Healthy Cat Food...what is best
What is the best food for your cat? This is a very controversial topic depending on who you ask. If you ask a veterinarian who does not have any further education in pet nutrition, nine times out of ten you will get Science Diet and Royal Canin brand foods pushed on you. If you ask a pet nutritionist, you are likely going to be told a raw balanced diet. So what is the right answer? I'll tell you how to come up with the best answer all by yourself!
Begin by pushing up your sleeves and prepare to educate yourself because YOU have to come to this conclusion by putting forth effort. I am writing this page because I am in a lot of Facebook groups and I see people post questions about a healthy diet for a cat and dog and everyone has their opinions of what is best and not best. Some have convinced themselves that feeding a raw diet is the absolute best, just to turn around and hear their own veterinarian tell them NO, do not feed raw! How do you look your vet in the eye and tell him/her she is wrong? They went to school to be a doctor to animals. They are supposed to help keep our pets healthy right? Yes, this is true and they are all doing their very best with what they have learned. None of us can truly give good advice on any topic we know nothing about but we are all full of opinions right?
Veterinarians are not taught nutrition in vet school. I learned this from Dr. Karen Becker on her youtube channel (and one of my vets confirmed this as well). Dr. Becker is a veterinarian who went on to specialize in nutrition (and much more) and I have loved learning from her since she was working with Dr. Marcola years ago. Since then, she has become a very well known, successful veterinarian who I have much respect for. I will share her youtube channel for you to watch and learn for yourself. You decide for yourself if you agree with her findings and teachings. I have done extensive studying and research on pet food since the late 90's when I started breeding and raising Toy Poodles. I owned a grooming spa and carried products for sale in my store. I sold what I fed to my own dogs and I needed to have as much knowledge as I possibly could on what was going into my animals as well as to being able to inform my customers. I was introduced to raw feeding in the early 2000's by someone doing holistic studies for humans. Long story short, it was where I began to care much more about canine diet and how it affected my breeding program. Fast forward a few more years. I started studying more, reaching out to dog food companies, and acquiring samples of different dog food brands. I did tests with my own dogs to see what they preferred. I watched closely for immediate physical reactions as well as how the food made their coats look, feel and if they had any adverse reactions. I kept tally on what worked best and in the end, I found that knowing the ingredients and limiting the ingredients was what worked best. Now, at this point I was only worried about canines, not felines. I did not raise cats at that time. I had several rescued cats and kittens in my life. I even had a couple of pet Persian cats. I learned from my first indoor cats, hard kibble was a big no no for me and my family. All of our cats prior to the Persians were either indoor-outdoor altered cats or strictly strays that I caught, altered, vetted, and released. They were all on a commercial hard kibble for years.
The first litter box I had in my home was with our Persian cats and that stunk our home up something fierce! I will add, to be fair, I have a very keen sense of smell and I smell things that others don't at times. I could not handle that stink when a cat used the litter box! It made me nauseous! Then I remembered, my representative that sold me my food I fed in my pet spa told me a story about how he was allergic to cats except he had a client who he delivered raw food to and he would never have a reaction when he walked into their cattery! They were a five generation raw fed cattery. So the switch came about and our cats were put on a 100% strict raw diet. That was all it took! Our home did not smell, the cats did not stink, dander was not eliminated but it sure wasn't what it was! I bathed my Persians once a week and shaved them in a a lion clip once a month for their entire life. So years later when we decided to get Maine Coons, I already knew there would be NO indoor cats in my life that did not eat raw food.
I now make my own food so I know where it is sourced from, know each ingredient, and how fresh it is. I can limit proteins since I have some cats with food sensitivities and I can measure it out easily for each one of our cats. It will not hurt a cat to feed them a half and half diet of kibble and raw. I'll be the first to tell you that feeding raw is not convenient or cheap! When prices went up 10% each month on the commercial food I was feeding, I knew I could not continue to spend $300+ a week on all of my animal feed. I can spend that in one month with what I raise and it is a win win situation for us. I will provide information on how I make a homemade, balanced, raw diet for cats in the very near future. These pages take me a lot of time to put together. Baby steps...
Pros and Cons
Raw is expensive and inconvenient as I mentioned above. It isn't easy to find at times. Commercial is sometimes hard to find in certain proteins. It is a waste if your cat doesn't like it. It can still have things in there that your cat doesn't like but hard to figure out what it is. Kibble is so much more convenient. Throw it in a bowl, let the cat nibble as he wants, when he wants, and it won't spoil. You can leave for days with food left out for your cat while you take a weekend vacation with no issues on food spoiling. Unless you have an extremely picky eater, these are the only negatives I find for feeding raw to my cats.
I see allergies controlled by feeding a regulated raw food. I have a less smelly home with a raw fed pet. I have no obesity issues. I have over all a healthy program of breeding cats that I attribute to good diet. I can manage the ingredients for picky eaters. I know exactly what amounts of food each cat is eating because they it all at once when I put it down and it is quickly most of the time. If I need someone to gain weight, I can easily feed more quantity or change the recipe to adapt to calorie intake. More food is absorbed and less waste...lots less waste! Less cat litter is purchased for raw fed cats. Fecal matter is much less smelly and less amount of elimination since the good is absorbed! Pets being fed raw are much more hydrated than they are on dry kibble. My animals drink lots less water because of how much liquid is in my food.
Begin by pushing up your sleeves and prepare to educate yourself because YOU have to come to this conclusion by putting forth effort. I am writing this page because I am in a lot of Facebook groups and I see people post questions about a healthy diet for a cat and dog and everyone has their opinions of what is best and not best. Some have convinced themselves that feeding a raw diet is the absolute best, just to turn around and hear their own veterinarian tell them NO, do not feed raw! How do you look your vet in the eye and tell him/her she is wrong? They went to school to be a doctor to animals. They are supposed to help keep our pets healthy right? Yes, this is true and they are all doing their very best with what they have learned. None of us can truly give good advice on any topic we know nothing about but we are all full of opinions right?
Veterinarians are not taught nutrition in vet school. I learned this from Dr. Karen Becker on her youtube channel (and one of my vets confirmed this as well). Dr. Becker is a veterinarian who went on to specialize in nutrition (and much more) and I have loved learning from her since she was working with Dr. Marcola years ago. Since then, she has become a very well known, successful veterinarian who I have much respect for. I will share her youtube channel for you to watch and learn for yourself. You decide for yourself if you agree with her findings and teachings. I have done extensive studying and research on pet food since the late 90's when I started breeding and raising Toy Poodles. I owned a grooming spa and carried products for sale in my store. I sold what I fed to my own dogs and I needed to have as much knowledge as I possibly could on what was going into my animals as well as to being able to inform my customers. I was introduced to raw feeding in the early 2000's by someone doing holistic studies for humans. Long story short, it was where I began to care much more about canine diet and how it affected my breeding program. Fast forward a few more years. I started studying more, reaching out to dog food companies, and acquiring samples of different dog food brands. I did tests with my own dogs to see what they preferred. I watched closely for immediate physical reactions as well as how the food made their coats look, feel and if they had any adverse reactions. I kept tally on what worked best and in the end, I found that knowing the ingredients and limiting the ingredients was what worked best. Now, at this point I was only worried about canines, not felines. I did not raise cats at that time. I had several rescued cats and kittens in my life. I even had a couple of pet Persian cats. I learned from my first indoor cats, hard kibble was a big no no for me and my family. All of our cats prior to the Persians were either indoor-outdoor altered cats or strictly strays that I caught, altered, vetted, and released. They were all on a commercial hard kibble for years.
The first litter box I had in my home was with our Persian cats and that stunk our home up something fierce! I will add, to be fair, I have a very keen sense of smell and I smell things that others don't at times. I could not handle that stink when a cat used the litter box! It made me nauseous! Then I remembered, my representative that sold me my food I fed in my pet spa told me a story about how he was allergic to cats except he had a client who he delivered raw food to and he would never have a reaction when he walked into their cattery! They were a five generation raw fed cattery. So the switch came about and our cats were put on a 100% strict raw diet. That was all it took! Our home did not smell, the cats did not stink, dander was not eliminated but it sure wasn't what it was! I bathed my Persians once a week and shaved them in a a lion clip once a month for their entire life. So years later when we decided to get Maine Coons, I already knew there would be NO indoor cats in my life that did not eat raw food.
I now make my own food so I know where it is sourced from, know each ingredient, and how fresh it is. I can limit proteins since I have some cats with food sensitivities and I can measure it out easily for each one of our cats. It will not hurt a cat to feed them a half and half diet of kibble and raw. I'll be the first to tell you that feeding raw is not convenient or cheap! When prices went up 10% each month on the commercial food I was feeding, I knew I could not continue to spend $300+ a week on all of my animal feed. I can spend that in one month with what I raise and it is a win win situation for us. I will provide information on how I make a homemade, balanced, raw diet for cats in the very near future. These pages take me a lot of time to put together. Baby steps...
Pros and Cons
Raw is expensive and inconvenient as I mentioned above. It isn't easy to find at times. Commercial is sometimes hard to find in certain proteins. It is a waste if your cat doesn't like it. It can still have things in there that your cat doesn't like but hard to figure out what it is. Kibble is so much more convenient. Throw it in a bowl, let the cat nibble as he wants, when he wants, and it won't spoil. You can leave for days with food left out for your cat while you take a weekend vacation with no issues on food spoiling. Unless you have an extremely picky eater, these are the only negatives I find for feeding raw to my cats.
I see allergies controlled by feeding a regulated raw food. I have a less smelly home with a raw fed pet. I have no obesity issues. I have over all a healthy program of breeding cats that I attribute to good diet. I can manage the ingredients for picky eaters. I know exactly what amounts of food each cat is eating because they it all at once when I put it down and it is quickly most of the time. If I need someone to gain weight, I can easily feed more quantity or change the recipe to adapt to calorie intake. More food is absorbed and less waste...lots less waste! Less cat litter is purchased for raw fed cats. Fecal matter is much less smelly and less amount of elimination since the good is absorbed! Pets being fed raw are much more hydrated than they are on dry kibble. My animals drink lots less water because of how much liquid is in my food.
My favorite holistic veterinarian and her Q & A
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Look up Dr Becker's youtube cannel (or her barkandwhiskers website and follow her if you are interested in feeding fresh pet food! I can only think of one other vet that I love and that is someone that Dr Becker followed before she even became a veterinarian herself. Now she has been a partner with him for many years!
That is Dr. Mercola and she mentions him and their partnership in the video below. |
Dr. Karen Becker answers questions from people like us who need help. I love this video! She talks about how to know what is good, how some companies can be bad, and why vets do not recommend a homemade raw. She talks about both cats and dogs and I find this video so interesting!
Dr. Becker has written books on health, food, longevity, and so much more useful info for all of us pet owners! She discusses what is good and what is not good for your pet. She tells us to stay away from anything in the onion family when it comes to veggies for cats. Cats do not normally need fiber like this but for those that do love fibrous foods, this is good info to know! There is so much to learn when it comes to feeding our pets. However, you know what is good and bad for us to eat and it is the same thing. You just learn as you go and try not to make mistakes. There is a saying "balance over time" when it comes to feeding a proper raw diet to pets. Just like in humans, we may not eat a balanced meal each time but we fill in the gaps and seem to survive just fine. You can do the same for your pets if you miss a daily requirement one day but feed it the next couple of days. This works and you will find how to make the puzzle pieces all fit as you go. |