ever come up with such things? LOL
OP I can't advise you on dry foods because I don't feed my cats such things. Keep in mind that male cats especially are at risk for urinary tract disorders when fed dry diets.
The soft stool could be from worms, or simply too quickly of a transition. Have the two boys been wormed? Did you do a slow transition of the food? Using a ProBioitc can help their bodies adjust to the new, better, food.
I was wondering what the vet said when you told him or her that the stool is soft. (I read that they have a clean bill of health, but I wonder what the vet thought about the soft stool regardless.)
I meant that the stool is softer than my female cat's stool, and they are eating the same diet. It isn't like diarrhea-soft, just not as firm. Like my female kitty's stool is firm and very easy to scoop, both male kitties occasionally have softer stool that tends to smear, stick to the litter scoop and fall apart.
The vet said not to worry unless it is watery or very frequent.
I'm assuming you mean the Archetype freeze-dried. Just looked it up and sure enough that one doesn't have added taurine. (I haven't used this product much. I bought some once and Amber liked it a bit but lost interest really, and she'd only eat it dry anyway. I went for freeze-dried Dream Treats instead. Certain other Wysong products do contain added taurine.) But, guaranteed analysis shows 0.9% taurine which is higher than in some foods where taurine is added back in.
No I was referring specifically to their canned cat food.
Au Jus: - no taurine added to any, however they do include "0.05%" taurine in the rabbit variety, in the crude analysis. The fact that they specifically add it to -that- one flavor, and don't include it in any other flavor, indicates that there isn't enough in any other flavor to warrant including it in the list. That means, to me, that there isn't enough of it for my cat to rely on, as a primary source of nutrition.
Vitality: no taurine listed in either the ingredients, or the crude analysis.
Anargen: no taurine listed in either the ingredients, or the crude analysis.
Geriatrix: taurine *is* listed in the ingredients, but there's no analysis of how much. Based exclusively on the fact that it's near the top of the ingredients list, I'd guess that it might be sufficient. But there's no way to know. Furthermore, soybeans is the 4th ingredient, with water being the third. It also has garlic in it, which is a known feline toxin. I wouldn't pay a premium price to feed substandard food. For that, I'll pay 40 cents and buy Friskie's.
Gourmet: taurine listed in all three flavor's ingredients. Taurine suspiciously absent from their crude analysis list. Garlic is also an ingredient of all three, and both wheat germ and soybeans are at the top of the ingredients list again. Gourmet organic hand-milled by virgins or otherwise, it's still carbs that cats don't need, and if I'm going to feed my cat substandard food, I'll feed her the cheap crap, and not the expensive crap.
Stew in Gravy: Both flavors omit any mention of Taurine, in both ingredients and crude analysis.
This is combined with Wysong's own disclaimer on their website, that their canned cat food is intended to be an *adjunct* with their dried foods, and is *not* intended to be the primary source of nutrition.
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This is combined with Wysong's own disclaimer on their website, that their canned cat food is intended to be an *adjunct* with their dried foods, and is *not* intended to be the primary source of nutrition.
That's true, and I don't disagree that many of those products look wacky. They certainly do to me as well. I think his method has been to introduce new products and not change formulas on old ones. Not sure. I think after a few decades some of those simply look outdated for a premium product, although some others he would probably argue that too much emphasis is put on such and such. Anyway. I just use my own judgment. I ignore most of the product line in favor of a couple of things that seem reasonably credible to my way of thinking and that my cat will eat.
The real thing Wysong would suggest from what I've seen is that the primary food be fresh raw meat. And he's nuts about supplements especially probiotics, etc, even producing that sort of stuff for human consumption. Obviously this kind of ideal doesn't work for everyone, certainly doesn't for me. See for example http://www.wysong.net/pet-health-and...th-program.php
I try to judge individual products on their merits or lack thereof, not necessarily whole companies. I mean, judging as a whole the pet food industry are crooks and liars so we have to take what little positive there is where we can find it. Or at least, that is what I choose to do.
Greg42, knowing about the background and history of Wysong is all well and good, but it doesn't address the OP's concern:
Quote:
Originally Posted by missik999
One of my cats won't touch wet food, I don't know why.
One of my friends recommended Wysong, but they don't sell it around here. He lives in Illinois and believes in it so much that he offered to send me some to try.
The OPs says, that someone recommended Wysong canned food as a primary source of nutrition for her cat. My answer is: don't do that, Wysong canned food *is not intended* to be a primary source of nutrition.
The OPs says, that someone recommended Wysong canned food as a primary source of nutrition for her cat. My answer is: don't do that, Wysong canned food *is not intended* to be a primary source of nutrition.
Fair enough. I wasn't focused on the OP's remarks at that point. Although the discussion I saw beforehand was about the freeze dried so I had assumed that is what was meant. In fact the OP doesn't say what type of Wysong the friend recommended (if in fact it was any specific type, maybe just recommending the company) so it may not have been canned at all. Although we do know that cats should eat food with moisture included so that may have been the assumption.
I wouldn't recommend sticking to one kind of anything anyway. Better to have the cat if possible be able to eat different things in case of problems. The cat, however, may prefer routine to our plans. Or not, sometimes they will up and stop eating their routine food. So tricky.
Ultimately I don't think wide-ranging single brand recommendations alone really get to the heart of the matter though. Ingredients and the attitudes of the people answering for the company (which is why I rambled on a bit about Dr Wysong) matter the most to me generally, along with whether or not Amber will actually eat it of course. Having ownership over manufacturing is nice too although many of the things I feed my cat don't have that and it's tough for a smaller company to do sometimes.
Some companies that don't do their own manufacturing appear to have serious animal welfare in mind. I would put Nature's Logic in that category, for example. They don't own their manufacturing but they do directly source their ingredients, etc. Some seem more marketing oriented than really health oriented. I would put something like Blue Buffalo in this category, I don't believe they do their own manufacturing and with all the varieties and such it seems to be more marketing oriented. The main reason they have grain-free is because that is selling right now. Of course many large companies do their own manufacturing and aren't really worth considering due to the quality of what goes into the food.
Weruva is sort of in between here. It appears to have been created by someone in the family that owns the manufacturing plant in Thailand where it is made. So maybe you could say they own the manufacturing. It's a high quality plant that also makes human food. Then I look at something like Tiki Cat, it sounds very much like a marketing venture and they don't make it (it may well be made in that same plant in Thailand though), but the food is clearly of high quality and they do appear to care about that at least even if they might not be as detailed or involved as something like Nature's Logic.
I suppose one way to weed out foods is to look for fewer marketing gimmicks. "Indoor", "Senior" and such are generally marketing gimmicks. Touting vegetables is generally a marketing gimmick. The silly breakfast thing I've seen TV ads for recently (Fancy Feast is it?) is DEFINITELY a marketing gimmick! LOL
For cats that won't eat canned food try different textures and different meats. It can be hard to be sure about different textures from the outside of the can but chunkier foods include Weruva (and its cousin Soulistic which is a Petco brand), Tiki Cat, Fussie Cat and a few others. My own cat will refuse a straight pate food pretty much no matter what it's made of, but chunkier foods do get eaten somewhat. Also there are different things the food can be made out of. Evanger's makes one with Pheasant. Rabbit is a lesser known one to look for (Nature's Logic rabbit does not come from China). Venison is out there too. Maybe some of these can entice a picky cat to eat. I also used to crumble a freeze-dried treat on top. Eventually I had Amber eating mostly wet food, and then with the hyperthyroid I backed off on that concerned she wasn't getting enough overall intake. The dry is still her favorite. At least the dry she eats is no longer full of useless fillers. She's 16, at I think she is allowed to keep eating the food that way if it's her favorite. I mean, I wish I'd known more 16 years ago, but at least I know more now even if I can't change everything.
I have been feeding Blue Buffalo indoor formula for years to the cat I have had the longest, and she is 11. She has done very well on it, loves it, and has firm low-odor stools.
My two newest additions (both 4 year old males) don't seem to do as well on the Blue Buffalo. Their stool has a lot of odor, and they seem to vomit fairly frequently. Frequently their stools are soft although not like diarrhea. Sometimes they pick at the food, looking through the dish like they are hoping to find something else.
When I adopted them they had been eating Iams, as the shelter they came from received free Iams from the company for the shelter animals. They liked the Iams but I didn't like some of the ingredients so I gradually switched them to Blue Buffalo.
I will mention that they have been vet checked and have a clean bill of health. They are both indoor only.
What cat food has worked best for you?
Try them on a Purina cat food both dry and wet to see if they will accept that. Purina is one of the safer brands not being involved with either of the recent cat food recalls.
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Or not, sometimes they will up and stop eating their routine food. 
The dry is still her favorite. At least the dry she eats is no longer full of useless fillers. She's 16, at I think she is allowed to keep eating the food that way if it's her favorite. I mean, I wish I'd known more 16 years ago, but at least I know more now even if I can't change everything.
