Raw food:  it’s what’s for dinner (and breakfast)

I’ve been raving about my love for Wild Kitty cat food kits for the last month and a half.  I’ve been ordering the kits where I add my own ground, cooked chicken meat, and the cats have loved the meals.  It’s been less expensive than “premium” canned food, it’s fresher, and I have more control over the ingredients.  The cats poop less, and they just overall stink less… even their pee is less noticeable.  Our house practically smells like a bouquet of roses.  I’ve just loved the way they all eat so enthusiastically, too—it makes my heart swell to see fussy Chelsea licking all the corners of her dish and asking for more.

Wild Kitty makes another kit, one where you add freshly ground raw chicken, with bones.  I’ve wanted to try it because the raw meat with bones is less expensive, but I’ve been hesitant for all the reasons people worry about raw food.  I’m concerned about hygiene issues, I’m concerned about the bones in the food, and I’m concerned the cats won’t want to eat raw meat.  Nevertheless, the cooked kits have gone over so well I figured I’d order a couple of raw ones, and they arrived two days ago.  I used two kits for my batch of food, which meant I had to grind 8 lbs. of raw chicken with bones.  The package recommended either grinding a whole chicken, or just using legs, but I had thighs available so I thought those would be okay.  I double-ground them, first on the largest setting, then on the tiniest one, and the meat came out smooth and looking fresh.  I’ve been so impressed with my Waring meat grinder… that thing is a real workhorse, and I already feel I’ve gotten my money’s worth out of it just in what I’ve saved by making my own cat food.

I mixed my 8 lbs. of ground raw meat and bones with water and the Wild Kitty mix, portioned it out, and stuck it in the refrigerator.  I had an awful lot of cat company while I was assembling the food, which I thought was a coincidence, but as soon as I turned my back both Tie and Frank jumped up on the kitchen counter to try to lick the bowl I was using.  Later that evening I fed the cats the raw food for the first time, and they all devoured it like little savages.  Even Chelsea, again, was pawing at me and yelling at me to hurry up and dish the food out, and she’s been cleaning her dish.  The cats have had raw food for two days so far, and I’m not noticing anything negative (or even, anything different).  I haven’t detected any bones as I dish the food out, and it looks very fresh and healthy.  The food has small dried pieces of carrots and broccoli which reconstitute themselves when you add water to the mix, so you know if you have cats eagerly downing food with carrots and broccoli, it must be something pretty special.

I’m really happy with how well Carlo and Bunny eat this food, because I think it will be especially healthy for Carlo.  I can see that he’s getting stronger, and although he still gets some cramping, I no longer have to give him sucralfate for diarrhea.  He honestly was not gaining weight until I started to feed the homemade food, so I think he’s metabolizing it very easily.  I tried giving a bit of raw food to our houseguests, Greg and Spiderman, but they would have none of it.  Turned up their noses and walked away.  They eat kibble, which I despise, but I offered them some Natural Balance, and they would have none of that, either.  They want their Meow Mix, ugh.  I’ll give it to them, of course, because I want them to feel at home, but I’d love to see a bit of food transitioning for them in the near future.  Especially for long-haired cats, I think food quality is reflected in their coat quality and the amount of shedding.

I know I want to keep feeding Wild Kitty permanently.  I feel so good about it, all the cats love it, and we’re saving tons of money.  I couldn’t have asked to stumble across anything better, because it allows me to feed homemade without hunting down obscure ingredients like chicken hearts, powdered taurine, etc.  All that work has been done for me.  What I don’t know is if I’ll stick to cooked or raw.  The size limitations of our kitchen and refrigerator are revealing themselves because I need to make about 100 pounds of cat food each month (counting Greg and Spidey), and that means I’m making a new batch of cat food every two or three days.  If I had another fridge and/or chest freezer, and some huge stockpots, I could do a month’s worth of food in one day and just store it, but I only have the means to store a few day’s worth of food right now.  Because I have to cook so often, I’m leaning away from raw food—it would mean following stringent hygiene and safety procedures almost constantly, and I think I’d go crazy from the smell of bleach and disinfectant!  Cooking the meat is a much lazier process, although it also costs more, so I’d pay for the convenience.  One complaint I have about the Waring grinder is that you can’t wash the parts in the dishwasher, so that’s another chore to add if I want to grind raw meat a few times per week.

I still have a lot of questions to ask, and maybe there are ways to make the food creation process easier.  Maybe the grocery store would pre-grind all my meat if I ordered 100 lbs. of it and paid for it in advance.  I’m sure I’ll be able to streamline the assembly line eventually, but I’m still in the learning phase.

Speaking of learning, I rarely write about my education lately, but I’m still cramming in some classes here and there!  I just completed a course in Feline Lower Urinary Tract Disease (identifying and treating), and that class covered a lot of litterbox behavioural issues.  It was quite interesting, although it was one of those classes taught by Hills, so the solution to any crystals in feline urine was to put the cat on one of Hills’ Veterinary Diets.  If I asked about raw diets or homecooked diets, I was given the standard line that only Hills’ foods (and one other brand) have gone through clinical trials and are proven to help prevent struvite and calcium oxalate crystals.  Blah, blah, blah.  I really wanted to know if cats who are fed homemade and/or raw diets present with FLUTD as often as cats fed kibble, or really, any commercial diet.  I have a feeling they don’t, but of course no one has studied it, because why would a commercial pet food company want to fund that sort of study?  I think it’s a disservice to pets if their caregivers and veterinary professionals don’t think outside the box when trying to solve problems, but I know that no one is offering money to think outside the box.  Hills is offering money to think about Hills and their pet food, period.  They do a lot of wonderful research and have made many advances in pet health, but it could be so much better if they were driven to produce the very best food, and not just the most economical.  It saddens me that I’ve yet to see any course involving nutrition which isn’t paid for by a pet food company.

I also recently completed a course called “Pain Management of the Canine and Feline”.  It was so challenging, and I learned so much, and felt very proud when I aced my final.  I certainly don’t know everything about the topic, but I know a lot more than I once did!  This Sunday, I start a new course in “Triage and CPR”.  Obviously, learning CPR over the Internet is limiting, but I think I’ll pick up some good pointers and it will lay a foundation for future classes I can take in person.  I’m tempted by the course offering, “Canine Dermatology”, but the courses can be expensive and we don’t have any money to spare right now, so I’m going to pass on it.  Apparently if I volunteer for the organization which teaches the classes I can attend classes for free, so I’m definitely going to apply to be a volunteer.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 07/14 at 02:54 AM

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  1. We put Ziggy on WC cooked, and it’s made an incredible difference.  Her ‘IBD’ (in quotes because it’s just a catchall ‘we don’t know what the heck this about!’ diagnosis) had kicked up, the 2nd round of antibiotics was coming to a close, her diarhea was increasing and she’d started vomiting pretty regularly. 

    We put her on a 1/2 Wild Kitty and 1/2 Hill’s WD (for now to ease into it) diet, and in 2 weeks she’s had only one instance of vomiting, has gained some weight, has normal stools, and is hungry and asking for food.  Her coat is good and we’ve been able to ease of the daily fluid injections to 4 times/week with no discernable dehydration from her.

    I don’t know how long this will last, but it’s far superior to the months we spent last year with increasing injectibles, etc., until she stabilized enough and had a great full year until this latest round.  The diet change is certainly preferable to that road and, at 17, we hope it will give her a good long stretch to continue enjoying her life.  She’s even started playing again!

    Thanks, Leigh Ann, for being a steady, reliable, astonishingly thorough and ethical source of information.  Don’t be in the least shy about asking for donations; it’s not just the adoptees who owe you a debt of gratitude.

    Posted by Print  on  07/14  at  03:33 PM
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