artemis canned cat food

[amy]

Just wanted to let everyone know that I was starting to feed Artemis canned to my cat, since it is made by Evangers.  I stopped when I found hard fragments of what appeared to be bone if I had to guess, and I do believe that I found a piece of a greyish gravel at the bottom of a can.  Has anyone had any of these issues?  I am thinking that their quality control is not as good as Evangers has with theirs, since I have never experienced that with their brand food.  There shouldn't be anything that hard in a canned food, that I can't break it with a fork!

[Cindy Nevarez]

I don't know about the "gravel," But many of these food companies like Evangers purposely leave the bone in, which has a nutritional benefit. But should tell you on their websites (like Evangers, and I think Merrick does too) if they have done that. They'll descibe if the bone is crushed in or if it is cooked specially to make the bone soft. One of the foods, I forget which company now...actually says not to use it for small dogs because of the bone in it. But I have found bone in almost all of that I bought of those 2 companies...and I wanted it to be there.

[amy]

I get the use of bone, but these pieces were really hard.  Should they be?  The grey thing I found really seemed to be gravel, or something gravel like.  I just never saw the bone in Evanger's, but I worry that the Artemis is a bit too hard or something for my cat to chomp on.  I might be overly concerned now, with everything showing up in food.

[Cindy Nevarez]

I'd be more worried about the size of the bone...if it would go down easily or not. You know what I mean?
Sometimes the grinders (true in home grinding too) don't crush the bone small enough...bigger pieces escape through. That's why when making homemade food for cats they have you run it through the grinder twice.

[CC]

I thought Artemis might be the answer for a grain-free, non-Menu, non-ANI product.  But, since I am also managing diabetes and urine crystals, I need to be careful about guaranteed analysis of fiber and magnesium.  I was shocked to see their magnesium max listed as 0.25%!  I emailed the company to ask if this could be a mistake, as magnesium levels are commonly around 0.025% with other companies.  Here's what I received for an answer:

"For labeling laws, we have to state a certain maximum percentage, but our product when put through computer analysis testing, the magnesium levels are:
 
Seafood= 0.025%
Turkey= 0.031%
Chicken= 0.033%"

While I appreciated their response, I don't feel I can trust their food now.  What labeling laws say that you need to list maximums AN ORDER OF MAGNITUDE higher than the actual values?!  Since other companies seem to have no problems listing reasonable magnesium levels on their cans, all I can conclude is that Artemis is  giving themselves room to be inconsistent in their production process.  Not for me.
 

[Cindy Nevarez]

That's just the point...they ALL have room to be inconsistent, since there is no real regulation on this issue.

[jenny]

I wrote an email yesterday to Felidae (also made by Evanger's) commenting on 'stuff' being in my cat's food.  Bone, rubbery chicken, and something large and brown (1" or so).  Today I decided to try EVO canned instead.

[garypen]

FYI, Evo canned foods are made by Menu, as are all Natura branded canned foods. (If you didn't already know.)

[nepeta]

My cats have been getting Artemis canned, along with Newman's Organics.  So far, no weird stuff in the food and they like it.