feeding raw to cats: resources?

i am thinking that i would like to switch my cats to raw - which is going to be TONS of work - and i was wondering if anyone can share some resources - websites, book titles, etc. - that i can have a look at. i feed my dog raw and from what i have read so far it seems to be pretty much the same, except for the higher need for taurine. this is one site that i have found so far raw fed cats.

also, if you supplement taurine where do you find it? how do you give it? what else would you supplement? i order my dog's food from a local company since in canada grocery store prices are outrageous! i cannot find chicken for less that 4.99-9.99/lb and that is on super sale! chicken breasts cost almost $30 ($27.17 yesterday) for 6 breasts!

this is what i plan to order for the cats

Totally Ground Chicken Dinner $9.45/5 lb
Five pound package of 10-1/2 pound patties consisting of: Ground Chicken meat, bones and organs.

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and later, when they are more used to it

Totally Ground Beef Dinner $9.95/5 lb
Five pound package of 10-1/2 pound patties consisting of: Ground beef muscle meat, liver, heart, tongue, kidney and bone.

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i will also get chicken necks to see if they will chew on the bones. i will try to get chicken wings. i am ordering ground since i have super picky kitties and they both have bad teeth. i hope that i can get them chewing on some chicken necks/wings and that it will help with the teeth.

do you think that i will have to supplement anything besides taurine with those meals? i emailed the owner of the company and she said that the meals are balanced muscle meat, organs, bone, and fat. they make the ground meals themselves so i trust that she has it balanced.

thank you for reading! thank you for any resources you can list!

A couple of great sites are :

www.catnutrition.org
www.catinfo.org

Another one that will tell you in excruciating detail ( ) exactly what nutrients your cat needs and how to get them:

www.holisticat.com.

I take the lazy, but more expensive, route of buying either premade (complete with supplements) or else I buy prepackaged supplements to add to ground meat and liver. The supplements are :

www.felinefuture.com.

It's also expensive. It adds about $1.50/lb to the cost of the meat and organs. I'm told it would be a lot cheaper if I gathered the supplements together myself. I'm about to get serious about looking into that.

Good luck and let us know how it goes!

thank you! i will read the sites that you posted, i have book marked them all.

i am really hoping that this works out. although you would never guess my 11 yo kitty was 11 - she acts very young and energetic, my 7 yo kitty is over weight and getting lazy. since i switched them to all grain free canned frodo has gotten more energy and he has lost weight already but i would love to see a big difference! i want these guys to be around for many years yet

www.barfdirect.com yes they sell food but the basic info is excellent

www.amazon.com often has some of the easiest to use book , I like books ... just check copyrights as new info comes out all the time

thank you!

Raw Fed Cats (linked in the opening post) is an amazingly good site - I love it because it gives practical information on doing the transition and it keeps things simple. No supplements or grinding or mixing or recipes or anything else to make feeding raw more complicated or intimidating than it needs to be!

There is a great community on Y!Groups for prey-model raw feeders - it's very active and full of experienced people: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rawcat/

I feed chunked meat with edible bone and some organ and I don't supplement at all, aside from an occasional fish oil capsule when I think of it.

Do you have a Superstore where you live? I'm in Ontario and feed a lot of chicken to my cats. I can usually find club pack drum sticks for about $4.50/kg at Superstore. They also have hearts and gizzards which are pretty affordable and are a great muscle meat to feed.

Raw feeding doesn't have to be expensive - I feed three cats for about $1.25 per day (that's for all three, not each.) You can see the full cost break down for my menus here: http://abnormalloveofcats.com/nutrit...ats-time-money This works out to be waaaay cheaper than any commercial food, canned or pre-made raw patties. And the dental benefits of feeding chunks are readily apparent in my cats. White teeth and no stinky breath.

hey thanks!! i do have a superstore, that is where we get our groceries all the time!

i am not sure yet that they will end up eating raw. i bought some of the ground chicken food that i mentioned above and they both turned up their noses. i also tried chicken necks and i got the same response. i plan to get more ground chicken food and continue to offer it all the time to see if one day they will give it a try. i am hoping anyway! chicken is always so expensive here, but i haven't looked at the prices of drumsticks, so i will have to check the next time i am at the store.

thank you for your help! i am keeping my fingers crossed for them eventually liking raw. i know that they are older (11 and 7) but i hope!

The transition can be challenging - some cats take to it right away and others may need up to a year to transition if they are really set in their ways. A lot of older cats who have been fed dry food all their lives don't even recognize meat as food. If you look through the archives of the rawcat Y!group there are lots of discussions on switching picky eaters.

If they're not taking to chicken you might try pork. A lot of people have found that their cats take well to pork when they've rejected everything else. Some times it just takes hitting on the right type of meat and suddenly it clicks with the cats.

I will admit I've been lucky the boys have been eating a raw meal each day for about 3 weeks and have taken just about everything without an issue, chicken, pork, turkey and venison thus far--even bones are no problem, now our struggle is organ meat, hearts are okay but livers and kidneys are a challenge, I have to cook them enough to give them some texture/chew or they snub them.

I've read that a lot of cats snub pre-made. You might also try the "oops" method where you accidently drop a piece of meat on the floor while cutting it up--as opposed to giving in a dish, some cats like to think they got it on accident and are "special".

Good luck!

Leslie

i could try it, but the doggie would get that before the kitties! my cats don't hang around while i am cooking. i was thinking i would get some chicken and cut it up really small and try them with it, but i am not sure they will even try that it is funny because my big kitty is interested when the dog is eating but not when i offer it to him.

thanks for your advice