Completely overwhelmed by cat foods

penny_pincha

I feed my kittens on home cooked food. I buy Albion lamb costing 68p a pound then a dessertspoon per kitten a meal in a plastic bowl in the microwave for 30 - 40 seconds, let it cool then serve. My kittens wolf it down. Un-cooked meat I keep in the fridge. A pound lasts about 3 days of meals for one kitten. So 68p over 3 days is pretty cheap, that is 23p a day.

I also feed biscuits either Hills or Royal Canin but they don't eat huge quantities of these.

My kittens do well on it with the boys weighing over 2kg each at 3 months old and the girls 1600g each.

Haffiana

penny_pincha wrote: »

I feed my kittens on home cooked food. I buy Albion lamb costing 68p a pound then a dessertspoon per kitten a meal in a plastic bowl in the microwave for 30 - 40 seconds, let it cool then serve. My kittens wolf it down. Un-cooked meat I keep in the fridge. A pound lasts about 3 days of meals for one kitten. So 68p over 3 days is pretty cheap, that is 23p a day.

I also feed biscuits either Hills or Royal Canin but they don't eat huge quantities of these.

My kittens do well on it with the boys weighing over 2kg each at 3 months old and the girls 1600g each.

Please, please do some research on feeding cats and on their nutritional needs.

Cats cannot survive on pure muscle meat - they need calcium and taurine and other nutrients that are not present in lamb muscle. If you make your own cat food, whether it is cooked or raw, you have to provide the full range of nutrients that a cat would get in the wild from eating whole prey. Your cats are probably only surviving because of the (poor quality but nutritionally complete) dry food that they are getting - otherwise they will soon be exhibiting symptoms of severe nutritional deficiency.

There are plenty of web sites on the subject if you wish to make your own cat food. This is a good one to start with:

http://www.catnutrition.org/foodmaking.html

penny_pincha

Thank you for your concern. I feed Royal Canin biscuits too which is a complete food with Taurine. The lamb also has small pieces of bone in it although I think that the calcium in it is not accessible. I also feed fish once a week (not much iron in fish) and a branded pouch once a day. As I said my kittens do well on it my last litter were good weights. An average weight for a 13 week old kitten is 1250g my boys were over 2kg and girls 1650g.

To my adults I feed raw beef and lamb heart as well as Hills, James Wellbeloved and Royal Canin biscuits.

My cats are a picture of health. I was mearly trying to point out that you can feed cheaply without having to buy specific convenience foods. Home cooked foods - you know what is in those.

I beg to differ about not feeding meat muscle though. for 10 years I fed raw rabbit (plus complete biscuits) and bred over 100 kittens and several Champion cats. My boy recently won Best in Show, so I can't be doing much wrong.

PS. The raw rabbit had all organs included. The rabbit were just gutted and skinned. I got it from the game dealer directly & they got the rabbit directly from the field or the people who netted them.

penny_pincha

Haffiana wrote: »

Your cats are probably only surviving because of the (poor quality but nutritionally complete) dry food that they are getting

Cough !! cough !! Royal Canin & Hill Science Plan. Yeah right.

That's why the kittens are 50% bigger than average then.

Perhaps you should read the whole of the post before hitting the quote button.

paddypaws101

Can i ask a couple of questions without anyone thinking I am causing a row?
Haffiana....why do you say that Lamb meat will be deficient in taurine?
Penny-pincha...why did you stop feeding raw rabbit?

I try and feed a mainly raw, home made diet so am genuinely interested in these points.

Paulaviki

My cats have whiskas wet food and usually supermarket own brand dry food and are both very happy and healthy. Of course if I had more money I'd buy them more expensive cat food but as long as they eat well and are healthy that's all that matters!

Haffiana

penny_pincha wrote: »

Cough !! cough !! Royal Canin & Hill Science Plan. Yeah right.

That's why the kittens are 50% bigger than average then.

Perhaps you should read the whole of the post before hitting the quote button.

Also freely available on the internet and on the packets are the ingredient lists of these so-called premium cat foods. Royal Canin and Hill Science Plan. Perhaps you would care to post them here so everyone can see?

I suspect that if you fed a child a diet of chicken nuggets and chips the child would be larger than average as well. But they would not be eating a nutritionally balanced or healthy diet.

But please, don't take any notice of my posts. I am just the annoying person that is prodding your bubble. Do your own research.

Haffiana

paddypaws101 wrote: »

Can i ask a couple of questions without anyone thinking I am causing a row?
Haffiana....why do you say that Lamb meat will be deficient in taurine?
Penny-pincha...why did you stop feeding raw rabbit?

I try and feed a mainly raw, home made diet so am genuinely interested in these points.

It may, or it may not be deficient, paddypaws. It depends where on the animal the meat comes from. By itself it is most certainly not a balanced or even safe diet for a cat.

Whole rabbit is very good, but should not be skinned...

paddypaws101

Haffiana wrote: »

It may, or it may not be deficient, paddypaws. It depends where on the animal the meat comes from. By itself it is most certainly not a balanced or even safe diet for a cat.

Whole rabbit is very good, but should not be skinned...

Sorry, but in what way would it be 'unsafe' ?
It is my understanding that all meat contains taurine, I have certainly never read that any part of lamb is deficient.
Also....why do you say that rabbit should not be skinned? Do you have experience of feeding whole rabbit with the fur on to cats?

Tashatutuw

I feed Butchers classic from the supermarket - it is about £5.50 for a tray of 12 and I feed each cat half a tin per day with dry food to supplement when they are peckish. I have had absolutely no problems on this food although I can change freely as my cats are not fussy.

Note: my youngest who is just about 1yr old was on adult food from 4 days after coming home, they told me he was on kitten food and adult biscuits so I went out and bought whiskas kitten which he refused to eat, I bought 3 other brands to try which he refused to eat choosing instead to eat left overs from the bowls of the older cats so I left him to it, gave him adult food and he has never had a problem. As mentioned previously by several posters - your kitty will let you know what he will or won't eat!!