Felix grain free? Massive diarrhoea issues!

[ljbanny]

Hi all,

I am literally at my wits end... I have a kitten who is 6 months old. She has been eating felix wet food and whiskers dry since 8 weeks old. The last 6 weeks she has had chronic diarrhoea. We have spent over £300 at the vets and they are still none the wiser! We've had antibiotics, stool binding stuff, we've paid £90 for her stool to be sent off and it's still happening! The vet thought she may have 'Giardia' but the stool results have came back fine with nothing wrong. We have been feeding her plain chicken and her stool was much better, however every time we start to slowly introduce Felix again the diarrhoea starts back up! What am I doing wrong? The vets haven't got a clue... She is fine in herself... I can't afford to keep feeding her chicken breasts though. Any recommendations? Does Felix contain cereal/wheat/grains?
Any help will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Leanne

[ThorpeDave]

Hi Leanne

I am no kitten expert only ever had adult cats

Obvious question? have you tried other Kitten food? there are plenty of other brands on the market.

I am also assuming that you don't give you kitten milk or any other foods aimed at humans and, of course, avoid giving her food that has been chilled.

Hope this clears up soon

Regards

Dave

[ljbanny]

Hi Dave,

Thanks for your reply

We have tried all Felix and whiskers wet.
The only thing that is stopping her from being sick and having major diarrhoea is chicken!

I just don't know what to do anymore?
Should I invest in some senesitive stomach dry food and see how she goes on that?
Is it okay for a kitten/cat to have just a dry food diet?

Thanks
Leanne

[ljbanny]

I'm just really confused because she was fine on this food before and then all of a sudden the diarrhoea and sickness started and now she can't eat it at all! :/
Definitely not giving her any milk or human food
Xx

[Ruth B]

Quite a lot of cat foods include some types of grain or other vegetable matter as bulking agents. Just what they are is a minefield to research, some will say which specific grains they contain, others will just list something like 'cereals'.

As far as I know Felix as Good as it Looks doesn't contain wheat, which is one of the main culprits in giving cats bad stomachs, but I'm not sure about other varieties of Felix. You could try some of the more exclusive brands, normally only available in pet shops or online (I don't use them so I can't really recommend which ones), they claim to have a higher meat content and some people swear by them. Personally my suggestion would be to put her on the dried food for her main meals if she is fine with that, and just give her wet as a bit of a treat, then go out and buy the odd sachet, tin or tray of different types and try her on those a little at a time and keep a diary of what she has been given and how she reacted. Trial and error might mean you can work out where her problem is, it could be she has just developed an intolerance to something in Felix and would be fine on another make.

One of mine was slightly intolerant of wheat when we got him but we also noticed that he reacted badly to the very oily fishy foods as well, Felix As Good as it Looks meaty flavours have become his mainstay. I also found giving him occasional meals of cooked chicken or minced beef really helped him. What he produces can still be very sloppy at times but other than that he is fine, if he didn't use a litter tray and went in the garden I would never know anything was wrong.

Hopefully you can sort your girl out and hopefully she might also grow out of it as she gets a bit older.

[ThorpeDave]

Hi Leanne

If her stools are normal after eating dry food then go ahead! just ensure that you have plenty of fresh filtered water - not straight tap water - as she will need more fluids.

Obviously any changes must be given a chance to work.

If she is showing no signs of distress and is playing as any normal kitten would do then you are probably looking at some kind of intolerance to an ingredient rather than an illness.

I am surprised that you vet has not found a solution though

Regards

Dave

[ljbanny]

Hi Ruth,

Thanks for your reply
I've been doing a lot of reading and wondered if she may be wheat tolerant however if Felix as good as it looks doesn't have any in then it can't be that!
At the moment it just seems like any wet food or the dry whiskers we're giving is causing the presistant diarrhoea and sickness. She must be allergic to something in the food right? I've tried just the meats too (taking away the fish just incase) but that still hasn't worked...
Should I try the Purina Sensitive? It doesn't say if it's suitable for kittens though :/
I just don't know what to do anymore... and my vets seem clueless too!

[ljbanny]

Hi Dave,

Yes my vets don't know what's going on... they're just costing us a bomb which is why I have now turned my attention to the internet.
I just wish I knew what she was allergic too... or what's causing the problem!

[MarySkater]

Just a thought on the cost of chicken. Iceland (the store, not the country ) sell frozen, pre-cooked diced chicken breast for about £5 a kilo. That works out at 50p for a hundred-gram portion, comparable with many pouched cat foods and cheaper than some. It just needs to be thawed out, although you can also put the thawed chicken through a chopper if you want. I've used it to tempt cats with poor appetites. I wouldn't feed it exclusively for a long time, because it's not a balanced diet. But if you want to use chicken some of the time, price needn't be an issue.

[ThorpeDave]

Hi Leanne

Hi Dave,

Yes my vets don't know what's going on... they're just costing us a bomb which is why I have now turned my attention to the internet.
I just wish I knew what she was allergic too... or what's causing the problem!

Have you tried contacting Purina who make Felix to ask their advice?

The contact page can be found here https://www.purina.co.uk/contact-us

Hope this help

Dave

[booktigger]

If you are going to give her only dry food, I'd look for a better quality than Whiskas. Purina will be fine for kittens, at 6 months you could start swapping to adult. Kitten food is more likely to cause upset stomachs, so swapping to adult could solve the problem

[ljbanny]

Thank you eveyone for your kind responses!

I shall definitely invest in some pre-cooked chicken from Iceland - that's fab thanks!

Dave - I have just contacted prions so thank you very much for the link

I think my next move is to move her onto Purina One Sensitive and see how that goes. She does drink plenty of water so I have no worries about that. I just wasn't sure if it was good/healthy for a cat to be on just dry food for the rest of her life? Does it shorten their life or I've any health related issues?

So I should be okay to give her the Purina One Sensitibe regardless if its for adults?

Thanks xx

[ljbanny]

Omg sorry for the countless typo errors!! Fat fingers and stress!! Ha

[vanilla]

I would suggest giving the chicken until her diarrhoea goes away and her stools are normal, then GRADUALLY mix some felix with the chicken slowly over the next few days and see what happens. If it comes back, then she has developed an allergy to that food for some reason. Do the same again with the chicken and try James Wellbeloved grain free dry and wet food. They have kitten ones.
It's best not to change foods quickly as kitties have sensitive tummies. Gradually change their diet over the course of the week.

I also presume your kitten has been wormed and is up to date with all her jabs.

Good luck! xx

[ljbanny]

Hi,

She's had chicken for weeks now and we've tried slowly mixing a tiny bit of Felix wet into her food over 2-3 days and after 1-2 days she back being sick and having horrible diarrhoea. We put her back on the chicken and she was fine... again we gradually introduced a tiny bit of felix and we were back at square on again
You're right, it must be something with the felix! No idea why or how!
I will definitely give the James W one a go thanks See how she gets on with that. Thank you very much for your help
She's had all her injections and is up to date with flea and worming. We use advocate too - which is a good flea & worm treatment and then an additional wormer for tapeworm.
My poor baby girl... I just want her to have normal stools! She always uses her litter... however when the chronic diarrhoea comes a long she won't use the litter tray... it's said she gets scared and doesn't like the feel! Luckily I have laminate!
Fingers crossed xx

[ThorpeDave]

It is not in Purina's interest for your kitty to be sick after eating their food.

If anyone knows what it could be they will and they may be able to suggest another product which has different ingredients. DON'T be afraid to ask them for some free samples of alternative products - indeed ASK for samples

Dave

[vanilla]

I found another link on this site where somebody had a similar problem.

https://www.catchat.org/felineforum/vie ... php?t=2065


My 8mth kitten has loose stools now and again. Sometimes it's when he drinks rain water that I notice he has this. I feed him a mixture of cat food, cheap and expensive as I don't want him to rely on one brand only and become a fussy eater. I mix a table spoon of James Wellbeloved dry food with his wet food.

Would the vet do an allergy test??

[Kay]

the one thing Felix wet food contains, regardless of the named flavour, is fish, and some cats can be intolerant of it

quite a few dried foods also contain fish oil, but it is possible to find good quality ones which don't - I don't know if you've discovered Zooplus yet, but if not you will find they list all the ingredients of all the foods, sell a fair few unobtainable in the shops in the UK, and also sell quite a few small bags of dried food which you could try her on

http://www.zooplus.co.uk/shop/cats?gcli ... oC1LPw_wcB

finding a few dry foods she likes, and tolerates, and a bit of chicken each day will keep her going and she may in time grow out of whatever the problem is

[Lilith]

Hi Leanne, I'm not an expert on cat nutrition and can't improve on the advice you've been given, but, at the risk of tmi, if your kitten will eat boiled rice, this can be an excellent short-term quick fix for diarrohea. Cook it as you'd eat it yourself, NOT to a mush, as you want it to absorb liquid in the gut, and if you cook it with the chicken for flavour, like a pilau, it might tempt her, or just cook it in chicken juice ... I've been using a recipe for years where you measure out what rice you need and cook that quantity with a bit more water or stock - say 200ml rice to 300ml liquid, simmer covered on lowest heat for 10 mins, leave for 5 mins and there you are, it comes out sort of steamed, needs no draining. Works well for humans too lol.

Sorry - again more tmi, but when kittens are teething it can cause runny bellies too, and she's about that age. All the very very best with her

[vanilla]

Or if that's too much hard work you can buy Encore chicken and rice

https://www.tesco.com/groceries/product ... =273824724

[Ruth B]

Another you might want to try is Applaws Chicken and Pumpkin. It may sound odd, but apparently pumpkin is very good at sorting out stomach problems. I know someone who buys jars of mashed pumpkin to mix in with foods if some of the rescue cats have problems.

[ljbanny]

Thank you eveyone for your reply and suggestions
I've had more help here than I have from my vets ha!

I'm going to give some of these branded foods that you've suggested a go Hopefully one of them will work!

I have tried rice before with chicken and she refused to eat it ha! I will definitely try again with the stock/using chicken to boil suggestion thanks Maybe I made the rice too mushy! :/

Thanks agin eveyone xx

[bobbys girl]

I believe James Wellbeloved do a range of kitten foods - wet and dry. Our lot love JWB senior dry food. It has no wheat and no pork (something mine have problems with). They do get Felix AGAIL but it is becoming more difficult as they introduce more flavours. They only seem to really like beef and chicken flavours.

We got chicken from Iceland for Tommy - he did love his meat! The only thing is that the frozen chicken is pumped full of water and other 'stuff'. But as it was the only thing Tommy really ate with relish, it had to do.

[Kay]

I've been feeding my two outdoor strays on chicken for the past year - I bought Tesco's frozen Everyday portions - stewed, chopped and frozen they made cheaper meals than cat food - but I have recently stopped because it was getting to the stage where they wouldn't eat anything else, and as the OP says, it lacks essential nutrients

[Lilith]

Or if that's too much hard work you can buy Encore chicken and rice

https://www.tesco.com/groceries/product ... =273824724

Hey Vanilla I never knew that!

I clearly don't get out enough ...

Something else I forgot till just now - I had an old tomcat who sometimes just got the runs for no reason, and what worked for him was a little bottle of vanilla Actimel. I think he thought it was melted icecream and it bunged him up every time, though I'm not sure about the wisdom of feeding this to a kitten - but maybe there is some probiotic product designed for cats?

Yeah I too have learned an immense amount since joining this forum - it's stood me in good stead

Good luck with Kitten, Leanne

[vanilla]

Thank you eveyone for your reply and suggestions
I've had more help here than I have from my vets ha!

Welcome to the forum ljbanny!! It's a lovely community here and the people are all friendly and helpful. I keep coming back!

@Lilith You'd save more money in the long run the way you're doing it

[meriad]

A bit late to this and I think I've managed to read everything.

The one thing I would say is that if you've been feeding Whiskas dry without a problem then the problem most certainly won't be cereals given that grains are the main ingredient in that dry food. If you look at a list of ingredients, they're usually listed in order of what is the food most.

Also to add that Felix as good as it looks (AGAIL) is grain free, but their chunks in gravy are not (same for Whiskas - the gravy foods contain cereals). So if the AGAIL is upsetting your cat then again an indicator that it's not cereals. First thing I'd suggest is get your cat off the Whiskas dry and buy a much better quality hypoallergenic dry food - James Wellbeloved, Arden Grange or the likes. Find one that uses rice or potato vs grains / maize

As has been mentioned it could well be the protein in the food that your cat is reacting to, have you noticed if she's worse after some flavours vs others. If you can find a wet food that contains venison see if that works for her; and then from there build up one protein source at at time so you can rule out any potential culprit. Another thing to watch out for is fish... one of my boys is OK with any meat based foods that have fish and fish by products as a listed ingredient but fish based flavours he stuggles with and gets more itchy.

Best of luck

[ljbanny]

Hi eveyone,

Sorry for the late reply! Thank you eveyone for your suggestions. So the past couple of days I have slowly introduced the Purina One sensitive dry food and (fingers crossed) everything seems to be okay... there's been no upset stomach yet... although I haven't seen her go for a number two yet!
Is it okay to keep her on just dried food? Is this healthy?

Hope everyone is doing well!
Xxx

[ljbanny]

I did think it could be the fishy flavours... so I took her off the salmon and tuna etc... but she was still poorly with the chicken and beef! I think it's the FAGAIL in general for some odd reason! Literally was fine one minute with them and then the next she's mega ill! I mean can this even happen?! So odd xx

[Gill_2017]

I think some cats can just be intolerant to certain foods, my older cat started to become intolerant to fish based foods for example and would be throwing up so we took him off it and now only feed him meat biscuits and wet food. He also can't have whiskers as it gives him the runs.