Do any of you boil your cats water?

I have never boiled water for ourselves or the cat's. We have a few large bottles of water for times like that. Buy them from the store and keep them stocked up. I do know that many people DO this when the cities send out a notice about the water being shut off. They always say to boil the water for a day or two after it gets turned back on.

Our water is perfectly drinkable but tastes of chlorine and is very hard - the rings of calcium I remove from kettles and taps would build a wall! So since I have at least two cats susceptible to calcium stones I give all of them low calcium mineral water.

We have also used a Brita filter water jug. We use it for coffee, general water drinking & Marmite's water bowls. Although she does also drink non-filtered water from the bath tap.

 

Although we have excellent water quality. I started using the water filter when I noticed many years ago that a friend of mine who worked for the local water company used one. We prefer the slightly softer taste of the brita water.

Edited by Biscuity - 12/1/11 at 9:33am

Boiling the water only kills bacteria and parasites, it doesn't make it any cleaner or better tasting, or change any of the mineral or chemical levels in it. American municipal water supplies are held to high standards and city water should be safe to drink unless they've put out an alert. But that doesn't mean it tastes any better. Bottled drinking water is usually less than a dollar a gallon (less if you get a jug refilled) at the grocery store, and cats don't drink a lot. That would probably be the best option if you have doubts about your water.

Because we have well water I always made my DD's formula with distilled water I bought by the jug at Walmart.  My kitties get water from the tap in their fountain.  Now that DD is older I get her water from the dispenser on our refrigerator. 

This exactly!  Beat me to it, word for word what I was thinking!  Great minds and all... 

 

But as was said, only do the bottled water IMO if there is an alert out.   Because otherwise, municipal water is held to higher standards than bottled water, which has very low standards if it doesn't cross state lines.   The big Walmart ones for example were found to exceed safety limits that are placed on municipal water:

http://www.ewg.org/BottledWater/Bottled-Water-Quality-Investigation/Walmart-and-Giant-Bottled-Water-Exceeds-Pollution-Safety-Limits

 

If the water is safe (no alerts), but is just too hard for your liking or has a taste to it, then I'd recommend a filtration system for you and your cats.   This has much reduced cost in the long term than bottled or boiling, and is more environmentally friendly.  

 

You don't have to go hardcore on it and spend this much by any means, but I like four stage ROs:

http://www.amazon.com/Watts-Premier-RO-Pure-4-Stage-Reverse/dp/B0035KLEFM/ref=sr_1_7?s=kitchen-bath&ie=UTF8&qid=1322768210&sr=1-7

 

Cheaper option is a pitcher system (the faucet ones seem to have low stats):

http://www.amazon.com/PUR-Dispenser-Pitcher-Filter-DS-1800Z/dp/B0006MQCA4/ref=sr_1_6?s=kitchen&ie=UTF8&qid=1322768477&sr=1-6

We use a Brita water jug at home, but our city water is drinkable, so sometimes Riley gets water from the tap, sometimes from the jug. The BF isn't too good at filling up the jug when he's done, so sometimes I when I go to fill the bull the jug is empty, so in those times Riley gets tap water 

Just a heads-up that distilled water is not a good option for long-term drinking.

 

Pulled from a littlebigcat.com article: 

 

"Distilled water has been purified so that it does not contain any particles at all. While  purity may sound good, you really should not use distilled water for drinking. The reason lies in the fundamental nature of water. Water and solutes (molecules and particles) move by osmosis and diffusion, respectively. You might remember these from high school chemistry class! Basically, water moves by osmosis from where there is more of it, to where there is less of it; and solutes diffuse from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration. Distilled water contains zero solutes, so when it enters the intestines, diffusion will actually pull solutes out of the body. Drinking only distilled water can ultimately cause deficiencies in sodium, potassium, and important trace minerals. It also becomes acidic when exposed to air. It may contain higher levels of volatile compounds such as benzenes, trihalomethanes, and trichloroethylene, as well as highly toxic “disinfection by-products.”  In people, exclusive consumption of distilled water is associated with high blood pressure and heart arrhythmias. While distilled water can be valuable when used for a short-term process of detoxification, it’s not safe for long-term consumption."

 

And tap water really should be filtered before either you or your cat drinks it: Water Water Everywhere, but What’s a Cat to Drink?

 

Regards.

 

AC

 

That is a myth that has been debunked.    

 

The minerals in water are healthy for you, there is no questioning that, however they are so extremely dilute that they do not account for a significant intake of any essential minerals, which are generally in overabundance in the foods we consume regardless in a healthy diet.     Yes, there is calcium in hard water for example, but studies of some of the hardest water in the nation showed contributions of only around 5%.    A slice of cheese, milk in cereal, or the popular calcium orange juice dwarfs this small contribution. 

 

The part about distilled water actually LEACHING minerals from your body is just patently false, but pseudoscience unfortunately isn't a new thing for lbc.

 

Google "distilled water myths" for plenty of sources.  

I just use the dispenser. It's tap water that has been through an RO filter (which greatly improves the taste--the water here tastes like farm chemicals, even though they say the tests all come back fine), and the way I figure it, it's cheaper for me to get it at the grocery store/Wal-Mart than to buy and maintain my own RO unit. Can't beat 35 cents a gallon.

I was thinking of trying the dispenser too. We are planning on getting a RO system too. Just doing research on them now

 

Do you have an example water bill available?   Most RO filters cost about 0.25 cents a gallon maintenance cost, and municipal water is around .54 cents a gallon (they usually charge a fixed amount for your first 2000 gallons).   Factoring in the inefficiency of the RO filters, filter replacement, and your initial investment price, total should come out to around 6-8 cents a gallon over five years  (about five times cheaper than Walmart).    And that's not factoring in the fuel cost of going to Walmart and inconvenience of carrying the water around, and that the Walmart water may be of questionable quality.  

 

So price wise, you can definitely beat 35 cents a gallon by a huge margin.

 

See the documentary "Tapped" or "Penn&Teller's The Truth about Bottled Water" for more hard facts.  

If I had a marine aquarium and used a lot of RO water, it probably would be cheaper. But if I use about 6 gallons a week, that's only about $110 a year, and I'm at Wal-Mart/the grocery store for food anyway. I was estimating the cost of the RO unit at $300, but I just looked it up and saw that most are cheaper now. My calculations are a few years old, maybe it's time to recalculate. I'm still not sure if the RO unit maintenance is worth it, though.

I'm also afraid that just having an RO unit wouldn't improve the taste enough. The dispenser at the store says that the water has been through a sediment filter, a charcoal filter, an RO filter, and finally treated with UV light. I wouldn't have all those different things and it might not do the job I want, or at least getting all those things would be added expense and maintenance. Better to let the store employees do the maintenance work.
Edited by Willowy - 12/2/11 at 4:21pm

 

I'm not going to indulge in yet another debate with you, Ducman. The internet is flooded with ads from manufacturing companies assuring the public that all distillation products are perfectly safe, but I've read enough articles written by actual doctors on this topic that I'm comfortable repeating the info to others - distilled water is not a good option for long-term drinking, or for supplying as the sole water source to our furkids.

 

Be well.

 

AC

I guess I've never seen any actual medical-type info about distilled water one way or the other. Everything I've seen is either nutbars who say that drinking anything else will kill you or nutbars who say drinking it will kill you. Meh, it tastes flat anyway.

FWIW, one guy on my hermit crab forum got sick of the debate and started using only distilled water for his hermit crabs (they're very sensitive to water quality so it seems to be a good litmus test). It's been a few years and they're doing fine. And in the Navy, they distill sea water to make fresh water while out at sea. Granted, it's only for a few months at a time, but I guess it doesn't hurt the sailors.

Correct, you won't find any such information as there is no peer-reviewed scientific documentation that proves that distilled water "leaches" any type of mineral or tissue material from the body or its cells.    There are real medical studies that show that North American tap water contains healthy minerals that are vital.  Here is one as an example: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11318912    However, the mineral content is so low as to provide only a tiny fraction of intake compared to food sources (even for the hardest water accounts for only 5%), and a typical Western diet is varied enough that malnutrition from such a small contribution is simply not an issue.   In other words, if you want more calcium in your diet for example don't drink ten gallons of hard water, drink a small glass of milk, have a cream cheese bagel, or take a multivitamin.

 

Reverse osmosis filters (the kind so many have under their sinks) provide nearly as pure water as distilled, which are commonplace in Western society and would be subject to lawsuits from greedy lawyers if there was even a tiny shred of evidence it caused any harm, and the entire United States Navy drinks nothing but distilled water.

 

Cliffs Notes: North American tap water is of high quality and good for you, but if there is a taste issue (perhaps even from your own home's plumbing) or its too hard (leaving deposits on your cat water fountain for example), there is certainly no issue with purification as demonstrated by REAL medical authorities below. 

 

Real authorities backing up official statements in writing vs a handful of people fear mongering trying to sell books or marketing overpriced spring water; not really a debate IMO.

Edited by Ducman69 - 12/3/11 at 9:12pm