Kibble Wars

There is something of a food war going on among vets. They don’t call it that, don’t tend to aim at each other, and may not even see it that way, but there are two sides presenting and pushing strongly conflicting ideas. It’s a war, and caught in between are the cats, humans with cats, and the majority of vets. The quibble is kibble.

On one extreme are the vets who say that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with feeding grains and other high carb foods to cats even as their entire diet. (While grains and high carbs can be found in canned food, it’s mostly kibble, aka “dry food” that is at issue.) The primary justification that I’ve seen is that if something works for a long period, there’s no reason to change it. At the other extreme are those saying that all kibble and any kibble is bad, utterly bad. If you’re thinking that there must be some middle ground, then you’ve found the way to make followers of both camps mad at you. This seems to be a no prisoners, no compromise war.

I know the results of taking the middle ground because that’s where I’ve made my stand in discussions with both sides, so I’m not writing this for those sides. I’m writing for those trying to do what they can with what they have, trying to do the best they can while realizing that even if there is a perfect way, they aren’t going to manage it. Here’s my take on both sides and what I see as primary flaws with the extremes.

The “Go Kibble” Side

There’s no denying that some cats live long lives on some of the worst foods made, dry, zero meat foods that are essentially nothing but corn and wheat. This, however, doesn’t mean that these foods are acceptable. “Causality” is a well-known logic problem, most often seen when people think that because two things happen one right after another, the first one “must” have caused the second…..even if no actual connection exists other than the timing.

The flip side of that is believing that just because two things seem to happen far apart in time means that one didn’t cause the other. Consider that even a common cold has an incubation period of 24-72 hours. That means that if someone sneezed in your face this morning, that’s not the reason you developed symptoms that night. Indeed, it may very well have been the seemingly cold-free person that you shook hands with three days earlier.

A cat’s system adjusts. Supply less than ideal “fuel” and “building materials”, and the cat will use them. A system that can’t adjust simply can’t last. So here comes my theory on the matter. Dry, low (or no) meat protein, high carb food puts additional stress on the system. The system adjusts and keeps running, but it requires more effort and puts more stress on the system. None of that shows as long as the system is able to adjust, but eventually the additional stress becomes greater than the system’s ability to adapt, and you get visible illness.

Just because it may take years for diabetes, inflammatory bowel disease, chronic kidney disease, or other problems to become visible quite simply doesn’t prove that the food was okay. It may very well have simply been an extended “incubation”. It’s not simply that a cat has gotten “old” and more disease is “natural”.

This part isn’t theory, and no one has disputed it that I’m aware of. Cats are obligate carnivores. Consider that. Humans are omnivores with varying ability to make “good” use of many food types. Dogs are carnivores, which means their systems are focused on digesting and using meat and related elements, but they can make use of other foods. Cats are “obligate” carnivores…..obligated to eat meat. Their systems “can” make some use of grains, peas, fruits, etc., but the system is not designed to do so. Grains have to be very highly processed simply to make them digestible for cats. There is simply no question that it’s less than ideal. That, however, doesn’t mean that all kibble is the same or all kibble is evil. It doesn’t mean that feeding any kibble at all is going to shorten the life or reduce the quality of a cat’s life.

The “Kibble Go” Side

This is the group that thinks all kibble should be eliminated….kibble-be-gone. The flaw here isn’t that kibble has issues. The flaw is that the extremists here treat all dry food the same, and they tend to act as if any amount of kibble in a diet is the same as an all-kibble diet. In particular, they tend to talk only about those foods that are all or mostly grains and related ingredients without ever acknowledging that some kibble has meat as the first ingredient and may be zero grain…..even though there may be other high carb ingredients.

The flaw in that logic and the problems caused by that flaw should be obvious, but I’ve yet to get anyone from that camp to admit that it’s even there, much less that it matters. Note that this particular issue isn’t a matter of technical, scientific, or medical knowledge. This is a matter of logic and language. I’ll modify that. It is a science issue in that any test or theory has to be well-designed if it’s results are to be of value. Treating all kibble as if it’s the same is not only bad logic but also bad science.

Consider the ingredient list on Meow Mix (selected because Amazon lists it as a best seller): Ground yellow corn, corn gluten meal, chicken by-product meal, soybean meal, beef tallow, animal digest, calcium carbonate, turkey by-product meal, salmon meal, ocean fish meal, phosphoric acid……. Now consider the ingredient list on Orijen Kitten & Cat food (often selected as one of the “best” dry foods): Deboned chicken, deboned turkey, yellowtail flounder, whole eggs, whole Atlantic mackerel, chicken liver, turkey liver, whole Atlantic herring, chicken heart, turkey heart, dehydrated chicken, dehydrated turkey, dehydrated mackerel, dehydrated chicken liver, dehydrated turkey liver, whole green peas, whole navy beans…….

Notice that with Meow Mix there are 8 ingredients before you find any actual meat. (By-product is not “meat”, and what it actually contains varies. There may be useful organ meat and such, or there may not be.) We can fairly conclude that there is very little actual meat content in this food, essentially insignificant.

In the Orijen, there are 14 meat sources before we get to peas. The fairly recent increase in fish is problematic in some regards, but it remains indisputable that the levels of meat protein in the two foods is significant. (And there are other meat-based dry foods with less or no fish.) There remains the problem that dry food is dry. This might not be an issue if cats could be depended upon to drink enough water to compensate, but cats tend to have a low thirst drive. Their desert heritage still dominates, and they are used to getting most of their moisture intake from what they eat. This makes kibble unsuitable as a the primary food source. (And adding water to dry food just causes a mess and other possible issues.)

It also remains true that even Orijen is too high in carbs and too likely to eventually over-stress the system in ways that increase chances of disease. I am not aware of any up to date figures on carbs in dry cat food as a percentage of calories, and the out of date list I’m aware of didn’t include Meow Mix or Orijen. However, based on comparable foods, best guess is that Meow Mix supplies about 40% of calories from carbs, and Orijen probably around 25% percent of calories from carbs. So what?

As obligate carnivores, cats have effectively no requirement for carbs. This doesn’t mean that they can’t eat them, only that they don’t need them, which does suggest that in the long run too many carbs becomes a problem. It does for humans, and we’re omnivores. In discussion groups, it seems that diabetic cats need to stay under 10% of calories from carbs to have a good chance of gaining and maintaining remission. Under 7% is better. Those numbers are not scientifically gathered, and how they relate to long term carb levels for non-diabetic cats is unclear. It does suggest to me that a diet that consists only of high carb foods is problematic, bad odds.

Seeking Balance

It’s really not a good idea to feed a cat nothing but dry food. Yes, some cats will live a long time on something like Meow Mix or Cat Chow, but that doesn’t make it a good idea. The chances of serious illness are likely to be significantly greater on an all-kibble diet just because there’s no getting around “obligate carnivore”.

Still, the ingredient lists clearly show that not all dry foods are the “same”. Ingredients vary, carb levels vary, amount of meat protein varies, and it’s a good bet that quality control standards vary. How much do the odds change of a cat’s diet includes 10% of a meat-based, comparatively low carb dry food? How much do they change at 20%? I don’t know. Somewhere, we almost certainly reach a point of diminishing return, a point at which decreasing the amount of meat-based kibble doesn’t significantly alter the odds of health issues, isn’t likely to affect length or quality of life.

Is it possible to find that point? In theory, sure. It would only require close, honest tracking of a few thousand cats for about 20 years while maintaining control over what each cat ate and getting an accurate record of diet, health, and other mitigating factors from the humans in the family. It’s not going to happen. So the war will continue.

For the rest of us, there are other considerations. While I really wish the zero-meat foods were off the market, there are people out there who can’t afford to feed the fur-family anything more expensive. Yes, there are people who say that anyone who can’t afford better food shouldn’t take in cats. There’s a serious lack of thought and empathy in such statements.

For the human, the cats are often important to emotional and even physical well-being. For the cats, where would they be instead? Should the strays be left in the wild? Should they be sent to a shelter with a significant chance of being killed?

If you know someone feeding an all-dry diet, and that person could afford better, consider supplying some gentle education. Teach, don’t preach. Advise, don’t accuse. If you know someone feeding an all-dry diet, and your the one who could afford better, consider supplying some better food, one friend to another.

As for me, I don’t eat a diet of nothing but potato chips, but I was “good” at breakfast, so I think I can get away with a few chips, maybe even some dip. If by chance that shaves a second off my life, I doubt that I’ll notice, and I’ll consider it a fair balance. As an idealist, I may try to move toward perfection, but as a realist I neither expect to achieve it or even claim to know exactly what it is.