Raw food diet for cats?
I am doing research on the raw food diet for cats, because I think my cat is allergic to the things they put in there like corn and grain products… Can you point me to some safe and reliable sources with articles and recipies?
Thanks.
Tagged with: corn • doing research • grain products • raw food diet • raw food diet for cats • reliable sources
Filed under: Raw Food Diet
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Here’s one good one
http://catinfo.org/makingcatfood.htm
There’s another one
http://www.holisticat.com/rawrecipe.html
Though, I don’t feed any vegetables… The amounts of those they would potentially eat are so small that I don’t include them..
This is a good place to start to learn about raw food diets and their positive effects on cats:
http://cats.about.com/cs/nutrition/a/rawfooddiet.htm
She is a very well-informed lady, and she uses well-researched, reliably sourced information.
Raw Homemade Adult Cat Food
Mix the following ingredients together in a large bowl:
• 2 cups ground or cubed raw beef, lamb, chicken necks, mackerel, clams or venison
• 1/4 cup mixed cooked grains — this can be omitted if you feel that your animal won’t tolerate grains (oats, bulgur, cornmeal, rice, etc.)
• 3/4 cup chopped or grated, assorted raw vegetables (broccoli, cabbage, kale, spinach, potatoes or whatever your animal likes)
You can also add:
• Digestive enzymes
• EFAs such as cod liver oil and flaxseed oil
• Amino acids (especially taurine)
• Nutritional herbs
• Vitamin and mineral supplements, used as directed by the product manufacturer
• 1 teaspoon baked eggshell powder or 1 teaspoon steamed bone meal (human food quality only)
You should start by trying Innova Evo cat food. It’s totally grain free and naturally non-allergenic. My mom’s cat has horrible allergies and digestive issues; we put him on this food and he’s been 100% healthy the whole time. It’s pretty much a dry food version of the raw diet, it’s all meat, eggs, cottage cheese, green veggies, etc. It’s great stuff. You can find it at natural pet food stores and online. It would be a lot cheaper and easier than a raw diet; raw diets take a lot of time and effort to get the nutritional balance correct. They are great, don’t get me wrong, but I think the Innova Evo is a good thing to try first and see if it fixes your problems.
Also, if you do a raw diet, NO GRAIN is needed for any reason. I’m not sure who decided carnivores need grains to survive, but they do not. Raw diets should just be raw meats, raw eggs, maybe a little cottage cheese, and some raw greens for fiber, and oils for good skin.
Dr. Jean Hovfe has an article titled "Easy Homemade Diets for Cats and Dogs" at http://www.littlebigcat.com and the catino site and catnutrition site are also good. There are a number of Yahoo groups that deal exclusively with that topic – for me some get a little too far out with feeding live mice and day old chicks to cats.
I question the recipe posted here as I see no calcium source in the food. Calcium is essential to balance properly the phosphorus/calcium ratio for the cat. You must grind up bone with the meat, use meat on the bone to do that, or add a calcium supplement for that.
Try this website as it is very informative. BARF diets are usually good for dogs or cats with allergy problems. Grains are not the only culprit as the pet industry does not have strict guidelines on what can’t be put in foods, so you’ll get diseases parts from cancerous animals as well as ‘by-products’ which can be anything from bones to teeth. In addition, chemicals are also added to preserve the food, and vitamins (which don’t do anything) are put into it after the processing cooks anything of nutritional value out. Do the research and make an informed decision.
Good for you! I’ve recently introduced raw into my girls’ diets, and they could not be doing any better. You won’t regret it!
What I suggest is joining a Yahoo group called Whole Cat Health. The moderator is half cat herself I think, and the other members are equally helpful.
I think this will be your best source. There are other good ones but I think it’s best to keep it simple. I did so much research that I got overwhelmed and scrapped the idea at first.