expenses and food quality

sorry for so many questions this week, I just want my kitties to live long and healthy lives and since they're both still fairly young, I want to make sure to start it all off right. so here are two new questions that popped into my head this morning:

which is healthier for a kitty: (I know it all depends on quality, but say we're talking the higher quality foods)this raw diet I've heard about, homemade cooked foods, store-bought canned food, or store-bought dry food?

also, how much more expensive is one style of food than the other? I'm not on a super tight budget, but right now I spend about $25/month on my two cats' foods. a large bag of dry food lasts a couple months and it's $30, and I buy a bulk package of wet food every month as well.

thanks in advance and thanks for all the help and advice you guys have given me already!

If my cats would eat it, I'd feed strictly a canned, grain-free diet. As it is, both of mine prefer dry so I feed them the highest quality foods I can which they will eat (for me it's a mixture of Kirklands (their preferred food), Evo Herring and Salmon, and Orijen). Both of my cats lick gravy and leave the rest of the canned food so I also give them FF Gravy Lovers. I don't like doing that, but at least it gives them some moisture. For the two of them, it probably averages to about $45 a month total.

My recently departed kitty ate Avoderm and Wellness canned for several years. It was pricy ($60 a month for just him) but I always felt like I was doing the best I could by him.

Probably raw is the healthiest in general, followed by home-prepared cooked foods, but it takes a ton of research and commitment to make sure you balance the diet properly. Done incorrectly, a home-prepared diet can be very harmful. And a lot of cats won't eat home-prepared foods, you have to start them young or they get imprinted on cat food.

An all-canned-food diet would be next best. Canned food is closer to their natural diet. Next would be a combination of canned and dry. I wouldn't recommend an all-dry diet for most cats. There may be isolated cases of some cats who absolutely can/will only eat dry food, but most cats should have at least some wet food in their diet.

Cost wise is going to be BIG difference depending on where bought and where the person lives.

I will give for me I feed a little of all that Willowy mentioned :

I have four cat s:
To feed all raw would be :
3-4$ a day for commecially avail...

2.50-3$ a day for Organic meats and organs from the butcher all from my local area( then another 20 a month for a well rounded whole food supplement)

2-2.50$ a day for the "natural" ie no hormones , free range chicken from the grocer and from a few hours away

1-2$ for meat from like walmart ( I wont eat so I would not give it to my "kids")


Freeze dried raw runs me 15-30 a month( this covers 4 cats and one dog) for supplement s to dry and wet ( as sole food it would be about 200$ for the four)

I vary the canned so the bill is about 15-20$ a month( I have one of those wont eat wet cats so this is for three).... If I did ONLY premium it would be 100$ a month , only grocery wet in LARGE 22 oz cans about 60$ a month

My dry is about 10$ a month ( 25lb bag last 8-10 weeks)

On ave my food bill for 4 is about 50$ ( okay I dont add in the raw and homemade as I include it in my food bill)

what about pet store bought raw foods? are these balanced properly or just a mix of raw stuff?

Originally Posted by twobananaz

what about pet store bought raw foods? are these balanced properly or just a mix of raw stuff?

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that is what I called commercial... Some are "leftovers" others are high grade meats that could be on your table... If it says Complete and balanced on the label it should be okay... Note : bones , meat and organs often are not labeled as complete when they can be in the right amounts for cats, as much of this is geared to a dog.. You have to research the company and ask lots of ??s

Originally Posted by twobananaz

what about pet store bought raw foods? are these balanced properly or just a mix of raw stuff?

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It depends on the specific brand and formula. For example, Primal (whose raw foods I am very fond of, and feed to my cats) make complete and balanced formulas, but also just ground meats that are intended to have supplements added to them. So you want to look carefully into the different brands and options they offer when making your decision.

For what it's worth, in my particular location, I've found commercial raw to actually be cheaper than grain-free canned food, which is funny to me because my cats are also so much healthier on the raw. You'll probably have to do a price comparison (figuring out how much you'd feed per week/day of each variety) to see if this applies to your area though.

yeah, i figured I would start the research now, while my cats still have tons of their current food (canned and dry food), and then start making the switch to either all raw or at least partial raw, just for the health benefits, and to get them away from all those preservatives that they're eating now. I figure if I'm willing to go the extra mile for my "exotic" critters, why not the kitties? they're no less exotic in my book just because they're more common. Before joining this site, I thought that kitties were easy pets, now I know there are no "easy" pets.

Originally Posted by twobananaz

yeah, i figured I would start the research now, while my cats still have tons of their current food (canned and dry food), and then start making the switch to either all raw or at least partial raw, just for the health benefits, and to get them away from all those preservatives that they're eating now. I figure if I'm willing to go the extra mile for my "exotic" critters, why not the kitties? they're no less exotic in my book just because they're more common. Before joining this site, I thought that kitties were easy pets, now I know there are no "easy" pets.

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Slightly off topic:
Once upon a time someone told me a Betta fish was an easy pet... lol... not when you start trying to find commercial foods without icky stuff

So I've been doing a tiny bit of research, and was wondering: if I were to prepare the food myself, instead of buying commcercial, why do I need a meat grinder? Is it just to grind all the parts up along with the bones and such to make sure they get all the nutrients? Wouldn't it be better to just give them chunks to rip chunks of meat off themselves? Is it because most cats wouldn't do that?

Originally Posted by Willowy

Probably raw is the healthiest in general, followed by home-prepared cooked foods, but it takes a ton of research and commitment to make sure you balance the diet properly. Done incorrectly, a home-prepared diet can be very harmful. And a lot of cats won't eat home-prepared foods, you have to start them young or they get imprinted on cat food.

An all-canned-food diet would be next best. Canned food is closer to their natural diet. Next would be a combination of canned and dry. I wouldn't recommend an all-dry diet for most cats. There may be isolated cases of some cats who absolutely can/will only eat dry food, but most cats should have at least some wet food in their diet.

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Especially the bolded part.

Otto: that's the plan! =)

I've only just started my research, and will be taking my time on this decision. I'm in no rush, and don't want to put any of my animals' lives in danger by not being knowledgable. I will be talking to my vet this Tuesday when I take one of the cats in for their check-up, and doing more research online and such.

Originally Posted by twobananaz

So I've been doing a tiny bit of research, and was wondering: if I were to prepare the food myself, instead of buying commcercial, why do I need a meat grinder? Is it just to grind all the parts up along with the bones and such to make sure they get all the nutrients? Wouldn't it be better to just give them chunks to rip chunks of meat off themselves? Is it because most cats wouldn't do that?

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There are a lot of different schools of thought regarding ground vs. whole prey. Some people don't feel comfortable feeding their cats unground bones (and I'd never recommend leaving them with whole bones unsupervised), some cats refuse to or have trouble eating whole bones. Also it's slightly more complicated because you can't just toss a recipe together and mix everything up in complete batches. You have to feed the required ingredients piecemeal, which I think can be confusing for some people as it requires more thought to balance (i.e. you may be feeding the required percentages of bone/meat/organs over time instead of every meal).

I think the dental benefits of unground raw make that a very worthwhile option to explore. I was originally pursuing that idea, but due to difficulties in sourcing all of the necessary ingredients (i.e. varied organs) I haven't gone that direction yet and am currently just using commercial raw with plans to supplement some raw meaty bones into their diet for dental benefits.

If I had the time and the available ingredients, I'd definitely do whole prey/frankenprey over ground any day, so I definitely recommend that if you're willing and able to put in the time and research. Granted home made ground raw is arguably even more work than feeding it whole, with I think more nutrient-loss risks and less dental benefit.

okay, so grinding all the stuff together is to make sure they get the right amounts of every type of nutrients they need at every meal. I would rather be able to do the frankenprey approach, just for the "laziness" factor in the prep work, and because the thought of grinding meat and other bits of animal sort of sickens me (I'm a pathetic carnivore, that can't have my meat looking like the animal, so grinding something that still resembles an animal even though it's not me eating it is yucky for me).

I was think about phasing out their dry food, and supplementing their wet food with some raw diet. I have tried small pieces of chicken (I buy the frozen raw stuff for us humans, so i just defrosted it in a ziploc running under some warm water) on both my kitties, just to see their reaction, and Isis eats the chicken like it's candy, and Saki just looks at it like "what the "f" is this???"

Since I have at least a month or more before the dry food runs out, I have tons of time to do the necessary research and find my meat and supplement providers if I go the homemade way, and know of the stores in my area that carry the better quality commercial diets. I do have that check-up appt. for my Saki, so i will be asking the vet their opinion about raw feeding (even though I think the answer will be don't do it.)

Yeah, making sure each and every meal is balanced isn't necessary. Some just do that for convenience, personal preference, or if their cats can't/won't eat it unground.

Just as we don't need to eat every single nutrient in even proportions throughout the day, neither do cats, as long as they're getting balanced meals overall (ex. meat and organ one meal, meaty bone the next). Just bear in mind, too much organ/meat can result in loose stools while too much bone can lead to constipation, so try to avoid meals that are too heavy in bone by themselves. Feed them with some meat to balance it out.

If Saki seems wary of the raw meat at first, here are some helpful transitioning tips:
http://feline-nutrition.org/nutritio...-to-a-raw-diet
http://feline-nutrition.org/answers/...inicky-kitties (a more in-depth article for transitioning finicky kitties)
http://www.rawfedcats.org/practicalguide.htm

that makes sense. I suppose it would be less thinking if I ground it all up into a balanced thing instead of trying to make sure they're getting enough of each individual thing. I still like the idea of just giving them chunks to gnaw bits off of, just for the jaw muscle strengthening and supposed teeth cleaning properties.

I did stick some chicken into Saki's dinner tonight, and mixed it in, and she seems to be eating it just fine that way, so I will start offering her plain chicken after a few days and see if she will eat it without the wet food.

Yeah, one thing you can do, if time and effort is an issue, is do a combo diet. I work extremely long hours and was having trouble rounding up everything I needed to do a fully balanced whole prey/frankenprey diet.

So the solution I've gone to for the moment is using premade raw and supplementing with occasional meat chunks and raw meaty bones for dental maintenance. That seems to be working pretty well. They're getting the benefits of some unground chunks while still getting a balanced diet without me having to chop or grind meat every night.

Ideally I would love to put them on an entirely home made whole prey diet, but obviously that's not always practical. What's most important is just that you find something that your cats will eat that suits them and your own schedule/preferences/lifestyle well.

that's what I was thinking of doing, at least this far into my research anyway. I was thinking of slowly phasing the dry food out (since they have 3 gallon sized bags full of the stuff, and I don't like to waste food), then to give them wet food in the AM, and the raw in the evenings. that way, I wouldn't have to worry too much about making sure they get a thoroughly balanced diet, because the wet food would in theory have the correct amounts of everything. I have some time yet, so right now I am at the stage of just testing different meats out on them and seeing which kinds they seem to prefer.

My vet who is a Rare one with a nutrition degree explained that balance is achieved over 6-8 weeks ( 4 -6 is far more ideal) with raw feeding so much more flexible than at least I thought .... Back then I was attempting to balance meals every time for two species with seriou


I totally agree with give the best you can and the best they will eat .... in my house only the domestics like raw that is ground or processed in any way,the one semi feral will eat some ,the other one prefers her raw with a pulse right before consumption and since she is now indoor only that = s she eats dry and freeze dried raw ...

If you want to try a yummy bone snack most say chicken necks.. here no one will touch ... but a chicken thigh is gobbled up

sharky, that does sound so much more reasonable! I already find it hard enough to find variety for my rabbits and that's just veggies and greens, so the thought of having to prepare balanced meals for the cats as well does seem a bit daunting. Can one get chicken necks at a regular grocery store, or would I need to go to a butcher's shop or something?