Go homemade?
I have been researching a new and better diet for our four cats.
The question being does it makes more sense to go raw with
whole meat (i.e chicken) or store dry with green ingredients.
Or perhaps not to go raw at all. Cook it. I did some reading up on the concerns of raw versus cooked. One article read that they prepared it raw but also fed the cats canned cat food twice a week so the cats would not reject it if they had to ever revert back to canned in an emergency.
Homemade cat food is the recipe ; what to include is the ingredient.
Currently we feed our cats a dry food made up of natural greens. I also feed them frequent canned soft food so they get the vitamins they need from meat.
After reading about a totally raw diet, I became inquisitive. It does make more sense being that in their natural setting cats would eat raw meat + bones and thrive.
But I wonder, following a diet that provides essentially all the vitamins and minerals cats need (including adding an elixir) and preparing their food within my own home with love ; this does sound very appealing.
There is something to knowing that what my cats ate came out of my forethought for their well-being with maws added touch.
Now, please share your thoughts on this one.
1. If you do use the raw meat and bone diet share your advice or observations on your cats (improved or declined) health.
2. If you are against a raw diet (or a cooked one) please share your
thoughts as to why.
Personally, I hardly EVER eat any meat which makes me about 99% veggie-tarian.
But, I feel perhaps my cats , being natural carnivores, need whole meats in their daily diets; the survey is then ....go raw or cook it all. I might have a personal problem getting past the handling of raw meat (as a non-meat eater it grosses me to even see it) BUT if it is best for our cats I can do it. Along with that statement, I may emotionally freak a bit with it since I myself have my own reasons for not eating meat; but once again IF my cats will achieve ideal health than I can deal with that since as I stated earlier (in a natural setting) they would be apt to eating that kind of diet.
I know they are domesicated within our home but I wonder if they yearn for what is instinctual sometimes.
Well, I look forward to your thoughts on this topic.
Our cats are very healthy and thriving so perhaps I need to just stay with what works and aint broken.
16 comments:
Something to really ponder about! Domesticated cats may not go all well with raw food. But i don't really know - just know that some cats have delicate stomachs, like my Poppy. Either it would come back out from the front or the back! Euw!
But then again, they eat lizards, rats...hmmm...
Hmmm, this is a tough one. The only thing we know is that our vet said that wet food is very important for kitties - they need the moisture.
Not sure about the raw diet - we think we'd like it, but Mommy's fairly certain that she wouldn't like it!
Easiest way to do it is to go to the pet store, and buy some feeder mice. Then give us a couple of mice each day and we'll kill em and eat 'em. Can't get any fresher than that.
Stripes, you need to go HERE and leave a comment with your Gotch or Purthday to sign up for the M-Cats club. Now I gotta figure out who to get in on the attack tabbies too.
Mama goes around and around about this a lot. She doesn't do raw meat that well and she knows that she's not that organized to cook for us regularly, so for now we eat high quality kibble and EG and I (the kitties) split a can of wet food every day. That way she knows that we're getting all the vitamins and minerals and stuff that we need.
Love,
Tazo
PS - Thanks for stopping by our bloggie. Nice to meet you guys!
I would LOVE that type of diet but I know the PM could never stomach the whole "meat" business. They are all "veggies" over here.
I have no choice but get my meat on my own.
Purrs Goldie
I don't think I would like raw meat. I do like lightly seasoned fresh grilled salmon, however!
--JB
Mom has a friend who cooks for her dogs. Personally, mom says she's not for or against raw or cooking...she just doesn't have the time. But she makes sure we get the best commercially prepared foods...mostly canned cuz us mancats need our moisture.
Wally & Ernie
We eat dry food with some canned food.
You said "It does make more sense being that in their natural setting cats would eat raw meat + bones and thrive. "
The thing is, we are domesticated cats so our "natural setting" IS in the home! We should not be wild. That is a fault of irresponsible beans ;)
Purrs Mickey
My Auntie is a vegan and she just feeds her kitties dry food. I have only recently found stinky goodness before that I was all dry too.
It sure would be nice if blogger coments offered spell check and I wouldnt have to delete my whole entry (above)....ya know! Or I suppose I need to just proof read more, lol.
Anyhow.
Great!
Thank you all for your resposes on this one. I think I am just going to look into what other dry foods are out there and perhaps add some omega 3 and/or flax oil to it and continue with the frequent canned as well.
Sometimes my cats will eat cooked chicken, others times they wont. They do not like turkey. So it is hard telling and I think I should just stick with what we know works.
When i visualized raw I really couldnt picture it going over well with the kitties. I may research some more on cooked but for now my furs told me , 'dont fiks it if it nowt brokin, maw' .
Thank you ALL for helping in this sruvey of sorts.
Maw bean,wlk crew.
My gran cooks for her kitties but SS hasn't got enough time to cook for herself, let alone me.
Ha...funny you write this. My kitties eat kibble, as do our big dogs, but our little dogs eat a homemade diet (urinary issues forced it) and I'm so impressed by the quality of energy, skin, coat, overall healthy that I want to do it for everyone. But I need a commercial kitchen to cook for 12, 13, 14 (I have no idea how many we have total) pets.
I'm for a homemade diet. Not so much on the raw. I just wouldn't trust the meat. Especially not meat from the store. It's important to research the proportions of protein/grain/veg.
Hi, this is Jack's Opposable Thumb Wench. I don't have time to make my babies their foods, not even raw, but there are other options. Some specialty pet stores carry frozen or refridgerated raw food diet packages, just defrost/warm and it's already complete. We tried it. Jack loved it, even though he was born in my house and has never ever been an outdoor kitty or hunted his own food. Persephone was a stray and outdoor kitty and wouldn't touch it.
Another option is to buy ground meats, and a mix to add to it to make it properly balanced. (see here: http://www.felinefuture.com/ )-it's a Canadian Company, but it can't be the only company that does this.
The third option is a dry crunchy food that's mostly meat, no grains. We buy Origen. They make Acana brand food too. (see: http://www.championpetfoods.com/ )They're also a Canadian company (we live in northern Canada), but sell in several places in the USA. The website has the locations of where they sell. When I introduced Jack and Persephone (and our other cat Whisper who passed away a year ago) they LOVED it. I switched the food slowly, mixing it with the old stuff and they would dig through and try to just eat the Orijen. Since we switched Jack hasn't had any urinary crystallization, which he had a problem with even on medicated food from the vet.
Hope that helps.
~The OTW
Mommy beeleeves a kitty shood eet the highest kwallity food a person can afford. Many kitties do jes fine on Purina. For sum, a homemade diet mite be the best blend of kwallity and cost. We eet Wellness dry and a premium brand of stinky goodniss called Triumph. Lots of meat, very littel grains. Mommy sez she jes duzzint haff time to cook for us. And if we did git sick and needed special vet food it mite be a big battle. It wuz with our sister in memry. Me and Echo are reel hellthee and we dont poop so much cuz our food is high kwality. When she fed Science Diet Nikki pooped all the time and wuz reel stinky. As a veggie person yoo shood be commendid for not trying to force a kitty to eet that way and for giving them meat even tho it makes yoo skweemish. It is kleer yoo love your babies and I'm sure whatever yoo do it will be the rite thing.
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