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We have done very few food reviews with our cat Arya as she’s proving true all the clichés about cats disliking change!
As a kitten, she LOVED one brand for about 6 months but would not touch their adult formula (using the same protein) so we had to find an alternative very quickly…
Any attempts to introduce any new food have since failed…abysmally. All cat owners would be familiar with the distinctive "paw shake of disdain" before their cat walks away in disgust…
So, when a couple of brands approached us to trial their cat food last year, we gave them our honest feedback: “You’re welcome to send something but we can’t guarantee she’ll take a look at it!” Understandably, most gave up...
To their credit, the team at Pet Circle understands cat psychology and was happy to put the Open Farm range to the test with the best selling Wild-Caught Salmon (3.63kg) dry cat food recipe along with some samples (57g) of their Homestead Turkey & Chicken recipe.
Introducing the Open Farm difference
Open Farm’s mission is to provide a revolution in sustainable, ethically-sourced and super premium holistic pet food.
Open Farm diets are made formulated in Canada (and manufactured in the USA) with top quality proteins and superfoods. Every product is also proudly produced with a focus on transparent sourcing and traceability, humane production animal welfare standards, ethically sourced ingredients, and sustainable fishing practices.
All pet food companies claim to deliver a complete and balanced meal for our companion animals. This means that their recipes are formulated to meet the nutritional levels estimated by the AAFCO Cat Food Nutrient Profiles for all breeds and life stages (updated regularly) but few go beyond that!
It makes sense for us to eat from the widest variety of food choices so why wouldn't our pets benefit from the same philosophy? To meet this new market demand, the larger pet food companies now compete to offer not only more exotic flavours but also a variety of textures, e.g. dry food as well wet food and freeze dried raw.
In Australia, the Open Farm range is exclusively distributed by Pet Circle who contacted us earlier this year to explore if we’d be open to trialling some of their flagship products for both cats and dogs to share our views on:
✔️ Open Farm Wild-Caught Salmon (Dry Cat Food, Dry Dog Food with Ancient Grains).
✔️ Open Farm Grain-Free Homestead Turkey & Chicken recipe (Dry Cat Food samples)
What is in the Wild-Caught Salmon Dry Cat Food Recipe?
Having recently reviewed the Wild-Caught Salmon & Ancient Grains recipe with our dogs, we noticed straight away a couple of difference with this grain-free cat formula.
Any attempts to introduce any new food have since failed…abysmally. All cat owners would be familiar with the distinctive "paw shake of disdain" before their cat walks away in disgust…
So, when a couple of brands approached us to trial their cat food last year, we gave them our honest feedback: “You’re welcome to send something but we can’t guarantee she’ll take a look at it!” Understandably, most gave up...
To their credit, the team at Pet Circle understands cat psychology and was happy to put the Open Farm range to the test with the best selling Wild-Caught Salmon (3.63kg) dry cat food recipe along with some samples (57g) of their Homestead Turkey & Chicken recipe.
Introducing the Open Farm difference
Open Farm’s mission is to provide a revolution in sustainable, ethically-sourced and super premium holistic pet food.
Open Farm diets are made formulated in Canada (and manufactured in the USA) with top quality proteins and superfoods. Every product is also proudly produced with a focus on transparent sourcing and traceability, humane production animal welfare standards, ethically sourced ingredients, and sustainable fishing practices.
All pet food companies claim to deliver a complete and balanced meal for our companion animals. This means that their recipes are formulated to meet the nutritional levels estimated by the AAFCO Cat Food Nutrient Profiles for all breeds and life stages (updated regularly) but few go beyond that!
It makes sense for us to eat from the widest variety of food choices so why wouldn't our pets benefit from the same philosophy? To meet this new market demand, the larger pet food companies now compete to offer not only more exotic flavours but also a variety of textures, e.g. dry food as well wet food and freeze dried raw.
In Australia, the Open Farm range is exclusively distributed by Pet Circle who contacted us earlier this year to explore if we’d be open to trialling some of their flagship products for both cats and dogs to share our views on:
✔️ Open Farm Wild-Caught Salmon (Dry Cat Food, Dry Dog Food with Ancient Grains).
✔️ Open Farm Grain-Free Homestead Turkey & Chicken recipe (Dry Cat Food samples)
What is in the Wild-Caught Salmon Dry Cat Food Recipe?
Having recently reviewed the Wild-Caught Salmon & Ancient Grains recipe with our dogs, we noticed straight away a couple of difference with this grain-free cat formula.
1) The protein and fat contents are significantly higher in the dry cat food than in the dry dog food variety.
The nutrient profile is Crude Protein (min 37%), Crude Fat (min 18%), Crude Fibre (max 3%), Moisture (max 10%) with the remainder comprising of Vitamins & Minerals.
2) A much stronger smell upon opening the cat's food bag than with the dog food variety (same protein). This is a high protein, grain-free and gluten-free recipe loaded with:
✔️ Wild-caught Ocean Wise® certified Salmon, Ocean Whitefish Meal & Herring Meal are the first 3 named ingredients.
All fish is sustainably sourced to avoid overfishing and destruction of ecosystems, and to ensure that fish have lived a natural life free from antibiotics.
✔️ Legumes: Chickpeas, Red Lentils, Green Lentils
✔️ Vegetables & Fruit (from third party audited farms): Pumpkin, Cranberries, Apples, Dandelion Greens, Dried Yucca Schidigera Extract
Dandelions are a great source of vitamins A, C, D, K, and B complex. They are also a good source of minerals - manganese, iron, and potassium - and are rich in protein.
Yucca Schidigera extract is a highly processed extract of the yucca plant. In cat food, it serves as a healthy ammonia binder to help reduce odours in your cat's litter box.
✔️ Natural Superfoods like coconut oil, herring oil, salmon oil, chicory root, turmeric.
The use of chicory root fibre inulin in pet food is currently based on its proven functional benefits in humans; the evidence emerging from studies in pets indicates that these benefits also apply in animals.
✔️ A long list of Vitamin supplements including Taurine and Mixed Tocopherols (a natural preservative for shelf life). Find the full ingredients list here.
There is no grain, corn, wheat, soy or potato here! Even the fruit and vegetables (cranberries and dandelion) are non-GMO. But first and foremost, this dry cat food contains no rendered poultry, meat meals or meat by-products.
Our Experience with the Open Farm range
A big tick for this brand is the great choice of novel single protein options for both dogs (5) and cats (3) and the focus on only using human-grade sustainably sourced ingredients.
Since Arya won’t step on the scales unaided, we held her and it works out that we could both lose a bit of weight… Our wee kitten has turned into a substantial 6.5kg cat (approximately 14.33 pounds).
Using the recommended daily ration, her maintenance portion would be 75g/day but since she could stand to lose some weight, 60g/day would be the right amount for her to lose some weight due to her sedentary indoors-only lifestyle!
In line with their commitment to sustainability, you can recycle your Open Farm packaging through the Open Farm Pet Food Bag Recycling Program. We certainly know where all our boxes get first recycled here...
RRP: $69.99 for Homestead Turkey & Chicken; $74.99 (3.6kg) for Wild-Caught Salmon dry cat food recipe, $49.99 for Rustic Blend wet food (all varieties, 12 x 156g) exclusive to www.petcircle.com.au
On this particular food, you’ll save 10% on all options if you opt for Auto-Delivery (you can choose your frequency and are also free to cancel any time).
All options for this brand sell out quickly so you may want to stock up if your cat loves it!
Connect with Open Farm Pet Food on Instagram @openfarmpet and on Facebook.
Disclaimer: a 3.63kg bag of Wild-Caught Salmon recipe and 57g samples of the Homestead Turkey & Chicken recipe were sent by Pet Circle to trial the Open Farm range.
Related Topics
Open Farm Wild-Caught Salmon & Ancient Grains dry dog food / Beef Rustic Stew Review
2) A much stronger smell upon opening the cat's food bag than with the dog food variety (same protein). This is a high protein, grain-free and gluten-free recipe loaded with:
✔️ Wild-caught Ocean Wise® certified Salmon, Ocean Whitefish Meal & Herring Meal are the first 3 named ingredients.
All fish is sustainably sourced to avoid overfishing and destruction of ecosystems, and to ensure that fish have lived a natural life free from antibiotics.
✔️ Legumes: Chickpeas, Red Lentils, Green Lentils
✔️ Vegetables & Fruit (from third party audited farms): Pumpkin, Cranberries, Apples, Dandelion Greens, Dried Yucca Schidigera Extract
Dandelions are a great source of vitamins A, C, D, K, and B complex. They are also a good source of minerals - manganese, iron, and potassium - and are rich in protein.
Yucca Schidigera extract is a highly processed extract of the yucca plant. In cat food, it serves as a healthy ammonia binder to help reduce odours in your cat's litter box.
✔️ Natural Superfoods like coconut oil, herring oil, salmon oil, chicory root, turmeric.
The use of chicory root fibre inulin in pet food is currently based on its proven functional benefits in humans; the evidence emerging from studies in pets indicates that these benefits also apply in animals.
✔️ A long list of Vitamin supplements including Taurine and Mixed Tocopherols (a natural preservative for shelf life). Find the full ingredients list here.
There is no grain, corn, wheat, soy or potato here! Even the fruit and vegetables (cranberries and dandelion) are non-GMO. But first and foremost, this dry cat food contains no rendered poultry, meat meals or meat by-products.
Our Experience with the Open Farm range
A big tick for this brand is the great choice of novel single protein options for both dogs (5) and cats (3) and the focus on only using human-grade sustainably sourced ingredients.
In addition to the Grain-Free Wild-Caught Salmon variety, there are a Grain-Free Homestead Turkey & Chicken and a Catch-Of-The-Season Whitefish recipes.
Because all pet food companies (dry food, wet food and raw alike) can be affected by production issues prompting a recall, we applaud Open Farm for providing 100% transparency and traceability with their Traceability Feature so you can find out exactly where each ingredient (down to the added vitamins and minerals) has come from and why.
However, once we used the US website at openfarmpet.com/pages/transparency, it worked fine the second time around with both bags.
When we first tried it, this feature did not work as we were automatically redirected to the company's Australian website but we understand this feature will also be available soon.
However, once we used the US website at openfarmpet.com/pages/transparency, it worked fine the second time around with both bags.
A minor criticism on the current packaging is that all feeding guides refer to pets' weights in pounds and feeding portions in cups so you’ll need to work out exactly how much to feed your cat daily.
We never use calories to measure our pets’ food intake but if you do, the bag indicates the Calorie Content (calculated) to be 3840 kcal me/kg, 470 kcal me/cup.
Using the recommended daily ration, her maintenance portion would be 75g/day but since she could stand to lose some weight, 60g/day would be the right amount for her to lose some weight due to her sedentary indoors-only lifestyle!
Time to reset our automatic pet feeder…
If we were surprised by how small the kibble size was for our dogs, it is probably a third of that size again for the cat food but Arya was totally fine with that.
Our dogs loved sampling their wet food option (Grass-Fed Beef Rustic Stew) but since Arya has never tried any wet or raw food previously, we’re unsure what she would have made of it…
As with the dog wet food options, the Crude Protein (min 7%) content is quite low so we would only feed it as a meal topper in combination with the Open Farm dry cat food.
All Rustic Blend varieties for cats (Harvest Chicken, Homestead Turkey or Wild-Caught Salmon) are available as a set of 12 packs (156g each), which are presented like juice poppers.
If your cat already enjoys chunkier-style wet cat food, this is definitely worth a look into.
In line with their commitment to sustainability, you can recycle your Open Farm packaging through the Open Farm Pet Food Bag Recycling Program. We certainly know where all our boxes get first recycled here...
Price & Where to Buy:
RRP: $69.99 for Homestead Turkey & Chicken; $74.99 (3.6kg) for Wild-Caught Salmon dry cat food recipe, $49.99 for Rustic Blend wet food (all varieties, 12 x 156g) exclusive to www.petcircle.com.au
On this particular food, you’ll save 10% on all options if you opt for Auto-Delivery (you can choose your frequency and are also free to cancel any time).
All options for this brand sell out quickly so you may want to stock up if your cat loves it!
Connect with Open Farm Pet Food on Instagram @openfarmpet and on Facebook.
Disclaimer: a 3.63kg bag of Wild-Caught Salmon recipe and 57g samples of the Homestead Turkey & Chicken recipe were sent by Pet Circle to trial the Open Farm range.
Related Topics
Open Farm Wild-Caught Salmon & Ancient Grains dry dog food / Beef Rustic Stew Review
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