# Is your cat raw fed?



## CavePaws (Jan 25, 2011)

Liam, my resident kitty who I've had for five years now, eats barely any of his kitty food and consistently kills rats and mice. He brings them to our porch, ALWAYS eats the head and will at times leave half a GIANT rat. My mother found a half eaten rat yesterday, it was missing it's head and top half but the bottom half was left behind. Yesterday, as usual, he left intestines, and a tail. We always have neatly placed organs on our porch in the morning. He's quite the prolific hunter. I tried feeding Liam a bit of raw the other day because he was curious when I was chopping up the dogs food and really would not be quiet about it. When he tried the chicken he wouldn't touch it afterward, the tilapia he ate like it was no biggy - I assume because he already has fish in his diet, and he always insists on the liver treats I buy. Even zukes salmon formula, I've taken to training him lately, it's very different from dog training, I can tell you that. I'd love to feed him raw, he's so healthy looking and his coat is luxurious, I think it may be from all the mice he eats? Is it even worth it trying to feed him all raw meat, or do you think he's getting most of his calories from the multiple mice he kills and eats every day?

Here is a pic of my little hunter about two or three years ago...if you've watched my video of me doing agility in the backyard, this is when we had grass lol! Too many dogs in the yard digging craters to lay in now:


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## Boxers&Pom's Mom (Jan 17, 2011)

I been trying to feed my cats raw for the past two days and they not even look at it. LOL


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## Onyxmom2 (Jan 10, 2011)

Sounds like he's already there! ;-) Going to start our 10 yr old rescue cat today an see how it goes.


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## DaneMama (Jun 27, 2008)

All of the cats we have owned were raw fed. Raw feeding cats is a LOT different than feeding dogs. I suggest you check out raw feeding sites and forums specifically about that

Www.rawfedcats.org


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## CavePaws (Jan 25, 2011)

Thanks for the link!

Alrighty guys, let me know how it goes with your cats. I'd like to know if how they like their diets!

I think I'll just let Liam manage his own food, we'll continue feeding him his kibble and wet food...But I'm sure he knows how to put together his 'raw' diet better than I would anyway.  He's been doing it for years now anyway. :tongue:


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## Paws&Tails (Sep 3, 2010)

At first they wouldn't eat it. At all. Not even with bribes. Sneaking it into food didn't work either. I stopped trying for a while. Then Rocky started to become very interested in Spike's food. I think it was because they have some sort of rivalry thing going on, and Rocky realized that, hey, Spike has something different to eat than me! He wanted Spike's food _bad_. There was actually a fight over it that I had to break up by busting out the spray bottle and separating them. 

After the fight I put down a plate of beef chunked into cubes for their dinner. eace: Rocky chowed down and purred the entire time he ate it. Which is rare for him. He doesn't purr very often. The girls weren't so sure about it, but they tried it because they saw Rocky eating it. They ate it and liked it! Penny seemed to have a little trouble with it. She's used to lapping up her food.

After that it was just trial and error in introducing more meats and organs, getting them to eat bone, and working the pieces up to bigger pieces. I had to smash the bone for them to eat it. Still do, actually, but not as much as before. So far they are eating beef, chicken, fish and chicken liver. They shunned liver at first but came around to it. 

It's going great! They love it! I even put out a bowl of kibble and canned food left from before starting them on raw the other day to see what they would do. They sat down and looked at me like "Is she serious? She expects me to eat this crap?? I don't think so!!"


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## CavePaws (Jan 25, 2011)

Paws&Tails said:


> At first they wouldn't eat it. At all. Not even with bribes. Sneaking it into food didn't work either. I stopped trying for a while. Then Rocky started to become very interested in Spike's food. I think it was because they have some sort of rivalry thing going on, and Rocky realized that, hey, Spike has something different to eat than me! He wanted Spike's food _bad_. There was actually a fight over it that I had to break up by busting out the spray bottle and separating them.
> 
> After the fight I put down a plate of beef chunked into cubes for their dinner. eace: Rocky chowed down and purred the entire time he ate it. Which is rare for him. He doesn't purr very often. The girls weren't so sure about it, but they tried it because they saw Rocky eating it. They ate it and liked it! Penny seemed to have a little trouble with it. She's used to lapping up her food.
> 
> ...


Omg, lol. :rofl: Thats cool they love it now. :] I don't know how Liam would do, it'd be interesting to see. He's probably thinking the same thing your cats do about his kibble and that's why he augments his own diet - because he can, being an outdoor kitty.


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## CorgiPaws (Mar 31, 2009)

I have two cats. One is a shelter kitty, Ellie, that refuses to eat anything raw, though we're making progress trying to get her on more canned and less kibble.... and the other is a raw fed kitten, Levi. 


Feeding Levi is a lot different than feeding my dogs raw. I don't worry about how long stuff sits out with the dogs, but I make sure all his stuff is fresh, and always refrigerated between meals. He also eats a lot less bone than the dogs need to to maintain decent stools. (I admit that bone is a *big* struggle for us, and his stools are less than perfect sometimes, but we're working on it) He eats a *lot* of heart. I have a hard time finding chicken hearts around here, but those are perfect. I have to cut beef heart into small-ish cubes. He also *loves* liver. I cut up whole mackerel, sometimes use canned sardines. I buy cornish hens, and whack away at the bones, totally pulverizing them. (the bone is our biggest struggle, but if your cat already eats the bones of small animals, then that's awesome!)


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## CavePaws (Jan 25, 2011)

Thanks Corgipaws, for the info on your kitty cats. It's helpful should I decide to make a switch with Liam. As of now I feel really bad for feeding him completely inadequate food, stuff he doesn't even want to touch half the time. :doh:

He has no problem with bone in his mice...I don't think it'd be the same with chicken, he's not killing the prey so I'm not sure he equates the chicken I tried feeding him with actual food. The bone in it was crushed and we tried adding it to his moist food just to see if he would eat it. That was a no can do, he didn't even touch his moist food with the chicken in it. I'm not planning on doing a switch right now, I'd rather research it a lot before just throwing everything at him in an uneducated manner. That'd be nuts...


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## Mia (Oct 4, 2010)

I have 2 (four year old cats), three (5 month old kittens) they are all raw fed:cheer2:

They eat goat, sardines, beef, chicken, turkey, deer, lamb, rabbit, mice, crickets, rats, quail....they also eat bones as well. Organs NO problem! It's amazing! Never thought I'd ever switch them to raw. It only took my last guy 2 1/2 months to completely convert to raw!


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## Boxers&Pom's Mom (Jan 17, 2011)

I tried, but I give up. They not even touch the chicken and I was told in the cat forums to feed them mouse. I will not touch a mouse for nothing in my life. So, I give up!


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