My ten years living with a cat with these sensitivities has taught me just how little pet food companies, pet food store owners, vets, and bloggers know (or indeed, seem to care about learning) about feline allergies. For years, I was told my cat probably had chronic pancreatitis. I suspected food allergies and was told ( by 4 vets) no – food allergies are very rare in cats, and when they have them it is to additives, like grains. Indeed, when I tried an exclusion diet, I didn’t get to the bottom of her allergies, because nearly ALL cat food includes chicken. Even foods labeled “salmon” for example, are mostly chicken. Because it’s cheap. Some of the worst offenders are the priciest foods. Blue, for example, uses a LOT of hidden chicken, even while bragging about not using certain chicken parts.

I recently sat down with my vet and insisted we pursue the possibility of a food allergy. He put her on Hills prescription diet ( WHY is it only available by prescription? I could have solved this on my own, 10 years earlier!). To ease her into this new food, I gave her Fancy Feast Purely treats (foil packets with a single piece of meat and nothing else in it) and literally solved the mystery in one day. She was fine until I gave her a piece of chicken and then she went into a scratching frenzy, and then cried all day, until she vomited several hours later. I crossed chicken off our list, and carefully eliminated all poultry and egg from her diet. She has not had any of her reactions since.

Now that I have solved the mystery, there isn’t a chance in hell that I will be giving my long suffering cat turkey, quail, duck or egg.

I’m frankly shocked that anyone would recommend foods with those ingredients for a fowl allergic animal. No human doctor or nutritionist would. ‘

I will say, I am THRILLED that your blog includes complete ingredients of various foods. However, everyone should make sure to read the ingredients on the can too, because they can change at any time. For all Blue, for example, brags about chicken free products, I recently couldn’t find a single one of their wet foods without some form of chicken in it.

🙂