[packrat]

👍 I’ve had a cat in the past that I think was probably poisoned by one of the cat foods that needed to be recalled. I hope someone has an answer to this.

[SLINGSHOT]

Your probably right there is no telling what they are putting in our pets foods.

[Raspberry]

♥️♥️

I am super interested in this topic! I’m under they impression cats, unlike dogs, need Taurine and another I supplement I can’t recall off hand to stay healthy, that’s provided via commercial bagged feed.

I was thinking it’d be awesome to just raise extra meat chickens for the cats and give them a raw food diet but I think you need to be cautious about how much bone to meat ratio they get.

[Monkey1]

Interested in make your own pet food for sure. In book “Dead Pets Don’t Lie” it’s reported the manufacturers collect euthanized animals from shelters and grind them up, collars and all, into to protein paste. The kill chemical survives the heating process.

You’re correct about taurine. Cats tend toward deficiencies which often leads to renal failure in old cats. Taurine is found primarily in meat. As a supplement, it can be purchased in bulk powder pretty cheaply. Know someone who added it to old cat’s food and his renal failure remarkably improved.

BTW taurine is wonderful for humans almost like drinking good water. Great one stop suppplement to keep handy. If you go to PubMed you’ll find lots of studies on taurine’s benefits. Expl: stops seizures in children, prevents damage in strokes, protects kidneys from chemo, heals the heart and lung, restores blood vessels in diabetic retinopathy. Also helps with drug withdrawals. Only thing to watch is blood sugar as it can lower it. There are no reported bad side effects and no reported overdose amount. Found in energy drinks at 5000mg +.

[Hippiemimi]

I make my own dog food and I wouldn’t expect it to be too much different. I pressure can veggies, meat, bone and potatoes. They love it.

[Maytag]

I got some dark chicken quarters today and cooked them to see if they will eat this. One of my cats is nearly an omnivore but the other is super picky (so I’m not sure how he’ll take to anything homemade). I’ve been cooking tonight just to run the numbers:

Purina cat food is $57 for 16 pound bag, so that puts it at $3.56/lb

I can get chicken quarters in 10lb bags at the grocery for $0.48/lb (raw).

1 lb of dark quarters is only about 6 oz of meat once cooked and de-boned.

That comes out to about $1.50/lb for the meat itself.

So there is your main protein already less than half the price, and that’s before adding back any crushed bone or other filler (like maybe some rice). And this leaves a lot of bones to make good broth.

[Now-What-Is-She-Doing]

I have taken chicken scraps and pressure cooked it for bone broth. Then take the scraps and blend them in a mixer bones, fat, meat, and all. The bones are soft from pressure cooking and mix easily. You can add in some egg and then dehydrate the mixture to feed as a dry food or leave it wet. If they don’t like it, you haven’t lost anything really since it was from the scraps anyway.

[KatRay]

I do some thing similar. I just haven’t fed it to them yet. I did it for my cat and dog and have about 50 pints canned up. Maybe I should go ahead and crack it open just to make sure they like it!

[Fy-Nyth]

We raw feed our cats and dogs. Mostly from butchering scraps from our place as well as any meat scraps/organs/bones/fish guts etc that friends save because they like the idea of that stuff not going into the trash. https://perfectlyrawsome.com/ has a lot of great info if you need.

[Maytag]

Thanks, I’ll check that site out. I fed my picky cat kibble again this morning because he was ignoring the chicken, and he puked almost immediately. Going to try to start mixing them a bit to get him used to the smell as safe to eat. He’s also funny about wanting me to be in the room when he eats, sometimes.

[Fy-Nyth]

Best wishes!

[Monkey1]

Thanks for the raw pet food website. Great resource. Addresses the taurine question.

https://perfectlyrawsome.com/raw-feeding-knowledgebase/the-importance-of-taurine-in-raw-diets-for-cats/

[Fy-Nyth]

Sure! I am glad if it’s helpful.