RAW stocking up

Well after promising myself that I would never get so low on RAW food for the cats again Christmas crept up and kept me busy so when I looked at the beginning of this week I found only a few bits a pieces left, aaghhhhh.

Felini Complete is used here as a supplement but now I use T C Feline

I thought we would have loads of success getting unusual game items as people had been on holiday and gone out for the day!! but no, we ended up doing two farm butchers, one local town butcher and one supermarket to get everything. What a morning!! however we came back with three rabbits, venison bits and pieces and liver, pheasant over shot items, Ox heart plus kidneys and liver etc. The best buy today however was pork at £3.59 Kg and Beef £5.59Kg at Morrisons. Liver, heart and kidneys are always cheap.

Chicken wings being eaten with mince to the left and Ox heart sliced to the right

Well if you think a well known brand of basic cat food is 50p per 100g  as long as I come in around that for 100% Human grade meat and I know I am trying to protect them against obesity,  diabetes and dental issues I think I have done well. Docs (Day old chicks) are also a brilliant way of cutting costs at 6.5p each.

The down side was that I had a pile of meat to wade through. I started with the most awkward, Rabbit. Already dressed meant all I had to do was cleaver apart and take off chunks of meat to add after mincing the bone. The first grind is very coarse to allow the bone to go through the mincer. Then I put in the finest disc to ensure the bone is minute, the bone adds to the calcium level whilst the meat adds to the phosphorus side, 10% of the total should be bone. I add heart, liver and kidney 5% heart 5% kidney/liver and then additional supplements plus egg. At this stage I add loads of water which is why I rarely ever see any of my cats drink at all. If I had been making chicken up I would follow the same procedure just trying to keep the proteins of the offal species appropriate i.e. chicken hearts and chicken liver to be added to chicken.

Basic ground mince without offal, heart, supplement, or water added yet.

Pheasant legs then had to be ground and added to a game mix of bits and bobs they had given me. The cats love the game food as well as the venison, beef, pork, and rabbit but they really dislike chicken??? why?? they love small game birds - pheasant, mallard, partridge, quail etc. The venison came next, as this has no bone in the supplement has to be added which has calcium extracted from natural bone. Similarly when it came to the beef and pork food additional bone supplement had to be added. I also ensure a balance as on the days I feed the pork, beef, venison meats I also supply mice or Docs , bone in. Visa versa with the rabbit, pheasant and chicken they get strips of heart etc.

Well after a morning mincing, cutting and bagging we have a freezer full of food and another months worth done. I must try and get a small etc garage freezer, the game meat should be frozen for around a month just to be uber careful regarding disease.

RAW or BARF feeding of cats

Mincer, containers , mince, Fortan Fortain, Fellini complete,  meats

Well I am going to put my cards on the table and say I totally believe in feeding RAW food to my cats.

Our last cat Louis unfortunately died at the young age of three from  a Urethral Obstruction. At the time we were told strongly that the best diet for him was dry cat food. He had the kibble sold at the vets and felt we were doing the best for him. On reflection I truly feel his diet and his behaviour combined to cause his illness. At no point did he have an over riding thirst drive and this combined with the feeding solely of dry food I feel combined to cause a constant level of dehydration and concentrated his urea to create uroliths causing the total blockage. It has been thought that early neutering could also cause a narrowing of the urethra however this in general has been disproved.

On getting our new male cats I looked into the causes of the disease and found that a RAW diet was recommended by individuals as a much healthier method of feeding resulting in better coat quality, better health, less obesity, fewer dental issues and no dehydrating effects of dry.

I had a EUREKA moment..... Cats are OBLIGATE CARNIVORES, they ONLY eat MEAT. They have a reduced thirst drive as they get all their hydration through feeding on raw meat, not cooked meat - raw meat. The more I read the more obvious it became that the continued benefits for health and overall cost made RAW an essential method of feeding.

For- 

Body condition - cat self regulate their diet better, less podgy cats. 

Coat - Shining good condition coat. Less dander for allergy sufferers.

Teeth - Bones and strips of meat help to clean the teeth and maintain healthy gums.

Health - No permanent semi state of dehydration and the stress that puts on the organs. Ease of digestion. Less urinary infections such as cystitis etc.

Cost - Home made is cheaper than tinned food but not as cheap as kibble however there could be a greater number of visits to the vets and those costs mount up.

Against- 

Convenience - Open a tin, always on hand. Kibble will last for ages.

Cost - Kibble is cheap.

Need to add more fluid to this mince

I started feeding our clowder of cats RAW in October using the company Natural Instinct ( human grade meat) Raw cat food, the food comes packed in 500g containers and the variety of frozen supplemented food varies according to the time of year. They have the basic chicken and beef/ chicken and lamb at all times but the Vension, Wild Bird Game and Rabbit is seasonal. The good thing about this company is that the food has all the additional health supplements you would want and the delivery minimum is only 5Kg. However quality can vary, the venison can be very dry as can be the Wild bird although these are their favourites. Good rich tastes. I have tried Honeys twice. Nutriment is a new company with the right ethos, which if their range expands I would hope to try with a sample box.
When supply became difficult recently I decided that I had to make my own. So this is when I officially became a mad cat lady to my friends.
I have tried mentioning the fact that it is what cats are supposed to eat, Obligate carnivores. That it doesn't have all the cereal fillers ( why does a cat need cereals?) that processed cat foods include. Nor the sugars which have may have raised the number of cats being seen for dental decay to epidemic proportions ( used for dramatic emphasis, maybe). That obesity is seen far less in RAW fed cats that  naturally self regulate. There maybe a high correlation in those cats with Renal issues such as Urethral blockage or cystitis being fed dry kibble alone as cats have no natural thirst drive naturally getting most of their hydration through the killed food they eat. AND that it is generally cheaper than tinned food but not dry. BUT who wants to feed food that has been hosed off carcasses and pasted up then dried out into a kibble. A well known general brand of wet  tinned food is 51p per 100g, therefore if I ensure I can buy my meat at £5.10 per KG or less then it is cheaper. For my bone content of 10% I can get Chicken wings for £1.50 and that is just the start, I have found sources at different butchers for kidneys, liver, heart, cheap meats ie Lamb breast/ Shin of beef/ seasonal game. I think all this human grade quality of meat is somewhat better than found in tins.

Home made mince, Chunked cut Quail, cut pancreas 

So I bought my mincer which is an Andrew James Electric mincer 1800 W. This beast is cheapish but can gnaw up bones needed in the food. In RAW food the suggested ratios of ingredients  are 80% Muscle meat, 10% Bone, 5% liver and 5 % excreting organ such as kidney plus supplements at the moment I am too lazy to buy individual ones so I get Fellini Complete or TC Feline Raw Basic.
So I start with my chicken wings and throw them in the mincer, followed by the kidneys and muscle meat, the wings I try to have at room temperature as it makes it easier for the mincer. The liver I tend to have just defrosting from the freezer so it has integrity for the mincer to mince. I make up the supplement and mix the whole lot in together. All this time I try to work rapidly to keep the whole are as chilled as possible. I add water to make the mix the consistency I  want. With my grind I keep it fairly coarse as they don't like paste, terrine style food. I then label a variety of containers from Lakeland and label, putting into each enough for one days diet for 4 cats. This then is frozen until needed. The night before feeding I remove from the freezer and defrost, you can put the container in just warm water. When giving I just give enough to be eaten over an hour but then regularly put new bowls of food down as the eldest cat is still only one and a half years old and a BSH, a breed which grows until 3years old. I add vitamin flakes sometimes, a Haem supplement sometimes and a Probiotic sometimes, not often though. It depends on the season and weather etc.

Love this mincer, just Olive oil the grinding discs to keep it A1

They also have in addition to the made mince on rotation each day and in another bowl, heart strips (lamb,pig, Ox), kidney chunk cut (pig, lamb, Ox), Chicken wings chunk cut, and wholesale cost Quail ( this is their absolute favourite including the new kitten of one week!! who will eat this first). 

So that is my story of Raw up to the present moment, with four very healthy, glossy coated, dentally fine, and superb body conditioned cats.