newbie needs help

This is a dedicated place for all of your questions and answers about Raw Diets. There are also some really cool groups like "Raw Fed" on the topic you can join. This forum is for people who already know they like the raw diet or sincerely want to learn more. Please remember that you are receiving advice from peers and not professionals. If you have specific health-related questions about your cat's diet, please contact your vet!

Bam Bam

1053356

Purred: Sat Nov 7, '09 3:30pm PST


	So I have 3 kitties and they're eating gasp dry Iams. Price is a huge deal for us. Hubby was just laid-off. However, I came across rodentpro.com and realized how cheap their frozen animals were! I could just thaw out a rat and put it in the blender! My question is, how many of them would my 3 cats need a day. Secondly, to just feed them that would still probably be too expensive. So would I be able to still keep their dry food out and give them, say, one rat (or rabbit) a day to share? I have a feeling Gomez wouldn't touch the stuff anyway. He's a 9-year old Persian and VERY stuck in his ways. Such a shame since Persians are more prone to health problms. *One more question: Is it possible for my cats to get rabies from eating a rodent (from rodentpro) with it? My cats don't get this shot. Getting a tumor from the rabies shot is far more common than getting rabies here.

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Natasha

Live. Love.- Forgive.

Purred: Sat Nov 7, '09 8:40pm PST


	I am personally not a fan of feeding raw and kibble at the same time. They digest differently and this can cause bacterial infections. I also wouldn't put a whole rat inside of a blender, as blenders tend to chop bones into shards and it would look really yucky in the end. I would get a good meat grinder instead if your cats can't eat it whole. As far as how much they should have- a cat should be eating 2-4% of it's body weight in raw food. This (in order to be balanced) must consist of 80% meat 10% bone 5% liver and 5% other organs. These ratios are proportionate to what is found in a whole prey item. So, you can essentially just choose to feed all whole prey items. They do not need vegetables, but vegetables are often found in pre-made raw formulas.

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Bam Bam

1053356

Purred: Sat Nov 7, '09 9:14pm PST


	Thanks so much Natasha. I might just get a meat grinder now. I highly doubt my cats would eat a whole rat on a plate (maybe if it were alive haha) Any ideas about the rabies thing though?

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Shade

My name is not- Kittyfloss!

Purred: Sun Nov 8, '09 5:53am PST


	Hi Bam Bam. I would imagine that it would be almost impossible for your cats to get rabies or parasites from a product from a place like Rodentpro. They have to keep their animals in certain conditions and I'm sure theyare subject to inspection. Also, if their product were suspected of causing disease in their client's pets, they would be out of business awfully fast. Hopefully Lurch will come along and see this post. His Mom feeds him mice and chicks from Rodentpro all the time and maybe she can answer some of your questions. I believe that she tried the rats with Lurch and he wouldn't touch them, so you might want to start with mice. I guess if you are grinding them up it might not matter though. I don't know where you live, but hare-today.com sells ground mouse. I have to tell you though that although my cats will eat mice they catch themselves they wouldn't touch the pre-ground mouse (it was really gross looking) and they do eat other pre-ground from hare-today. Good luck!

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Charlie

Why did they- take almost all- my tooths??

Purred: Sun Nov 8, '09 11:14am PST


	Kibble and raw shouldn't be fed together. If you needed to do that, you should leave at least 8 hours between the two. Have they eaten any raw yet? If not it may be a challenge. You might need to start with canned and then move to raw from there. I am about to place my first order with rodentpro too. Pinky mice at pet supplies plus are $1.00 each, and at rodentpro with shipping they are about $0.50. But they will be at a show near my home next week, so I can pick up my order and not pay for shipping!

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Bishop

Mr. ``B``

Purred: Mon Nov 9, '09 6:47am PST


	One thing you are going to have to realize is that your cats MAY NOT take to raw feeding immediately. This is VERY common. And it does not mean they will never eat raw food. I have heard of it taking up to 6-9 months to get a cat onto raw food. It may take baby steps to get them to eating whole prey. My one cat took about 1 month to be fully on raw food but my other cat took about 2 months to make the full switch. And - yes there were times when they played on my patience. Holding out for their canned food. You may have to trick them into eating the ground up mice. By covering it with tuna juice, crumbling the kibble ontop, adding catnip, etc. You can also try cutting a slit in the tummy of the mouse and lacing it with a treat and offering it to them. Some people introduce whole prey in very unique ways. I heard of one lady tying a string to the mouse's tail and tying the string to a pole and playing with her cats. This took many days and hours of playing but then they started eating the mouse when they caught it on the string.... If your cats do not take to it immediately and don't seem interested you may want to think about transitioning them to grain free canned food first and then from there onto raw. Whenever you are transitioning a cat to a new food you must make the switch slowly or else they can get a very upset tummy. On the other hand there are cats that take to raw immediately. Lucky owners that's forsure I would most of all recommend that you research raw feeding and educate yourself on this type of feeding. There are many ways that you can cut costs on feeding raw. And for me raw feeding is quite a bit cheaper then feeding commercial pet food. On another note - I have never heard of rabies being passed on from a dead animal to a cat when raw feeding. If you get meat from a hunter it is a good idea to freeze the meat for a couple of weeks before feeding to your pet. Or knowing if there are certain diseases prelevant in the wildlife in your area. It has also been recommended that you freeze pork before feeding it to your cat. Good luck!

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Frodo

Hobbit Kitty,- Mighty Hunter

Purred: Mon Nov 9, '09 12:54pm PST


	9-year-old Frodo (who was 8 at the time) was willing to switch from crap canned food to Evo 95%. She won't eat raw unless she catches it. Between the Evo and her own prey, though, I'm pretty satisfied. The wonderful thing about the Evo is that their cat and dog diets are identical. That means I can get the big dog food cans and save a ton that way! My two that are on Pro Plan canned are sucking me dry at over $100/month, but Frodo gets about four meals out of a large can, and the large can is only a little more expensive than the PP small cans. Why grind the mice? Lurch adores them whole. Chicks, too. The other cats don't care for them, but grinding wouldn't make a difference. No one liked rat, though. Not even the dog. I was so disappointed.

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