We are butchering a handful of pigs in a few weeks and I was wondering if there was anything I could give my cat as a treat? Like cooked liver or something. Is it safe? What organs are harmful for cats?
Raw meat and organs of any animal are good for cats
You can cook the meat and organs if you are squeamish about feeding raw or if your cats won't eat raw. I don't think there is any organ that is harmful to cats. If you take a look at Hare-Today.com, an online source for raw meats for pet food use, you'll find all sorts of animal organs and livers and meats.
Too much liver in general can cause vitamin A toxicity so limit it to the occasional treat.
There are canned foods made with pork, such as the NV LID one and Hounds and Gato. It's not a common meat found in cat food, more of a novel protein.
Pork is on my rotation of raw on a routine basis. I can find it easily and it is often reduced @ 30% or @50% when the meat is close or at its 'sell by' date. The only caveat I have is pork can be fairly fatty; I trim the fat for Ritz (she needs to lose weight) and leave it on for Dahalia (eight month bundle of energy).
BTW: since you are butchering your own pigs, I would save all the organs, like spleen, pancreas. They are good organs to give your cats. Too much thymus may cause a problem (thyroid). You can freeze what you can't use immediately. Hint: freeze organs in a ice cube tray; each cube weighs roughly one ounce. You can pop them out like (water) ice cubes and freeze. Much quicker and easier to defrost.
The ice cube idea sounds like a great idea! Small and pre portioned. I knew organ meat in general was good but I had heard pork was kind of sketchy. But I'm glad to hear at least some of the organs aren't going to waste. I doubt I'll take all six pigs worth of organs but at least Chaos can get a good treat out of if.