james t kirk

Hence the need to mix the tuna or chicken with veggies.

My natural vet told me that cats are pure carnivores, however, they do need vitamins and minerals. Apparently, the ratio is 80% meat to 20% veggies with absolutely no carbs or rice.

The veggies contain the vitamins and minerals that a cat needs. They also need chlorophyl, which is why you will see them eating grass from time to time. The vet recommended wheat grass, or dandelions, or simply parsley. I also add calcium citrate and potassium to their veggie pulp.



I guess I am not saying this loud enough - NEVER FEED A CAT DRY CAT FOOD, YOU ARE KILLING YOUR CAT IT'S CONVIENIENT CHEAP FOOD IS ALL


BTW, As I said, I don't vote for the NDP, I don't own birkenstocks, I don't believe in the welfare state, in fact I am an Engineer dammit, I know corporate bullshit when I see it.


I was doing some googling on cat diets and found a very interesting site by a vet in the states.

He too strongly recommends against EVER feeding a cat dry (human convienience) food. Here's an excerpt..


We Are Feeding Cats Too Many Carbohydrates

In their natural setting, cats—whose unique biology makes them true carnivores--would not consume the high level of carbohydrates (grains) that are in the dry foods that we routinely feed them. You would never see a wild cat chasing down a herd of biscuits running across the plains of Africa or dehydrating her mouse and topping it off with corn meal gluten souffle! In the wild, your cat would be eating a high protein, high-moisture content, meat-based diet, with a moderate level of fat and with only ~6-9% of her diet consisting of carbohydrates. The average dry food contains 35-50% carbohydrates. Some of the cheaper dry foods contain even higher levels. This is NOT the diet that Mother Nature intended for your cat to eat! A high quality canned food, on the other hand, contains ~3-6% carbohydrates. Cats have a physiological decrease in the ability to utilize carbohydrates due to the lack of specific enzymatic pathways that are present in other mammals, and the lack a salivary enzyme called amylase. Cats not only have no dietary need for carbohydrates, but too many carbohydrates can actually be detrimental to their health, as outlined below. With this in mind, it would be as illogical to feed a carnivore a steady diet of meat-flavored cereals as it would be to feed meat to a vegetarian like a horse or a cow, right? So why are we continuing to feed our carnivores like herbivores? Why are we feeding such a species-inappropriate diet? The answers are simple. Grains are cheap. Dry food is convenient. Affordability and convenience sells. But is a carbohydrate-laden, plant-based, water-depleted dry food the best diet for our cats? Absolutely not. They are designed to eat meat – not grains.

Cats Need Plenty of Water With Their Food

Another extremely important nutrient with respect to overall health is water. It is very important for a cat to ingest water with its food, as the cat does not have a very strong thirst drive. This is a critical point. This lack of a strong thirst drive leads to low-level, chronic dehydration when dry food makes up the bulk of their diet. Cats are designed to obtain most of their water with their diet since their normal prey contains ~70% water. Dry foods only contain ~10% water whereas canned foods contain ~78% water. Canned foods therefore more closely approximate the natural diet of the cat and are better suited to meet the cat's water needs. A cat consuming a predominantly dry-food diet does drink more water than a cat consuming a canned food diet, but in the end, when water from all sources is added together (what's in their diet plus what they drink), the cat on dry food consumes approximately HALF the amount of water compared with a cat eating canned foods. This is a crucial point when one considers how common kidney and bladder problems are in the cat.

Link to rest...

http://www.homevet.com/petcare/feedingyourcat.html

My cat has kidney problems from eating dry cat food. End of story.\

If you have to feed your cat processed cat food, at least feed it the turd from the can, and not the turd from the bag. At the very least.