This Has Me Baffled

[John Popp]

I tried "WildTrax" supplement but he'd turn his nose up to anything I put that one. Leto just dislikes anything with veggie in it!

My cats have a strong dislike for WildTrax as well. I had a real struggle when I had premixed it with their raw and after giving it away to my Mom for her Bengal who wouldn't touch it, I had her throw it away.

Fed him some frozen raw tilapia, which I cubed, yesterday. He ate it all.

Be careful with the fish, as a treat it's OK but not something that should be a staple food in their diet. Also, the bigger the fish the bigger the issues with heavy metals. Then ofcourse you have all the issues of farmed and genetically altered fish like tilapia. They are farmed offshore without regulation, genetically altered to meet the whims of the medical advise we get, saying eat more fish and the food industry conglomerates wants to raise fish that will grow and can be farmed as quickly as possible.

Just do a google search on "aquaculture risks" and you'll see a ton of issues going on. Then as unfortunate as it may be, Tilapia sits pretty high on the list for genetically altered and farmed fish.

 

[Rafiki]

Rafiki eats Darwin's raw. It is human grade, arrives frozen (with dry ice), comes in chicken and turkey, and is packaged in 1/2 lb chubs. It costs me about $4/lb. They have a special introductory offer of 10 lbs for $14.95 with free shipping. At that price, how can you go wrong?! Here is the link: http://www.darwinspet.com/our-cat-food/

Note: if you do your own raw (and I plan to down the road), you also should be grinding the bones and a normal food processor will die an ugly death. If you don't grind bones as well, it is very important to add supplements, primarily tourine (for heart and eyes).

 

[WitchyWoman]

LD,

You can find great info at catinfo.org and catnutrition.org about feeding a balanced diet if you are going to make your own ground food. Or, you can buy whole prey from rodentpro.com and/or hare-today.com. The advantage of feeding whole prey is you don't have to worry about meat/organ/bone ratio like you do with a home made ground diet. And you can do your own homemade ground and still feed some whole prey to vary the diet.

Variety is key. Cats need a variety of protein sources (rabbit, turkey, chicken, quail etc) so that don't become bored and so they don't develop a sensitivity to one source of food.

Their digestive systems are able to overcome some rancidness in meat but why take a chance on making a cat sick? And why take a chance on making yourself sick if you accidentally ingest harmful bacteria.

As far as supplementation, I think it's a good idea to add a multivitamin compound such as Mazuri or WildTrax for example just to cover the bases. Freezing, heating tends to diminish amino acids and vitamins a bit so adding a supplement to homemade ground or to whole prey a few times a week is a good thing.

If you are going to change Louie to a raw diet, please read as much as you can before you choose a method (store bought ground, homemade ground, whole prey) that will work for you.

 

[Rafiki]

LD,

You can find great info at catinfo.org and catnutrition.org about feeding a balanced diet if you are going to make your own ground food. Or, you can buy whole prey from rodentpro.com and/or hare-today.com. The advantage of feeding whole prey is you don't have to worry about meat/organ/bone ratio like you do with a home made ground diet. And you can do your own homemade ground and still feed some whole prey to vary the diet.

Hi Deborah,
I have been wanting to expand her food selection. What age rabbit or quail is appropriate? I have no idea how big or small these things are! And you just what....place the whole bird or rabbit on a plate?

 

[Tort518]

Well, you can buy a fountain from our sponsor, Glacier Point...best fountain as far as I am concerned and I have had them all...everyone here who has purchased one, loves it.

I'll second the Glacier Point fountain. Two of my cats love it and are drinking more than they used to. I can tell by the litter box needing to be changed more often. The third cat, Hobbes still prefers water from the faucet. Yep, he has me well trained.

I will sing the praises of Glacier Point as well. I have two of the Perfect model and the cats love them.

 

[WitchyWoman]

Rafiki...it's best to start with small whole prey -- pinkie mice or fuzzies, day old chicks, baby quail just to see if the cat will take to whole prey and to give the jaw muscles time to build up strength to eat larger bones. During this time, it will still be necessary to feed the food the cat is transitioning from because the baby animals do not have the same nutritive value as mature animals. After a week or so on the baby prey, start feeding larger prey -- maybe cutting it up into pieces again until the jaws are strong enough to bite through larger bones. If you decide to try whole prey, buy a few bags of baby prey and a few bags larger and a bag or two of adult and experiment to see what the cat likes.

My F6 can't handle the heads of adult guinea pigs or rats so he eats less mature animals. My 2 F2s can chow their way through most of the mature animals.

I've fed baby rabbits that were about 4-6" long and the cats do fine with them but I doubt they could handle a huge adult and I don't think I want to clean up that mess so I've never tried adult rabbits. It's easier to stay either with the baby rabbits (and they are darn cute and it makes me cry when I see them) or rabbit chunks which I get from hare-today.

I just throw the bodies down on the floor. If I put it on a plate, the cats will drag it off onto the floor anyway.

Rodentpro.com gives the length and weight of its prey so you can get a good idea of size.

 

[John Popp]

I haven't had success with whole prey as they end up going half eaten, or more like just chewed on and become toys. Much better luck with the home ground raw, and a pretty high confidence in the recipes I've worked with from catnutrition.org and what I've modified on my own.

You can't get grinding raw done with a food processor done with bones or at least not for long. Lots of quality meat grinders out there and I'm sure lots of opinions on what works. There also isn't nearly the health benefit of having real bone as opposed to a calcium supplement.

As for storage, I've done the small plastic containers, ice cube trays and what's worked best is quart size freezer bags. I'm not keen on having food unthawed for more than 72 hours and generally try to keep it under 48 hours. Stores great in the freezer, never any freezer burn and easy to label the disposable bags. Last round made about 60lbs and still plenty of room in the freezer for the human housemates.

Be careful with the turkey as a lot of cats aren't fond of it. It was a test of wills to get them to eat some chicken that just had a small portion of turkey gizzards. Later I learned that it wasn't just the gizzards, but none of them wanted anything to do with turkey. They relented, and so did I swearing it off.

If our cats had their druthers, the young kitten as well, they would eat rabbit every day. They'll largely eat their chicken, do a bit better with duck and definitely like pheasant. Some is a bit pricey, so I break it into thirds. A third chicken, a third other poultry and a third rabbit. As two of our cats are on a reduced protein diet their is lots of dish diving and foraging when someone has rabbit and someone doesn't.

Currently the bags are filled up with about a pound and a half of food which feeds the two young SVs for a day, and the older cats for two days.

All in all, it's worked out great and the cats are beyond healthy. The guy that was knocking at deaths door is doing great and our vet has told us what a model of health the SVs are. Perfectly clean teeth, excellent body weight and beautiful coats. In fact our vet asked me if I was brushing Chongo's teeth which I promptly told her "no way am I going to risk putting my fingers in his mouth but your more than welcome to".

 

[Dantes]

And how do you wrap your brain around feeding your cats bunnies and guinea pigs? I get all sad just reading about it. I've had them as pets, even rats are such sweet, personable creatures, although I get the whole life cycle stuff it makes me so sad.

 

[John Popp]

What I put through the grinder doesn't at all resemble a bunny. Even my wife who's a vegetarian doesn't have an issue making the chow.

Sometimes you do what you have to do, and our cat's health trumps our squeamishness.

 

[Louie'sDad]

What I put through the grinder doesn't at all resemble a bunny. Even my wife who's a vegetarian doesn't have an issue making the chow.

Sometimes you do what you have to do, and our cat's health trumps our squeamishness.

What do you use as a grinder?

I can only imagine what would happen to my fully carpeted home if I fed Louie whole rodents. The carpet, which is "off white" , would quickly be ruined and stained/soiled with blood, intestine contents/feces, etc,from the rodents.

I believe that the grinding of food is a much more prudent option. The only thing lacking, is the fact that the cat would not fully exercise the mandible with the pre-ground food.

The feeding of raw food should preclude the necessity of a drinking fountain, I would think?

Is there any deficiency that might need supplementation in grinding, say, whole turkey parts, including bone, rather than whole prey animals, including entrails and their contents?