I got this email from Laura — not the first time someone has been concerned about Thailand as a source of Weruva.
I emailed a while ago regarding my cat’s recurring UTI issues. Thanks to your advice, I switched to Weruva and my cat Leo has been doing great! In fact both my cats love the Chicken Soup. They both eat 1/2 a can (5.5 oz) twice a day… is that too much? If I try feeding them less, the both sit in the kitchen and meow loudly for more.
My other question is, bought a case of Weruva to minimize the number of trips to the store, and the label on the box indicated that it was a “Product of Thailand”. I thought that this food was manufactured in the US in human-grade facility. Are the food and factory standards in Thailand comparable to the US?
I’d love your opinion on this.
First of all, let your cats guide you in how much food they need at each meal. The CAT CHAT® rule is that you give them as much as they will eat in about 15 minutes and then pick up the dish. So even if they can eat an entire can apiece, that would be okay. In all likelihood, once the excitement and novelty of eating real food wears off, their appetite will stabilize and they will probably want only half a can at each meal. However, cats will not over eat (like people and Labrador Retrievers do!) so there is no downside to being generous with the wet food, especially when it is as good a quality as Weruva.
Secondly, I don’t know whether you are aware that you can get Weruva from Pet Food Direct, who also gives a 20% discount to my listeners. You need to put CATCHAT20 in the coupon code box — and you can also order a mixed case of Weruva with an assortment of flavors. They also now have a less expensive line of food called BFF (Best Feline Friend) which is fish-based, so you’d only want to use that a couple of times a week since fish is not the most desirable protein source for cats.
Lastly, your concern about the safety of food coming from Thailand is a worry I have heard about before. I think we’re all pretty suspicious of ingredients and foods coming from China, but Thailand is a completely different country, with very little in common with China except that they are both in Asia. Thailand actually has much more restrictive regulations about what can go into pet food so their standards are higher than the U.S. standards for pet food. There is a letter in my blog from David Forman, the founder of Weruva, explaining to another customer how the Thai food industry follows the British rules and regulations, which are apparently more stringent and cautious than our own. Here is David Forman’s answer on the cat food made in Thailand issue. Standards for pet food in the United States are pretty lax, while countries like Thailand use the British code which is much more strict.