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Merrick Cat Food Reviews
ConsumerAffairs has collected 41 reviews and 193 ratings.
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Reviewed May 28, 2022
About 2 months ago, my female cat began to lose weight and refuse to eat. Her condition is now fragile. Since she is a very healthy cat, normally, this caused me great concern. After much evaluating, and monitoring, I could see that the problem was the Merrick Limited Ingredient Sensitive Stomach dry food, which all four of my cats have eaten for years. But no more, as the last bag I purchased will not be eaten by any of the four, and even the local ferals won't touch it.
As a show breeder of 50+ years of experience, I recommended this food to my past kitten owners. I have begun to contact them and suggest that they switch foods. I was very afraid that this would happen once Purina bought Merrick, and began to change the successful formula, after the 2 year no touch clause was reached. I've seen this before, in quality foods I fed, that Purina bought out. We still don't know what to do to help our girl. No current intervention has made a difference. Time will tell now that I've started feeding a privately owned premium food. It will be a long road.
Reviewed Oct. 31, 2021
My cats had been eating Merrick cat food for years. We’d give them a variety of the Purrfect Bistro chicken, turkey, duck, tuna, and salmon. Starting maybe end of 2019, early 2020 we noticed one of our cats being oddly picky about which kinds he was willing to eat - sometimes only tuna, sometimes only chicken. Our other cat would eat only small amounts and walk away, but ask for more frequently, and started hanging out constantly by her water dish. We thought it was just them being weird with us being home all the time, or maybe we got a few odd batches and the next would be acceptable.
Fast forward to 2021 when we could finally get into the vet again, we find the cat that would only eat small amounts had lost a significant, concerning amount of weight and she was continuing to eat less and less. She started vomiting more frequently in the mornings though her stool was normal. She was extremely gassy all the time. We started her on steroids concerned she had developed IBD or lymphoma. She was doing well, but relapsed so we changed out her meds. In the midst of changing her meds our other cat suddenly started having the same symptoms, started refusing any Merrick we offered regardless of kind, was skeptical of all food we gave him, and was hanging out by his water bowl.
We took him to the vet and all his bloodwork and urine analysis looked fine for the most part, just like our other cat. We decided then to try switching out their food and it’s only now that both of them seem to be doing marginally better, but I feel there’s still a long way to go and I’m not sure if they will both make it out ok. I urge everyone that has had a similar experience to please file a complaint with the FDA as this food should be recalled and investigated before it makes anyone else’s fur baby sick: **.
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Reviewed Oct. 21, 2021
We raised Archie on Purina Beyond Grain Free Whitefish dry cat food since 2014 and this is the only cat food he would eat until about a month ago when Purina did something to their formula. The smell is horrible and the texture looks like dog food and does not have the same look to it either. Archie will only eat dry cat food that is made with fish and we preordered $300.00 worth of food for him because he used to love it and now we are stuck with all this food he will not touch, so we decided to go with Merrick’s Salmon grain free dry food and we put it in his bowl and he got a whiff of that and ran for his life. Would not even go near the food.
Now I know why. Purina took over this company. We compared this cat food to his original cat food and it smelled just as bad. It smells exactly like dog food and not that wonderful fishy smell that our kitty used to love. Now we are stuck with another $40.00 worth of food. Too bad, we were really excited because the reviews were so wonderful and the ingredients were perfect.
Reviewed July 31, 2021
One of my cats' favorite flavor is Merrick's Purrfect Bistro Thanksgiving Day Dinner. She's the picky one so we cater to her flavor preferences and my cats have been eating it for years (besides other flavors/brands). Recently (and by that I mean for the last two months) Chewy has been "out of stock". I called them, they had no information. I called Merrick and they said something about "supply chain issues". Hmm, okay. I ordered Chicken Casserole flavor instead. THEN MY BOY KITTY (Benjamin) STOPPED EATING, would dry heave and spit out bile. I freaked out, took him to a veterinary urgent care location (Bond Vet, they were fabulous). They did bloodwork, urinalysis, gave him fluids and ** (anti-nausea shot). $586.86 later, he went home. It took him several days to regain his normalness.
Maybe it was the Merrick, maybe not. But I started digging a bit more after finding out Chewy is STILL "out of stock" on most Merrick wet cat food products = VERY SUSPECT. While nothing "official" has been listed, through Consumer Affairs I found out other cat-parents experienced something similar with their babies getting sick *AND* Merrick has been bought out by PURINA. Purina, the company that manufactures Friskies and Fancy Feast (junky cat food in my opinion). I've stopped buying Merrick because all this is not sitting well with me.
Reviewed Feb. 2, 2021
I have been feeding Merrick wet food, several flavors, for about six months, about 75%, remaining 25% is Wellness. They love it. Great, healthy ingredients. I am shocked reading all the negative reviews and really put some question marks behind them. Vomiting?? Never. Merrick got worse reviews here than Purina and Fancy Feast, both known for junk food. One caveat: Merrick is now owned by Purina, so it has to be followed closely, although they promised they would not lower the quality. At this point of time I can absolutely recommend, it is, without a doubt, by far the best cat food reviewed on this site.
Reviewed Jan. 5, 2021
We had been using Purrfect Bistro for our rescue cat, Luna, for over 4 years. Her favourites were Rabbit and Turkey. About 9 months ago, she started rejecting the Rabbit, which she used to eat in case loads, but would no longer touch upon smelling it. In late-December 2020, she started throwing up violently after a couple of times eating Turkey. We switched her to Purrfect Bistro Salmon, but she continued to vomit for 2 days after each feeding, ranging from a brown paste to blood-tinged bile. We rushed her to the Emergency Vet Hospital on December 24, where the vet diagnosed her as suffering from food poisoning, loss of weight, dehydration, lethargy, and disorientation. Because Luna occasionally goes out, we thought that she might have eaten something outside.
After $460 worth of a large number of tests and immediate treatment, she recovered the next day, and stopped vomiting. However, as soon as we stopped giving her the anti-nausea pill treatment, her vomiting resumed. Since we had kept her inside for treatment, it was the Bistro food, which she was now vomiting and refusing. Even when she ate a small amount of it, she would throw it up within minutes. We then found the numerous reviews here which detailed almost exactly what Luna experienced.
We have switched her to new brands and she is has now regained her weight and energy. We returned all the Purrfect Bistro to our pet store, with detailed information on Luna's experience, to forewarn other cat owners. Interestingly, when we shared Luna's experience with our friends, they informed that their cat is also now rejecting Purrfect Bistro, which had been their main cat food brand. The producer should investigate what is wrong with their food now. Did they change their formulas over the past year?
Reviewed Sept. 9, 2020
I've had the same experience I'm reading over and over here. Vomiting. Have used Merrick Limited Ingredient can cat food for years. Something has changed, looks different, smells different. All 3 of mine started vomiting. When it's one kitty vomiting I don't jump to conclusions but when all three get sick together right after I've noticed the food I'm feeding them looks and smells different... well. And vomiting the weird red-ish color of the food (turkey) for 12 hours: my sensitive girl was REALLY sick. I know I read the company was bought out a few years ago ("all about cats" website states: 2015, Nestlé Purina announced its buyout of Merrick Pet Care).
It seems once Purina buys out they wait a couple of years and then slowly start changing things, went through the same thing with my previous favorite brand. I'm guessing that could be what's going on? Whatever it is it's unfortunate because I'm out of options, this is the only reliable food that's worked for all of mine for the last couple of years.
Reviewed July 24, 2020
I have used Merrick cat food for years. I buy it from Pet Supplies Plus. About five days ago one of my cats threw up after eating some of the canned Merrick cat food and some of the dry Merrick cat food. He threw up and then was not interested in eating for a day. When he started eating again, he seemed reluctant and was very slow. He also was not interested in his food as much as he normally is. I was not sure what was wrong, but I noticed he had softened stools. Then my other cat started exhibiting the same symptoms. I have read some of the comments and I suspect there is a problem with the Merrick food. I am going to return all the Merrick food I bought. I just am not sure what food I can try now that Merrick has made changes to its cat food.
Reviewed July 17, 2020
The wet food is literally one of the only foods my super picky Maine Coon will eat. And she never gets sick of it either, like she will with other foods. Great ingredients and family owned, We love them. ❤️
Reviewed June 3, 2020
I feel very upset what happend with this food, esp been feeding this close to 2 years. Maybe I got a bad batch or got unlucky but I rather share my experience so more people are aware of it. So I bought new bag from Petco and started feeding after week, cat started vomiting, then this moved to intense diarrhea where it became pure liquid form. I ended up taking to vet twice coz I thought it was parasite issue. Feeding medicine helped but diarrhea continued. When vet asked me what I was feeding and suggested prescribed wet/dry food, that's when I realized maybe dry food was causing it. I immediately changed the dry food to different brand, I had no issues with poop/vomiting since then.
Merrick Cat Food Company Information
- Company Name:
- Merrick Cat Food
- Year Founded:
- 1988
- Country:
- United States
- Website:
- www.merrickpetcare.com
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