I just ordered some raw food...

[riccadawn]

I'm at a good place in my life where I feel like I have the time/energy to devote to switching my kitties to raw. I just ordered some stuff. Kind of randomly. I promise I won't just plop it onto a plate for my cats without doing the proper research, but at least now I'll have it in my freezer/fridge so that when I'm ready, it's there.

Here's what I got, according to the descriptions on the website:

Ground beef/organs/tripe and bone. This is approximately 80% meat, 7% tripe, 7% organ [heart,liver, lung, and kidneys] and 6% bone.

Ground duck/bones/organs. This is ground with the bone, heart, liver, and gizzards included. Fine ground.

Ground whole carcass mouse. Includes the entire mouse, hide, stomach, and intestine. Nothing removed.

[font=Verdana, Arial, sans-serif]So my biggest question is: Do I need to add anything to this in order for it to be "balanced" for my cats? Is it okay to plop it on the plate and let them try it, or are there supplements I need to order? Are there other kinds of meat that I could buy that would allow me to forgo supplements? Maybe it's selfish, but I want this to be "easy" for me, and not having to thaw it out, mix it up with a bunch of other ingredients, then stick it back in the fridge/freezer, will make me much more likely to succeed at this. (Not to mention getting the hubby on board.) And are the kinds of meat I chose generally accepted by cats? Is there a starter food that's readily accepted by most?[/font]

[font=Verdana, Arial, sans-serif]I should mention that I've been giving my cats scraps of raw chicken, steak, and turkey for quite some time and they're really into it.[/font]

 

[harleydiva]

Sounds like you are off to a good start, particularly if they already like raw meat.  There are some really good articles here that should help you out.  

May I ask where you ordered from?  I've never seen any place offer ground mouse..

 

[ldg]

If your kitties are already into strips of raw beef, chicken and turkey, I see no reason not to plop some of the ground down and see what happens. :lol3: The trick - when dealing with healthy kitties - is really just to go at their pace.

I don't know how often you feed them, but raw will cause changes to their digestive system, the main one being that their system will become more acidic (which is what it should be). But for the first few months, this can cause some vomiting of bile if they go too long without a meal. I feed at 7:30 - 8:00am, 5:30pm, and 10:30 - 11:00pm. When we were transitioning, I'd usually put down a small bit of freeze dried chicken for them to eat. This would absorb the stomach acid, so throwing up a meal wouldn't be an issue due to acid-build-up.

As to making the food complete and balanced.... the rule of thumb is 80% meat / 10% bone / 5% liver / 5% other secreting organ. FYI, that 10% bone is usually too high for most cats, and the frankenprey feeding guideline at CatCentric says 6% - 8% is more appropriate for cats.

Bear in mind that hearts and lungs are not secreting organs. So with 7% organ that includes heart and lung, you may want to give a little bit of liver once a week or so. Not an entire meal - far from it. But just some here and there.

So whole ground animal should naturally have the right proportions, the grinding itself can impact nutrients via oxidation.

What many do is use Alnutrin to make up for that. But there's really no need to dethaw the grind, add it with water, mix it up and refreeze it. You can just add it to each meal at the time of the meal. I figured out the volume (with the Alnutrin for meat/bone/organ mixes), and it works out to 5/64 teaspoon per ounce of food fed. You can obviously adjust per amount of food actually fed. On this set of mini spoons, the "smidgen" is 1/32, and the "drop" is 1/64. So 5/64 would be two smidgens and a drop.



Hearts are a great source of taurine, which I'm sure you know is essential to cats. The Alnutrin ensures they get enough taurine. But it is water soluble, so make sure you mix up any juices that separated in the dethaw back in before feeding. And if feeding any plain meats, just pour the juice in the bag into the dish with the heart or meat or whatever.

Another great addition is an egg yolk as a treat once or twice a week. These are high in choline and vitamins A and D. Meat has very little vitamin D, so eggs are important. Also, a sardine (tinned in water, no salt) once or twice a week. (You can just freeze the sardines not needed individually, and dethaw to give as treats). These are also a great source of vitamin D.

Some of us add omega 3s to the meals, 500mg of krill oil or salmon oil daily. But that's not "necessary," it just helps bring the omega 6: omega 3 ratio into better balance.

I also give them a probiotic daily. If you're feeding whole ground mouse, or foods with the tripe, it may not be necessary, as the guts and tripe have the healthy gut flora in them.

 

[riccadawn]

Thanks for all the replies I promise I did read them - I just now realized how rude I'd been in not even replying to say thanks!

I put some of the mouse down for the kitties to try the day after it came in the mail. It was in the smallest package and was already starting to thaw so I picked it first. Everyone took one bite and then walked away. Leo was very confused when he walked in the kitchen to see food on the floor when he had never heard a can open. I put it down every other meal (didn't want anyone to starve since they weren't eating it). It was a no go

I have off work this week (yay!) so I thought it'd be a good time to try again. I thawed out the beef this time. While I was still bagging it up to refreeze, I put a little bit down on a plate for the kitties. Clarkson came right over and started sniffing and licking it. He did take a few small bites. Then, less than 30 seconds later, he threw it all back up on the kitchen floor. It and his previous meal from this morning. What does this mean?! He wasn't choking, and I don't even think it was in his tummy long enough for it to disagree with him. Did he maybe bite into a piece of something he didn't like? Like when you go to a picnic and are joyfully stuffing your face with pasta salad and then you bite into an olive and almost gag and it ruins the whole meal for you even though it was just one olive. Does that happen to cats? lol

Anyhow, I left the puke on the floor and continued bagging up meat since I was almost finished. When I turned around to wash my hands, Mikey was back there just gobbling up this beef and also Clarkson's PUKE! Ugh lol. So gross!

Any ideas on what made Clarkson puke so immediately after eating? And is it okay to keep giving it to him? (That is, of course, if he'll even try it again.)

 

[ldg]

Red meats can be difficult for some cats to digest. I don't know why. I've been feeding raw for about 1.5 years now (really? :lol3: ), and Sheldon still can only tolerate a meal that is 50% red meat / 50% poultry. When introducing raw proteins to them, even the smallest amount of red meats would come back up immediately.

Your other cat is eating it because it's undigested protein - that's what he smells. I know - gross. But....

When introducing raw, their bodies go through a lot of changes. Think of it as if you've been eating cereal without milk and canned stew for ... some length of time. You decide to eat a more healthy diet, and you start eating a lot of salad, fruits, etc., all raw. You're probably going to have some gastric upset as your body adjusts. It's the same for kitties going from highly processed foods to unprocessed foods. It requires a much more acidic environment (which is natural for them) to digest the raw. This is why some people recommend digestive enzymes (and / or probiotics ) during the transition. It's best to offer just one type of protein at first - and an easily digestible one, usually chicken or something - until they're used to that. Just offer a very small amount with the canned, and slowly increase the amount. When you're sure they're OK with it, then you can introduce a new one.

I always took diarrhea or vomiting as a sign that I needed to slow down. My cats actually had very little issues with diarrhea, that's more common in cats with IBD. But there was vomiting during my transition, and it was whenever I offered too much of a new protein they weren't used to yet.