My plan it to use Dr Pierson's recipe and add venison since I have tons of it. I plan on using half chicken thighs meat/bone/skin and half venison (meat only) I think that should give me a good fat and bone ratio and save me from skinning and deboning any chicken. So tonight I decided to see if the cats would even show interest a raw/homemade food. I ground together a couple pounds of venison, a can of anchovies in water, and a few chicken livers. Not a complete balanced recipe I know but again the purpose was to see if there was interest from the cats. I used my kitchenaid food grinder attachment to grind the meats. I also added a cup of water and some forti-flora that I had kicking around.
Out of 3 cats one gobbled it up without hesitation. The other two sniffed it and looked at me like "that's it?" so I mixed a teaspoon or so of canned cat food with the homemade and they licked their bowls clean. I'm thinking we'll have a pretty easy transition here. I plan on starting out feeding one ounce twice a day and leaving their dry food out and slowly taking the dry away and increasing the homemade. I hate to just switch them over all of the sudden and run into problems. I have about 2# of the stuff I made tonight so I kept 2 days worth in the fridge and put the rest in ice cube trays to freeze overnight. I'll get everything I need for Dr Pierson's recipe in the meantime so when I'm out of this "experimental food" they'll be ready to switch over to all homemade.
Oh and my main reason for switching to homemade is my rather fat Kevin cat. He started peeing on my clothes and rugs and is on antibiotics for a UTI. He's also getting older and needs to lose weight. I've tried feeding meals rather than free feeding, feeding canned food, making him get more exercise but he's still really overweight. I'm hoping that switching to a homemade diet will help him all around. Plus, I've always wondered why so many cat foods are made with grains and veggies... when was the last time you saw a lion raiding a corn field or a cougar in your vegetable garden??
Out of 3 cats one gobbled it up without hesitation. The other two sniffed it and looked at me like "that's it?" so I mixed a teaspoon or so of canned cat food with the homemade and they licked their bowls clean. I'm thinking we'll have a pretty easy transition here. I plan on starting out feeding one ounce twice a day and leaving their dry food out and slowly taking the dry away and increasing the homemade. I hate to just switch them over all of the sudden and run into problems. I have about 2# of the stuff I made tonight so I kept 2 days worth in the fridge and put the rest in ice cube trays to freeze overnight. I'll get everything I need for Dr Pierson's recipe in the meantime so when I'm out of this "experimental food" they'll be ready to switch over to all homemade.
Oh and my main reason for switching to homemade is my rather fat Kevin cat. He started peeing on my clothes and rugs and is on antibiotics for a UTI. He's also getting older and needs to lose weight. I've tried feeding meals rather than free feeding, feeding canned food, making him get more exercise but he's still really overweight. I'm hoping that switching to a homemade diet will help him all around. Plus, I've always wondered why so many cat foods are made with grains and veggies... when was the last time you saw a lion raiding a corn field or a cougar in your vegetable garden??