High Protein: Chicken, Herring & Salmon

My wife and I started our two cats on this brand a few weeks ago, and the changes are incredible. Our cat Cid was nearly 30 lbs when we began, and he’s lost 2 pounds since, and has been a happy, loving ball of chatty sunshine. He was never this active until we started him on Tiki. Thank you so much for helping my cat!

I searched high and low for the healthiest, low carbohydrate, semi-human grade cat food and I found it! I only have a few issues that I will discuss later. Starting with the ‘Taste’ category, I haven’t tried this food myself, but I’m sure my two cats would tell you that they find it much more appealing than their old food (Purina Indoor). In fact, my younger cat named Sunny picks through the mix of old (Purina) and new (Tiki) kibbles to eat the Tiki kibbles first. I also want to mention another sense: smell. The first time I opened the trial size of Tiki Cat Born Carnivore Chicken and Fish Lue, my Olfactory nerve was pleasantly awakened to a cat food that clearly had no grains- besides pea and was heavily populated with the kind of protein my cats need.

Now, onto the next two categories ‘Value for Money,’ and ‘Presentation.’ I rated the value for money 4 stars rather than 5 because I believe that the largest size should be cheaper. But other than that, the overall ingredient quality and company reputation is worth the money in my opinion compared to other grain-free brands with more filler ingredients and/or less reputable but still pricier. As for presentation, the packaging is refreshing and draws the eye. The food- as seen in the first photograph (only the exposure is edited), looks appealing in general color.

As for the negatives or rather what I disliked in this food. Starting with the most significant problem I had with this food, its density. What do I mean by density? Well, to put it plainly, the food seems to be too hard for my older cat Jazpurr. Jazz does not have confirmed dental issues, but he has always seemed to have had a hard time chewing his food. As seen in photograph 3, Jazpurr always leaves kibbles half eaten, but he has been doing it more with the new Tiki food than his old Purina food. He tends to dunk kibbles in water (photograph 4) as well, but unlike his old food, these kibbles don’t become softer once submerged in water; they stay the same. This could be seen as a good thing, proving the ingredient integrity, however, in my opinion it’s just gotten to be a larger mess than it was before. Since, the kibbles don’t soften, he doesn’t take them out of his water, so I have to change his water very often. Anyways, my other cat, Sunny does not have this problem, but it does concern me for further down the road in both of my cats’ lives. And maybe Tiki Cat should consider making a softer version of this food for elderly cats and cats with dental issues.

The only other negative I would like to highlight for potential buyers are some of the ingredients in the food. Like I said before, this food is the best priced most reputable brand for a grain free food, however, that doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be some clear improvements. One of the ingredients that I am the most miffed by is the inclusion of whole peas and whole chickpeas. There is no verifiable research that pea protein is a valuable replacement protein for cats, there is research on it for dogs. Not cats, period. Until there is such evidence that peas are beneficial for a cat’s health do not include this as a filler or else I will low-grade scorn (not fully trust) your company. Adding on to that, other ingredients such as whole flaxseed, tomato pomace, chicory extract and rosemary extract are lesser evils, but they still have no research done on them for a cat’s benefit. Only research done for our canine friends. Dogs are a completely different species from cats, treat them this way. As many of you who have already done your research, pumpkin is the one fruit that was researched with cats to see the health benefits. However, there was one study and it was inconclusive whether it was beneficial or not. So, when a brand puts something like pumpkin in their food it just means its there as another filler to keep the cost down. The least on my list of worries is the chicken meal, salmon meal and herring meal only because they are labeled meals instead of just ‘animal meal.’ However, meals are still a filler and are not as healthy as just meat (example ingredient: herring).

I hope this is helpful for any potential buyers,

Abbey

The shape and size of this food is terrible..my cats cant and wont eat it..the ingredients are good but that is worthless if the cat cant chew it..needs to be more appealing..smaller bites..

What temperature is this kibble extruded at?