cat food

Cat with a bowl of pelleted cat food.

Kitten eating cottontail rabbit.
Cat food is food for consumption by cats. Cats have specific requirements for their dietary nutrients Certain nutrients, including many vitamins and amino acids, are degraded by the temperatures, pressures and chemical treatments used during manufacture, and hence must be added after manufacture to avoid nutritional deficiency.

The amino acid taurine, for example, which is found in meat, is degraded during processing, so synthetic taurine is normally added afterwards. Long-term taurine deficiency may result in retinal degeneration, loss of vision, and cardiac arrest