Comments on: Questions About Feeding A Raw Diet?

By: Darksong

Darksong — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 21:56:06 +0000

Feeding a raw diet is better than feeding any commercial food, yes. Raw feeding is as expensive as you make it… it’s entirely possible to raw feed for cheaper than the cost of feeding cat food. A good raw diet will consist of a balance of raw muscle meat, raw organ meat, and raw meaty bones (there is absolutely no need to include any grain or vegetables as those are rather species inappropriate). I’ll star for some raw contacts and leave you with some good links for research.http://www.rawfedcats.org/ (Raw Fed Cats)http://www.rawmeatybones.com/ (Raw Meaty Bones)http://rawfed.com/myths/preymodel.html (Raw Prey Model Diet Vs. BARF Diet)http://www.rawlearning.com/ (Jane Anderson’s Raw Learning Site)http://community.livejournal.com/rawdogs… (Raw Dogs Livejournal Community [not just for dogs despite the name!], excellent raw feeding information on the profile page and overall helpful community for raw feeding questions)http://www.rawfed.com/myths/index.html (Myths About Raw Feeding)
Edit: I have to disagree with Ocimom on talking to your vet about it. Vets know very little about pet nutrition, and most vets will try to convince you that raw feeding is dangerous when it’s not.
Edit x2: As Ocimom said in her addition, if you can find a holistic vet or another vet who has done their research and supports raw feeding, that’s another story.
Darksong~

By: Ocimom

Ocimom — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 21:56:06 +0000

Do plenty of research on raw diets and talk to your vet about it. Not many vets are familiar with feeding raw. Its not a matter of just giving them a raw chicken or hamburger.
There are specialty raw foods you can buy for cats that has everything in it. I don’t feed raw except for a few handouts when packaging hamburger or chicken. I make sure the chicken is rinsed off before they get their bite or two – they do like both.
Added – regarding the vet – if you can find a vet that knows about feeding raw, he/she can help you out a lot better then most vets.

By: Ken S

Ken S — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 21:56:06 +0000

It should be about the same money to feed a raw diet. There is the initial expense of a grinder although you may have a butcher be able to do that for you
Here you gohttp://www.catinfo.org/makingcatfood.htmhttp://www.mousabilities.com/cats/food/h…http://www.catnutrition.org/pictorial.ph…

By: lgdubya

lgdubya — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 21:56:06 +0000

You’ve gotten great answers. I’m going to put my 2 cents in too.
Yes I do feed my 2 cats a raw diet. The only thing in my cats food is the muscle meat, organs and bone. I purchase is pre-ground. I know that is more natural for the cat to eat whole prey but ground up is much easier for me. There is nothing else added in the raw food I purchase. Only the carcass. I do add 1 Omega 3 Fish Oil pill to 1 serving of food each day.
15 lbs of food lasts about 1 month for the both of my cats. 1 lb costs approx. $2.30 depending on what meat I purchase. That’s 34.5 plus $10 delivery fee so $44.5. I can purchase as many lbs as I want. So if I purchase 50lbs it will still be $10 delivery fee. But I only purchase as much as I can carry.
At the beginning, they’ll eat alot since it’s new to their system and their body is sucking up all of the nutrients that they’ve been missing for so long. After about 1-2 mos, they’ll eat about half less than they’ve been eating so you’ll save even more money.
My vet knows some about raw but he’s a cool doctor and has never tried to get me to go back to dry and/or canned. He always says if the animals are happy and healthy, then he’s happy. He doesn’t have many clients who feed their cats raw so he does pay a little more attention to mine to monitor how well their doing. You will probably have a more difficult time finding a vet that knows alot about raw. If you’re lucky enough to find one that doesn’t talk bad about it and trys to switch you back to dry/canned, then stick with them.
As far as interviewing, I had my lizards before I had my cats. He is my lizards vet as well. So I just stuck with him when I got my cats. It didn’t make sense to have more than 1 primary doctor. He just turned out to be really cool with my cat’s diet which is good for me.

By: Auntie O

Auntie O — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 21:56:06 +0000

I feed my cats four cats raw food. Three love it, one, not so much. It has saved me money over better-quality cat food.
Raw can be as simple or as complex as you want to make it — to me complex includes grinding your own bones. I opt for the simple, which is raw meat with an appropriate supplement to make sure all the nutrients are there and I don’t have to worry about buying a pricey grinder or that the bones aren’t ground up enough. I use Feline Instincts and primarily use their very idiot-proof recipe. I’ve included a link to a page on supplements.
Even if you get so complex that you begin to add all the minutia needed to round out nutrients, you are probably still going to need a supplement, and that is going to be one of the keys to a homemade diet.
There are many sites that describe raw diets and give directions. You can do a search for raw, prey, and BARF diets.
I use primarily chicken. I’m out in the boonies so rabbit is pretty available also. You will also discover there are companies that will sell pre-made raw foods for you, will sell rabbits, venison, duck and other meats suitable for cats. I use little beef as beef is a little too much for cats, not to mention pricey. Organic is always preferred, but I’m a state away from a store that carries organic meats (Whole Foods — although you can buy online from them) so I just go with supermarket fare — good enough for me, good enough for them. I actually find that raw costs me less, even with the supplements (which really aren’t that expensive). I shop around for the best deals, buy in bulk, make up a batch and freeze.
The cats have done well on raw. My brood are 16, 16, 17, and 18.
As I said, I live out in the boonies, and when I approached my vet my vet (who deals with horses, goats, and emus as well as pets), he was in favor of it, his comment being, “I don’t see the kind of health problems in barn cats as I do in house cats.”
There are many more experienced raw food feeders here on YA, and I hope one of them sees your questions and can answer in more detail.
I’ve also linked you to a lengthy article by Dr. Lisa Pierson that is a wealth of information!
Good luck!http://cats.about.com/od/homepreparedfoo…http://www.catinfo.org/