Instinct Raw Boost Grain Free Recipe with Real Chicken Natural Dry Cat Food, 10 lb. Bag

I am a Registered Veterinary Technician who has not had any luck treating my 11 year old cat's IBD. I used the steroids and prescription food for 1 year, but he still vomited every day and had a huge problem with hairballs. My other cat had hairballs, so I put her on this food too. She is 10 years old, and they both have had all the required tests to establish there are no other health conditions.I bought this because of the high protein / low carb percentages. Cats still need up to 12% carbs in their diet, plus a minimum of 45% protein and moderate fat. Unfortunately, 98% of kibble on the market has 25 - 50% carbs and less than 40% protein. Since I already tried prescription food and medication, I decided to limit his carbs and increase the protein since it is much harder to digest carbs.I slowly transitioned to this new food over 3 weeks. His vomiting and hairballs stopped by week 6. There are off-white poops in the litterbox now. I'm hoping it's his hair finally able to be passed like it should (he's a bright white cat). Although, light colored poops could indicate an absorption problem - I now have to check that out at work.Why 3 stars? One reason is the white poop thing. But, remember I said I put my other cat on the diet too? Well, I rarely believe in coincidences - and this would be a HUGE one:My other cat Ziva was transitioned just as slowly. That first week after complete transition, she started vomiting. She wasn't eating for about a day, then one night we heard a yowl - then nothing. We found her face down in her own vomit and she went into a seizure. Her x-rays showed her entire GI tract was full. Her stomach was still full after a 16-hour fast.You could actually see all the "raw" pieces on the xray in the exact shape they are in the bag, filling up most of her stomach. The next day she went into cluster seizures for over 30 minutes until they were finally under control. There was no mechanical blockage, but it took so long for all of those “raw” pieces to clear out of her system. She is permanently on wet food now (best food for cats, just expensive).Cats do not chew a large percentage of their food (that's why when they vomit their food within 2 hours of eating - it's always kibble shaped, just puffed up from the stomach juices). The “raw” pieces are no exception. They are dehydrated! So, guess what happens when you put something dehydrated in a stomach full of juices and the water they drink? They puff up so big it fills their stomach fast!Again, we cannot connect her sudden onset seizures to her inability to clear the “raw” pieces from her GI system for several days - but that's one hell of a coincidence in my book! We immediately removed all the “raw” pieces and are just feeding the kibble to my IBD cat. But, the “raw” pieces are where the high protein percentages come from, so I will be transitioning my IBD cat to the Instinct Ultimate Protein line once the white poop mystery has been solved.

I used to love this food, but they must’ve changed the formula or something. I ordered it on Oct 23, and opened it about a week later. I noticed immediately that the raw boost pieces were a dark brown instead of the light brown that they used to be (and were in the bag I finished before this). About a week later, one of my cats starting vomiting and diarrhea everywhere. He’s a bit of a chunker that likes to go outside, so I figured it was something that either he ate or caught outside. Went to the vet and had a fecal tested, no bacterial problems. So something about this new formula is bad. I called and had a new bag sent to me via Amazon Customer Service, and opened it today; same color. My other cat actually pushed the boost pieces out of the food, and just ate the kibble with no issues.I’d suggest not getting this version until they can figure out what is going on with the boost pieces. Something is bad in this new formula, and it’s making the cats sick.

There is something seriously wrong with this food and my cats knew it before I did. I combine this food with another dry food to help them with a balanced diet...I've been doing this with these exact brands and flavor for over a year. I was even on the subscribe plan with Amazon.This last bag I did the same thing I always do. My cats ate it at first. I noticed they were losing weight and my poor older cat pooped all over himself which was pretty bad diarrhea. I didn't think it was the food so I kept giving to them and then I noticed they stopped eating this food at all. They would leave every single piece of this food in their bowl even the freeze dried chicken. When I noticed that I put it together that the food was making them really sick and that they realized it. I switched to another brand and they quickly gained weight back.I would be cautious with this food. For my older cat the risk was incredibly dangerous as its hard to keep weight on him already. For the high price it is unacceptable that there would be something so wrong with the food.

I've been subscribe & saving this food for years now for my 2 cats and I've always been a big fan of this cat food. It's great quality, not super expensive and my kitties have grown from tiny kittens to strong, muscular cats with sleek coats.Unfortunately, something recently changed with this food, as anyone else can see from recent reviews of people mentioning that it made their kitties sick.My boy kitty is very picky and this food is just about all he eats, the girl kitty eats more things. The last batch of this food I received looked different. The raw nugget pieces were a lighter, kind of mottled inconsistent color. That was something I noticed right away. I figured they changed the raw nugget formula and gave it to my cats.After eating this for just a couple of days, both of my cats got some form of diarrhea. My male kitty got it the worst, because this is his main source of food. Thankfully, they didn't throw up and I noticed the issue after only a couple days of feeding them this bag of food.It's also thankful that I always keep an extra older bag on hand, so I started giving them that instead. They have been fine since I switched, so it's definitely the newer batch of food.I've included pics of both bags of food with nuggets so you can see the difference (labeled with Good Batch & Bad Batch so you can compare). If you get a bag where the nuggets look strange and speckled/mottled, that is probably a bad batch. Please pay close attention to your kitties if you decide to try to give it to them. And contact Amazon right away for a refund/replacement if there is an issue. They will replace the bag for free.UPDATEI contacted Instinct to let them know about the issue. I was not happy with the lack of responsibility they took on this issue. They basically said that they didn't find any indications there was anything wrong with this food.But they did send me coupons for two free 10lb bags. I decided to use them at Petco (you can't use them on Amazon). I purchased a different kind of their raw chicken kibble (without the nuggets) and my cats have been fine.I won't be purchasing this type of kibble with the raw nuggets. There is clearly some issue with with the nuggets themselves and/or some of the stock in the Amazon warehouse has been contaminated. The fact that the company didn't address this or come to this conclusion is disappointing. They also have no customer service team addressing concerns on Amazon (which is also not good).If you have any issues, make sure to contact both Amazon and the Instinct company directly. Leaving reviews only serves as a warning to others (which is important) since Instinct doesn't care about checking them or replying to them.

After treating my cat with medication for hyperthyroidism for the past couple years with no improvement of symptoms, I decided to see if there was anything dietary that could be done to help him gain weight and reduce diarrhea. This food has done both! Within the first few days I noticed that his stool was indistinguishable from our younger cat's. It's now been a couple months and he's definitely gaining weight. I don't have exactly numbers yet (can update after the next appointment), but the feeling of bones along his spine has reduced significantly and he feels heavier when I pick him up. There has also been a marked reduction in the frequency of stomach upset/vomiting. This poor guy has had a rough go of it since developing hyperthyroidism and has had a couple close calls, so these small improvements over the past couple months have been huge!