Ground mice for raw diet?

eclipse3

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Hello everybody. I have been researching raw diets for cats and will be switching from wet canned food when I understand everything, but one thing I can't find much information about is a good recipe for ground mice. They are high in taurine so it would be unwise to add more, right?

I will start with commercially available first, although it would be ideal to make the raw meals eventually. ( I am currntly looking into Hare Today to see what is available).

Does anybody have experience in this? Thank you.
 
abby2932

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Hi! 

I did the same thing that you are planning on: started out with commercial raw (Rad Cat) just to see if the cats would like it and then went to Hare Today and ordered a variety of ground meats for my cats to try.

It is true that mice have lots of taurine but whenever and animal is GROUND and frozen, it loses some nutrients. All ground meat needs added supplements. Hare Today sells a premix called Alnutrin and that is formulated to be mixed with whole ground animals. Or instead of using a premix, you could buy your supplements separately and add them to your batch of food.

So if you ordered some ground mice (and other kind of proteins, such as chicken, turkey, rabbit) and Alnutrin from Hare Today, your recipe would be to add 4 grams of Alnutrin premix to one pound of ground mouse. You would also want to supplement with Omega 3's such as fish or krill oil. I add 500mg of krill oil a day to the ground food. And I give my cats 1 egg yolk a week because yolk contain extra Omega 3's, Vitamin D, choline, etc.

Definitely read the stickies at the top of the page and learn as much as you can before starting so you feel comfortable that your recipe is balanced. And feel free to ask lots of questions! I'm relatively new to raw feeding myself. I just started commercial raw in April, moved on to include Hare Today ground meats + Alnutrin in June and this week my cats graduated to include bone-in quail in their rotation!

It is a super fun journey, this raw fed cat transition.
 
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eclipse3

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Thank you. This is exciting and becoming easier to understand. [emoji]128570[/emoji]
 
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eclipse3

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I can do that. It actually does not bother me at all, (had to do that for injured lizards when I worked with reptiles), but the additional nutrients is my main concern with that.

Very few places would provide rodents fed with berries and grain and such as would be ideal. Would it be wise when feeding whole animals to cut open and insert supplements?
 
abby2932

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Major benefit of whole animal, such as mice, rats, quail, guinea pig, etc and also Prey Model feeding (Frankenprey) is that you dont have to add supplements. Well, except for Omega 3's and maybe an egg yolk or so a week. Only ground food requires the supplements, I believe.
 
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eclipse3

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So to add the omega 3 and egg yolk by coating the animal and letting the cat have at it? What would be a nice method of transition from wet/ground food to whole food?

(Sorry for so many questions...just trying to soak up as much education as possible. Looking over many threads as well.)
 
roguethecat

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you ca
Eclipse3 said:
So to add the omega 3 and egg yolk by coating the animal and letting the cat have at it? What would be a nice method of transition from wet/ground food to whole food?

(Sorry for so many questions...just trying to soak up as much education as possible. Looking over many threads as well.)
Click to expand...
you can try, of course!
 I haven't found an omega 3 that anyone actually likes 
... neither do they like egg yolk, with or without omega 3. What two of mine like is day-old chicks which are basically egg yolks on legs.

Best thing of course is breeding your own mice. Commercially raised ones don't have much real estate or grass, but should still beat any can, right? 

I buy from reptile suppliers and rarely give supplemental treats, but a lot of freeze-dried heart treats because more taurine can't hurt. Two cats eating nothing but whole rodents are doing fine, although the Rogue is a bit of a porker (so it sure doesn't work as a weight loss diet, or at least not when the subject is given to begging pathetically).
 
ldg

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With whole prey, you don't need to supplement - not even egg yolk or omega 3s. Brains are high in choline (so don't need yolks) and the EPA and DHA you'd be providing by adding fish oil of some kind. The D is stored in the fat, and kitty will eat all of that.

I think most find feeding whole prey somewhat cost prohibitive - especially if you have more than one mouth to feed. I know the Hare Today pinkies are expensive - as is the ground mouse. I do feed my cats the ground rabbit (fur and all), though I mostly feed a modified prey model raw. "Modified" in that I use eggshell powder instead of bone for a number of the cats, because they were all older when we transitioned, and I haven't been able to get them to chomp bone. Yet. ;)

The way I introduced raw was to use commercial ground, mixing it with canned (or putting both in the same dish but not mixing). I slowly increased raw-to-canned until they were on all raw. I treated each protein as a new introduction - which was a good thing, as I have several cats that had issues with red meat at first (and one that still does, 2.5+ years into eating raw only).

After they were on ground raw for about two months, I offered a meal of bite-sized pieces of just meat. All but one loved it! Introducing organs was a little more difficult - a few eat pretty much anything, but a few are very picky eaters. Two like liver, but can't keep it down. One of those loves kidney, and does keep it down. :dk:

I introduced bones with the two smaller pieces of a chicken wing. Cut that middle section up the middle between the two bones - and maybe cut them in half. I also ended up having to score them (cut the skin) a bit. For a couple of them, I had to coat them with freeze dried chicken before they decided to try it. Several of them just had no interest (and still don't).

For the meat, over time, I made the pieces bigger and bigger. I started with strips, and then made them longer and fatter. But my cats only eat 1.2 ounces per meal - so these are not large portions. ;)

I think the process of introducing whole prey would be the same. Just chop 'em up at first - and you may have to sprinkle stuff on them to entice them to try it (help them recognize it as food).

In the meantime, just start offering them bites of raw meat here and there, if you're not a vegan or vegetarian. If you keep it to 15% or less of the diet, no need to worry about balancing. If you make chicken, start buying ones with the little bag of gizzards, heart and liver inside. If your cat(s) are introduced to the stuff as special treats, it might make it easier to transition them to it as food.
 
abby2932

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Rogue and LDG, thanks for the great information and insight. I now wonder if I am giving my cats too much yolk and krill oil. When I incorporated whole dressed quail from Hare Today to replace 5 Rad Cat meals for the week, I doubled the krill oil per day (from 250mg to 500mg) and added an extra 1/2 yolk for the week.

BUT, instead of hijacking this thread, I'll try to get answers from you guys when I do an update on Friday.

Thanks all!
 
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eclipse3

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roguethecat said:
you ca
you can try, of course!:)  I haven't found an omega 3 that anyone actually likes :nausea: ... neither do they like egg yolk, with or without omega 3. What two of mine like is day-old chicks which are basically egg yolks on legs.
Best thing of course is breeding your own mice. Commercially raised ones don't have much real estate or grass, but should still beat any can, right? 
I buy from reptile suppliers and rarely give supplemental treats, but a lot of freeze-dried heart treats because more taurine can't hurt. Two cats eating nothing but whole rodents are doing fine, although the Rogue is a bit of a porker (so it sure doesn't work as a weight loss diet, or at least not when the subject is given to begging pathetically).
Click to expand...
Then I have no worries about experimenting with rodents.[emoji]128568[/emoji]


LDG said:
With whole prey, you don't need to supplement - not even egg yolk or omega 3s. Brains are high in choline (so don't need yolks) and the EPA and DHA you'd be providing by adding fish oil of some kind. The D is stored in the fat, and kitty will eat all of that.

I think most find feeding whole prey somewhat cost prohibitive - especially if you have more than one mouth to feed. I know the Hare Today pinkies are expensive - as is the ground mouse. I do feed my cats the ground rabbit (fur and all), though I mostly feed a modified prey model raw. "Modified" in that I use eggshell powder instead of bone for a number of the cats, because they were all older when we transitioned, and I haven't been able to get them to chomp bone. Yet. ;)

The way I introduced raw was to use commercial ground, mixing it with canned (or putting both in the same dish but not mixing). I slowly increased raw-to-canned until they were on all raw. I treated each protein as a new introduction - which was a good thing, as I have several cats that had issues with red meat at first (and one that still does, 2.5+ years into eating raw only).

After they were on ground raw for about two months, I offered a meal of bite-sized pieces of just meat. All but one loved it! Introducing organs was a little more difficult - a few eat pretty much anything, but a few are very picky eaters. Two like liver, but can't keep it down. One of those loves kidney, and does keep it down. :dk:

I introduced bones with the two smaller pieces of a chicken wing. Cut that middle section up the middle between the two bones - and maybe cut them in half. I also ended up having to score them (cut the skin) a bit. For a couple of them, I had to coat them with freeze dried chicken before they decided to try it. Several of them just had no interest (and still don't).

For the meat, over time, I made the pieces bigger and bigger. I started with strips, and then made them longer and fatter. But my cats only eat 1.2 ounces per meal - so these are not large portions. ;)

I think the process of introducing whole prey would be the same. Just chop 'em up at first - and you may have to sprinkle stuff on them to entice them to try it (help them recognize it as food).

In the meantime, just start offering them bites of raw meat here and there, if you're not a vegan or vegetarian. If you keep it to 15% or less of the diet, no need to worry about balancing. If you make chicken, start buying ones with the little bag of gizzards, heart and liver inside. If your cat(s) are introduced to the stuff as special treats, it might make it easier to transition them to it as food.
Click to expand...
I'll start my little guy with attempts of treating him with various raw meats, and keep track of anything he has trouble keeping down and what he favors. Hen as patterns emerge I will feed him raw of those animals.[emoji]128587[/emoji]
 
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