Just some questions about raw feeding...

[lindseys]

Having a litter of foster kittens with a sick momma has caused me to have a lot of free time.  I sit just outside the bathroom door for long periods of time, checking in every half hour or so to make sure we don't have another case of diarrhea or overly exuberant feces burial (or EFB as my family calls it).  Don't worry about the diarrhea, it's being taken care of.

Anyway, while sitting on the couch wasting time before I will check in again, I've been doing a lot of research.  Thank goodness reading material is in no short supply here .  Anyway, after further educating myself on cat nutrition, I've discovered that my "top of the line" dry food (for our cats, not the fosters) is merely the best of a bad situation.  I've also discovered that my enormous downstairs freezer (which is currently running, but only holds a bag of 5 year old ice pops) is a sign that I should start raw feeding.  Apparently I am very lucky to have so much freezer space.

As a newbie who would really like to not buy a grinder, but would prefer to feed ground, I would like to purchase pre-ground meat from Hare Today.  I read almost every article on raw feeding at feline-nutrition.org and found a base recipe. (http://feline-nutrition.org/nutrition/making-raw-cat-food-for-do-it-yourselfers)

Here are the ingredients:

• 4.5 lbs chicken thighs (72 oz). Remove the skin from half of it before you weigh it out. If your cats are chubby you can remove all the skin before weighing it. Don't remove the fat from the meat!
• 7 oz raw chicken liver.
• 14 oz raw chicken heart. If you can't source chicken heart, then substitute with 4000 mg Taurine. If you do omit raw heart, remember to make up the missing 14 oz of heart with additional chicken thighs. Your total weight for thighs would then be 5.375 lbs or 86 oz.
• 8 to 16 oz water. Use 8 oz if your cats like it firmer, or 16 oz if your cats like it soupier. I'd start with 16 oz, and then reduce it next time if desired. Use bottled water, not tap water which can have too many chemicals.
• 4 raw egg yolks. You can add the white also, but it must be cooked first. When initially using this recipe, don't add cooked whites; some cats with gastrointestinal issues may have an intolerance for them. You can add it later on, if desired, and monitor for any problems such as diarrhea.
• 2000 mg Taurine. This is in addition to the Taurine you may have added if you didn't use hearts. I always add a little additional of this so-important amino acid, just to be sure and to make up for any loss due to freezing. Taurine is water soluble so you don't have to worry about your cat getting too much.
• 4000 mg wild salmon or wild caught small fish oil
• 800 IU Vitamin E
• 200 mg Vitamin B Complex
• 1 ½ tsp Lite Iodized Salt
• 4 tsp Psyllium Husk Powder

The thighs, hearts, and liver is about 93 oz together.  At Hare Today, I can get units of ground chicken/bones/skin/heart/liver/gizzards.  Nutritionally, would 93 oz of this mixture work in place of the chicken thighs, liver, and heart in the recipe?  I know the balance of ingredients might differ, but could I use it instead, and then include the rest of the items in the recipe?

It also says in the recipe to add the fish oil in while grinding, because the gelatin capsule is edible.  However, if I'm buying pre-ground meat, how do I include the fish oil?

Also, I have no clue how the break-down of supplements works, so does anyone know if feeding the ground mixture from Hare Today would render any of the supplements unnecessary, or if it would cause a need for additional supplements?  Basically, can someone teach me how to edit the recipe for my personal uses using Hare Today ground chicken/bones/organs to replace the thighs, heart and liver?

I apologize if I use any incorrect terms or sound really dumb, but I really would like to raw feed and I am having some trouble understanding what all of the supplements do.  If anyone has a link to a break-down of supplements, or feels like typing one up, it would be VERY appreciated.

BTW - I would also like to mention that raw feeding will be SAVING us money.  It works out to about $2.70 a pound with this recipe, and our current dry food is a little over $3.00 a pound.  *Happy little squeal of excitement*

 

[peaches08]

I use the www.catinfo.org recipe which is very similar to the one you're talking about (Anne turned Dr. Pierson to raw feeding, if I'm not mistaken).  I have a grinder and love it, but will be incorporating Hare Today grinds in the near future.  In Dr. P's recipe, you'll see that she's just using chicken meat, bones, skin, and liver.  But my understanding is that we can apply the same supplement mix to the HT grinds since all but vitamin E and fish oil are water soluble and even those are hard to overdose on.  I'm still looking into that myself.  If not, I'll be ordering Alnutrin without calcium and going from there.

What I do is put the capsules in water, then add the water and the rest of the appropriate amount of water for the recipe.  Not including fish oil, some people use a coffee grinder to grind up the B vitamins, vintamin E, and etc and add it that way.

The one thing I wouldn't add is the psyllium.  If constipation becomes an issue, we can address it then and maybe psyllium might be needed as an ongoing thing.  But initially, no.  It's just not needed IMHO.  My cats went through a short period of constipation but I also literally transitioned them overnight in one meal (I'm NOT a role model).  Most here advise cutting down some of the bone percentage of the poultry grinds from Hare Today with the meat/organ grinds of the same species.

 

[andrya]

Hi @LindseyS   and welcome aboard 

l'm a ground-raw feeder and alternate between the catnutrition recipe you posted and the catinfo recipe @peaches08   mentioned.

Like peaches, l omit the psyllium. When l first started out l put it in, but one of my cats developed mild constipation so l no longer add it. l do add a little pumpkin because as you will see (and squeal again with excitement) the stool of raw fed cats is pretty dry, small, and almost odour-free!!

l alternate between salmon oil and krill oil, just because of the cost of the krill. lf it was less expensive l would only use krill. The salmon oil comes in capsules that l cut and squeeze. The krill caps have a hard shell so l soak them in hot water until they're soft and then cut and squeeze. Most of us add extra wafer to our raw, so making a slurry out of your supplements and oil and mixing well would be the same as for those of us who grind.

 

[peaches08]

Oh yes, how could I forget the extra water?  Especially since these are the first boys I've ever had and I'm super paranoid about urinary issues?  I add 2 to 3 times the amount of water it says to.  My cats' bladders are well-flushed.

 

[lindseys]

The HT grinds include heart, and Dr. Pierson's recipe does not, so are the feline-nutrition.org supplement quantities more suitable for the HT grinds?  Also, does one cup of water per pound of meat/skin/bones/liver/heart sound about right?

Sorry about the hoard of questions, but @peaches08 mentioned that those who feed HT grinds dilute the bone-in mixture with the boneless, skinless version.  What ration of bone-out to bone-in should I use?

 

[andrya]

This is why l alternate between the two. l always make batches in the increments provided so l never have to round up/down or fiddle with any partial measures. l'm pretty anal about being exact, as are most people who post here, so l don't know how you'd measure .7 of a yolk, for example.

Be sure the salt is a sodium/potassium blend.

 

[lindseys]

To be quite honest I'll probably end up buying ground bone-in organs and Alnutrin for bone-in meats.  So much simpler and a lot easier.  I'm all about quick and easy

Question: With Alnutrin do I need to add anything else?  It says I can add salmon oil but do I need to?

Also how much water would I add to a 35 pound batch?

 

[harrylime]

I do Hare-Today ground + Alnutrin. I add one squirt of salmon oil right before serving. 

I add one cup of water for every 2lbs of meat. For this last batch, my turkey and pork came out normal, but those same 5 cups (for 10lbs) made my chicken a tad soupy, so your mileage may vary.

 

[peaches08]

 
The HT grinds include heart, and Dr. Pierson's recipe does not, so are the feline-nutrition.org supplement quantities more suitable for the HT grinds?  Also, does one cup of water per pound of meat/skin/bones/liver/heart sound about right?

Sorry about the hoard of questions, but @peaches08 mentioned that those who feed HT grinds dilute the bone-in mixture with the boneless, skinless version.  What ration of bone-out to bone-in should I use?

Either recipe is fine.  One may have more taurine, the other may have more fish oil...I kind kind of meet between the 2 of them.  I probably do about a cup of water per pound of meat, but that's me.  I never had boy cats before and I have an almost irrational fear of urinary troubles so I make sure they take in water.  Neither has ever had a problem I'm just fearful.

The poultry grinds are too much bone for some cats.  But that doesn't mean it's too much for you cat. I think people are cutting the bone-in portion with about 1/3 non-bone.

 

[ldg]

YES! All that freezer space going to waste! :lol3:

To be quite honest I'll probably end up buying ground bone-in organs and Alnutrin for bone-in meats.  So much simpler and a lot easier.  I'm all about quick and easy
Question: With Alnutrin do I need to add anything else?  It says I can add salmon oil but do I need to?
Also how much water would I add to a 35 pound batch?

Yes, SOOOOOO easy! I always add salmon oil to the mix, Alnutrin and water. :nod: In fact, I also add egg yolks, because that helps prevent hairballs, and is also a good source of choline (which Alnutrin has because it IS in an egg yolk base). I just have older cats, and once on a healthier diet, all the problems with the old one surfaced. I need the egg yolks to help prevent hairballs, and they hate them, so I mix 'em into the ground.

And yeah - poultry is usually 30% or more bone. So many buy the poultry organ ground stuff, and add that to the whole ground animal. Works great, lowering the bone content to something more reasonable. :nod: