Sometimes, you have to wonder if the pet food manufacturers make up a market for their "specially formulated" pet foods on their own. For instance, what is with all the hypoallergenic cat food that's all over the place now.
They first sell you cheap, mass-produced pet food that's full of all the ingredients that cats are not supposed to eat. Then the food produces all these undesirable allergies and intolerances in your cat. Finally, they tell you that your cat seems to be oversensitive to its food, and they try to sell you hypoallergenic cat food. That's what they call making money hand over fist.
But what are we talking about here? What do they put into hypoallergenic cat food (or dog food) that's supposed to not aggravate anything in your cat?
Well, if it's hypoallergenic pet food, they claim that since animal proteins are the main culprits, they take that completely out. Instead, they use a lot of hydrolyzed chicken, soybean oil, cellulose and starch.
The advertise their products as having no intact animal proteins, in fact; the hydrolyzed chicken is supposed to make sure that no proteins in there is intact and in their natural form.
What is this "hydrolyzation", anyway? What kind of process is this? Well, let's just say that you wouldn't ever want to eat anything that was "hydrolyzed". It's a process where they chemically treat meat, and grind it up until it's a completely homogeneous paste. They then treat it under heat and pressure so that its completely neutralized and sterilized.
Unless you actually buy cheap pet food that's made out of stuff that cats and dogs were never supposed eat in the first place, it's not likely that your pets will never develop any allergies at all.
If you do have to feed your cat inexpensive cat food, at least, make sure that you don't stick with one brand for a long time. If you switch brands often, your cat will get different kinds of proteins sources.
It's very important actually that cats are just fed food that's meant for cats. Cats are not meant to eat meat or rice - filler that is abundantly used in cheap cat food.
You need to make sure that your cat food contains lots of moisture, lots of regular muscle meat, just a little bit of fruit and vegetables, and some animal fat. When a cat is fed a natural diet, there is no way that it's ever going to become allergic to anything.
