Both emotionally, as in the cat keeps asking for food!

And financially, as in I’m throwing away expensive food!

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Ever since the Big Corporate Cat Food started making our cats sick, we’ve eliminated them almost entirely. By choosing cat foods with better ingredients, which turn out to be from smaller companies, we lose some convenience but reap great health benefits.

When we routinely offer a variety of different foods, we have fallbacks when something becomes unavailable. This also keeps our cats used to encountering new foods in the rotation.

Here’s how we managed:

Potholes. They would eat the new food one day, and ignore it the next. Mr WayofCats was driven crazy by their requests, so he would give them their treat food, Fancy Feast, out of desperation. Sometimes that worked… sometimes, it didn’t.

I had to explain to Mr WayofCats that this food wasn’t what they wanted, either. They wanted their old food. The problem was our cats were asking for something that no longer existed, so there was no “weaning off” period.

While divvying up a small can among four cats didn’t impact their nutrition much, trying to rely on it would. Mr WayofCats knew it wasn’t a long term solution; but the poor man has both a kind heart and a compromised immune system… when he doesn’t feel well, he wants to Turn Off The Cats. I totally understand.

These factors made the process longer, that’s all.

Patience. I knew this would be tough, going in. But I really had no choice. I would take down the basket where we store their cans, and exclaim over how Look, that kind of can isn’t there anymore.

This shows that I’m aware of their request, and would love to fulfill it; only I can’t. This helps get across the concept that the “old food” has gone away. Which, since the company changed the formula to make them throw up… it has.

Persistence. Remember the first rule of getting cats to accept anything:

If we keep offering it, it’s no longer new.

We would agree with the cats that it was new. We got excited over its newness. We would smell the can with great enjoyment. (And this stuff does smell like real food.)

To keep the cost down, we bought the big cans and only served small portions. Then, the rest of the can would be doled out on stoneware and heated up in the microwave, on low power, to take the “chilly curse of fridge” off of it.

This turned out to be a major selling point for Reverend Jim. He was eating out of the microwave just like the humans! It was pretty funny to see him do his Happy Dance in front of the microwave at mealtimes.

Bribes. Of course we bribed them: with tuna and bacon fat and bits of chicken and hamburger. All good food we eat ourselves, which also helps make our cats’ new food more appealing.

When we began bribing them routinely, they started eating the new food more routinely. Until this past week, it was still a process of bargaining and bribing. No matter what we did, they were On Strike because of the changes. We were still having to make special fusses over their meals to reassure them that it was okay stuff.

We’re back to normal. They still get their bribes and RJ gets it microwaved if he asks, because we like to fuss over their food with them. But finally, if I’m in a hurry and I just put food in the bowl, they just eat it.

So I’m declaring a breakthrough.

For the curious, this turned out to be the favorite flavor from the favorite brand, Holistic Select Salmon Shrimp. We also feed Wellness and EVO for canned.

Last year, Natura Pet Products was bought out by Proctor & Gamble. Keep tabs on their ingredients, and our cat’s reactions.

For more tips, see convincing a cat to eat the new food.

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It might not work that way in other homes. But everywhere, empty bowls, even not-all-the-way-empty bowls, have great power.

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Cats monitor our behavior and the behavior of our devices the way they would study prey habits in the wild. If we have cats who like to monitor the food status, we need to notice how they react to different routines. Some cats panic when there aren’t any food bowls down; some panic when the bowls are there, but empty.

Since can openers and food in bowls are not covered in a cat’s instinct manual, they rely on interpretation of signals to understand how these important devices work. A particular alarm is the ring of dry food that forms around the view of the inside of the bowl in the center. This “bottom of the bowl” signal activates the cats.

I find this an example of abstract thought. They are not reacting to an actual shortage of food. They are acting on a projection of a shortage, an anticipated one.

Since we now know how sophisticated and elaborate our cat’s prey behaviors can be, we should be able to pay more attention to how we present this important slice of their day. The food bowl behavior we create by our care habits can work to soothe our cats and help them through territory or dining upheavals that might occur.

In my cats, a period of kitchen floor bareness creates more appreciation for the next installment to appear. We feed small amounts more often so everyone has a shot at a full bowl. We get a shot at a cleaned plate more often that way.

Other cats need the bowl somewhere. They might be left alone for a long stretch. They might need to eat as needed, such as when they are a growing kitten. That is when what we put into the bowl becomes more important.

We should see about upgrading to a grain-free cat food choice. These have more nutrients, and the cats eat less. This makes our dry food more expensive; but the cheaper kind is not saving money.

Cats have trouble digesting grains, and can develop allergic reactions which lead to serious disease. Cat metabolic disease, like diabetes and kidney failure, can be traced back to a poor diet.

Removing the anti-nutrients of grains means we are automatically buying more real food. High quality food will not make our cats sick.

To keep interest in the dry food reassuring, we blend two different kinds so a shortage won’t mean a dry food that they do not recognize. We add Brewer’s yeast to their food, as a nutritional supplement, which helps any variation in the “house blend” seem familiar. We offer it in a small bowl so it gets refreshed often. All these moves will calm the cat’s distress signals.

Flexibility in our nutritional approach does a lot of good for both of us. Chances of something bad are lowered, and extremes of something won’t be so extreme. We also get a continuity of supply when many different sources contribute.

Canned is an important part of any cat’s diet. But if we need to fill in around its edges, a food that duplicates more of its good qualities, like high fat and protein content, will nourish our cat in what is ultimately the most economical way.

We have an indicator about how well our cat is responding to their new food. We can see it in our cat’s skin and fur. Almost a third of their metabolism is concentrated there. If it improves, we know our cat’s whole nutritional profile has improved.

Understanding our cat’s “table manners” lets us speak in their language about their food and what is best for them. Without the power of mutual negotiation, we would not be able to change our cat’s food habits when needed.

Then we both handle change better.

For more about our cat’s food delivery system, see Cats and Bowls and Cups.

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I recently found out someone’s cat got into a food with lots of onions in it, and onions are toxic to cats. I didn’t know that.

Fortunately, the cat involved was made to throw up (under a vet’s instructions) and she is fine now. But maybe your readers should know about this?

Dear Readers,

I agree! My readers should know about onions, and a few other foods, too. The fact that cats might eat them may be surprising, since cats have a well-deserved reputation for fussiness.

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But life with humans, and exposure to foods they would never encounter in the wild, can distort a cat’s best instincts. What foods should we make sure they don’t get into?

Onions/Garlic/Leek family: Onions contain N-propyl disulphide, which destroys a cat’s red blood cells. Cats are unlikely to eat them alone or raw, as they are quite strongly scented and not especially cat appealing.

But their ubiquitous use in meat dishes, which cats do like, might lead our cat to assume meat where there is none.

Chocolate: Chocolate contains theobromine, which is toxic to both dogs and cats, though dogs are more likely to eat a lot of it. Still, we don’t want our cats dealing with a central nervous system stimulant that can dehydrate them and make their heart race out of control.

We might not catch our cat gnawing on a candy bar, but chocolate pastries are made with baking chocolate, which has the highest levels of theobromine. I’ve known many cats who are attracted to pastry, such as our young tortoiseshell, Olwyn.

Green Tomatoes and Raw Potatoes?: This video of a cat who loves tomatoes stirred up controversy as some commenters warned that tomatoes are poisonous and others proclaimed their cat lived a long life while loving Italian.

The Solanaceae family of plants has leaves and stems with a high level of solanine, a poisonous alkaloid which creates the bitterness of green potatoes. People can still eat potatoes because, when ripe, the toxin is at low levels in the tubers. Certain cooking methods, such as deep frying, makes the alkaloid move into the cooking fat for an even lower toxin load.

The tomato connection is murkier; tomatoes are in the “deadly nightshade” family. But this entry in Wikipedia suggests concerns about their toxin load is overblown:

Some, such as the California Poison Control System, have claimed that tomatoes and tomato leaves contain solanine. However, Dr. Mendel Friedman of the federal Department of Agriculture contradicts this claim stating that tomatine, a relatively benign alkaloid, is the tomato alkaloid while solanine is found in potatoes. Food science writer Harold McGee has found scant evidence for tomato toxicity in the medical and veterinary literature.

This actually makes sense to me, since tomatoes are fruits which are meant to be eaten to distribute the seeds. While the starchy potatoes are accumulated for the plant’s own use; plants discourage animals from eating them by developing toxins like solanine. While this information might make us feel reassured about giving our cats a french fry or a dab of tomato sauce, we should be on the lookout for digestive upsets in response.

Milk: It’s not that milk is toxic so much as cats can be lactose intolerant, just like humans, and for the same reasons. We are born with lots of lactose digesting enzymes, like all mammals. As we grow older, we can lose this ability.

Cream, yogurt, and cheese have much lower levels of this milk sugar in them. Our Tristan is a true “cheese monster” at nine months; and since he gets a small bit a couple of times a week, he might keep this ability. But if our cat exhibits digestive distress after eating dairy products, they don’t have the right enzymes.

Butter, on the other hand, has no lactose, and can be a nice treat which offers healthy fats.

Grapes & Raisins, Currants: Many dogs have actually died by ingesting quantities of grapes, or their dried form, raisins. Since it is still not yet known what toxin is involved, or if cats are vulnerable to it, medical authorities are advising avoidance.

Tuna: Calm down; tuna is fine in moderation. But I do mean moderation. Not only for the mercury contamination worries if our cats eat tuna at a faster rate than their body can excrete the mercury.

Tuna as a major source of nutrients is too high in unsaturated fatty acids, and too low in vitamin E. This particular combination can lead to a painful inflammatory response known as steatitis, or “yellow fat disease.”

A bit of tuna now and then while we are making salad for ourselves, or as an emergency meal when we are out of supplies, or when the cat is sick and needs tempting to eat; these are all safe uses of tuna. But do not let our cat overdo it.

Raw eggs and fish: Raw fish can cause thiamin (Vitamin B1) deficiency, and raw eggs can create a similar disease state by blocking biotin, (Vitamin B7.) Cooking destroys the enzymes in these foods that can block B vitamin processing, and makes them safe.

Don’t cats eat raw fish in the wild? Certainly; but it’s rare for any cat to be fed raw fish exclusively; except in the cases of human “raw foodists” applying similar rules to their cat’s diets.

Raw fish also carries the danger of parasites; human food-grade sushi is the only kind we should offer our cats.

Nuts: Macadamias (and possibly walnuts) can cause seizures and paralysis in dogs. The specific toxin is unknown, but since one pug site warned that as few as six macadamia nuts had been known to cause temporary paralysis of the hind legs, caution is certainly indicated.

We must also remember that cats have no grinding molars, and cannot crush or chew nuts of any kind. There is a real chance of choking when we let our cats eat such an unyielding food.

Avocados: I was aware that many parts of the avocado tree are toxic, but I didn’t know the fruit itself was considered so for cats, dogs, and horses, too. Keep them away from the guacamole.

I owe my Faithful Reader a big Thank You for bringing this subject to my attention. My research uncovered several food items I hadn’t known about. If there are documented reason for concern about a toxin it is best to forbid that food to our cat. It can seem that “the cat seems fine!” but toxins often have a cumulative effect we are not aware of; until kidney or liver problems appear.

If we suspect our cat has eaten something that wouldn’t be good for them, we should consult our vet or a poison control hotline.

These medical professionals have the skills to evaluate each case on an individual basis, and to advise the best course of action for our particular cat.

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But that is not how it works.

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For most of human and cats’ shared history, there wasn’t any such thing as cat food. There were the mice and rats the cat caught and the human food they got from their people. I was not at all surprised to discover some humans felt feeding their cat was counterproductive to their job assignment. Per Wikipedia:

In 1837, a French writer critiqued this idea:

It is… thought wrongly that the cat, ill-fed, hunts better and takes more mice; this too is a grave error. The cat who is not given food is feeble and malingering… while well fed, he is wide awake and satisfies his natural taste in chasing all that belongs to the rat family.

An ad for Spratt’s animal food, around 1875, claimed that their cat food entirely superseded “the unwholesome practice of feeding on boiled horse flesh; keeps the cat in perfect health.” Dry foods, or kibble, originated more recently.

by 1956 the first extruded pet foods were hitting store shelves. Extrusion is the process by which pet foods are formed into pellets, and then sprayed with synthetic nutrients to compensate for nutrition lost during processing.

Nom, nom, nom; that’s good extruding. It has many advantages; cheapness, keeps well, and offers ease of use. These are all the reasons we should be wary of it for our cats.

If we have been reading labels on our cat food, we will notice that all dry food has some form of starch; even if the package is saying it is “grain free” they will have sweet potatoes or tapioca starch or something similar. This isn’t for the cat; cats can’t digest carbs. This is so the pellets will hold their shape.

I know of only one dry food which is also lower in starch, which is Epigen by Wysong. My cats like it so much we are using it as treats to see if we can transition them from the different, grain-free, dry food we feed now. Which was itself an upgrade from the supermarket kibble.

It is tough to break some cats of their “carb habit.” Our cats are used to having food around all the time, and our oldest cat is both the most addicted, and the most prone to emotional and digestive upsets. Mr. WayofCats has an erratic sleep schedule from his chronic illness, and the last thing he needs is a conga line of cats waiting to register a complaint.

This is what trips people when they want to switch to a healthier diet for their cats. One of my tricks is to feed a variety of high quality foods, and see how my cats do. Also, a variety means we aren’t gambling on just one company to get it right every time; a variety of foods lowers risk of both deficiencies, and way too much of something.

By feeding a variety of foods, I am able to knock out a lesser performer with an upgrade the cats are already eating. This is less of a shock to the cats; it’s only like 25% of their diet I’m changing at a time.

This also lets me decide if a certain food is worth a likely jump in cost and or/convenience. But my cats eat less of the Epigen and feel satisified. So I need to spread the cost over more time to see its true cost. I try different times and amounts to see how well, and for how long, it satisfies my wide range of cat ages (from 13 to five months.)

Wysong is a most interesting company, which offers a complete course in their stance on pet nutrition. You can figure out what you will be getting. They will also autoship for discounts; it’s a good way of not running out.

I wish to state for the record that Wysong had sent me a box of assorted pet foods for review. Epigen was tested for a couple of months, and the cats voted it Treat-Worthy.

Another appeal to me about this food (which I bought myself once I had tried the sample) was that it doubles as a treat. I put some in the puzzle box and it keeps the younger three as happy as toddlers at break time.

These kinds of steps are how we can successfully transition to a different food. Even when that food is more expensive than what we are currently serving. Even when our cats have only eaten a particular flavor of a particular brand for upty years/since we got them/like grim death.

Cats eat less of a better food.

So it turns out a better food can help us keep our cat healthier; less expensively that we might have thought.

We’ve spent the last few weeks test-driving canned foods; coming up next.

Dry food history quote from a pet food company offering mixes to more easily feed raw at home. I have not tried them yet.

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Mr. WayofCats and I love our cats, just as my readers do. But I know I share certain challenges when it comes to feeding our cats the way we would like; just as my readers do.

We have financial hurdles which make it less easy to outsource to an optimum food. People can have many cats, or are feeding strays, too. I have a tiny kitchen. There are others in the house to care for, so time can be a limiting factor. Add in cats with special needs, and this is why so many of us have a big job to tackle.

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Last week, it was not quite a panic when, within the space of an hour, I:

Considering how many pets were wiped out in the Melamine Scandal of 2007, I think I handled the situation well.

Fortunately, we were already low on supplies, because we threw out the few cans left; not wanting to donate possibly tainted food to anyone. I hasten to make clear that I have no evidence the food was contaminated. But, and this is the sad state of affairs we pet parents find ourselves in: I don’t know that the food we threw out is safe, either.

I intend this subject to be an ongoing process that we can all share in. The first, and biggest, challenge for most of us, is cost. Heaven knows I would love to sign up for automatic shipment of an optimum raw diet, delivered to my door. But the upfront costs of such an order (over $200 based on some quick web searches) is more than I have lying around at the moment. As an ongoing expense, we then multiply times four cats.

So if we can’t use money to solve this problem, what’s the next best thing? Mr. WayofCats and I decided the fussier pet food companies, whose cans are available at our local feed store, would be better recipients of our pet food dollars. If they put “no grains” on the labels, that’s a good start.

I won’t have to pay shipping, and while it is not as convenient as picking it up at the supermarket at any hour I’m passing by, it’s worth the extra trip and we do want to support our local feed store.

Here’s a typical “gravy” flavor from the supermarket, noting the first five ingredients:

Water, chicken, animal liver, meat byproducts, wheat gluten

What are “meat byproducts”? I didn’t know either, but I do now:

AAFCO Definition: Meat By-Products, Meat By-Product Meal

Definition: Meat By-Products are parts of slaughtered animals, not including meat (please note: no muscle meat included). Included are lungs, spleen, kidneys, brain, liver, blood, bone, partially defatted low-temperature fatty tissue, and stomach and intestines freed of their contents.

What AAFCO doesn’t mention is that meat byproducts may also legally contain: “4D animals (dead, dying, diseased, down), road kill, euthanized cats and dogs, including their collars. These source products are rendered, the fat is siphoned off to be used as “animal fat,” and the remaining material is extruded to form “meat by-product meal.”

“Meat,” by definition, is limited to the meats of cows, swine, sheep, and goats.”

from the Cats.About.com glossary

Here’s the first five ingredients of what we are serving now:

Chicken, chicken liver, whitefish, chicken broth, herring

Yes, we are spending more; twice as much per can, in fact. However, as this “first five ingredients” exercise shows: are we really spending more?

When a chunk of that lower price I was paying went for water and meat byproducts, maybe I’m actually getting more food out of my cat food dollars, now.

For more on my recent research on cat food, see my nutritional and corporate roundup.

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Class Action Lawsuit
“Premium” Pet Food Marketed and Sold as “Complete and Balanced” Has Historically Contained Such Items as Euthanized Dogs and Cats, Restaurant Grease, Hair, Hooves, and Diseased Animals, and Other Inedible Garbage

And yes, this was first reported in 2009. But I don’t think the concerns have been addressed yet, because of this story filed eighteen hours ago.

Woman believes pet food killed her cat

Herget says she was aware there had been a class action suit involving Friskies cat food, but she thought any problems with the product had been corrected. That’s why Herget says she gave the food to her pet.

Are you feeding from this list? I’d reconsider!

9 Lives, Alpo, Beneful, Eukanuba, Fancy Feast, Felix, Friskies, Gravy Train, Greenies (treats), Iams, K9 Carry Outs, Kibbles ‘n Bits, Meaty Bone, Meow Mix, Milkbone, Natures Recipe, Nutro Complete Care (cat), Nutro Feline Greenies (treats), Nutro Max, Nutro Max Cat, Nutro Natural Choice, Nutro Ultra (Holistic), Pedigree, Pounce, Prescription Diet, Pupperoni, Purina Cat Chow, Purina Dog Chow, Purina Gourmet, Purina One, Purina Pro Plan, Royal Canin, Science Diet, Sheba, Snausages, Whiskas

Kim Herget says she cries every night and is grieving over her five-year-old cat, Smokey. She says after feeding Friskies to her cat for several days, her pet got sick. Herget says she took her pet to the vet, where it was diagnosed with acute kidney failure.

Here is the press release regarding this suit.

MIAMI, FL — May 15, 2007 — A cat and dog owner from Michigan and two cat and dog owners from Florida have filed a nationwide class action against food industry giants Mars, Inc., Proctor and Gamble Co., Colgate Palmolive Company, Del Monte Foods, Co., and Nestle U.S.A. Inc. These manufacturers have a combined approximate 70% of the market share in the $16 billion dollar a year pet food industry. The suit also names as Defendants Nutro Products, Inc., Menu Foods, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. Target Corp., Publix Supermarkets, Inc., Winn Dixie Stores, Inc., as manufacturers and marketers of their own brand pet food and retailers PETCO Animal Supplies, Inc., Pet Supermarket, Inc., and Petsmart Inc.

I have a call in to the gentleman representing the plaintiffs. I will share any new information if I get it.

But right now, these giant corporate brands are out of my house. That includes supermarket house brands that are more than likely manufactured by these same companies. Even if you are feeding something not on the list, that might be only a new brand name. Look for the parent company marked on the bag or can; these corporations are bolded, above.

If you are feeding a certain food and are happy with it, please share your experience in the comments!

Looks like a trip to the feed store is in my future. And, I hope, in yours.

The only way this will be brought to an end is if we stop buying from companies which hold the lives of our pets, and our own hearts, in such contempt.

The way to kill this beast is to starve it.

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I’ve seen it over and over again; cats who are fed according to their “wild” eating pattern of low carbohydrate, meat-based, high-moisture food will normalize their weight. Skinny cats put on muscle and fat cats slim down; all from eating the same food.

But sometimes this isn’t what happens. Sometimes, even with multiple cats eating the same food, we will have one cat who still has a problem. What is going on?

It could be one of these scenarios:

Genetics. Some cats have hanging belly skin, which makes them only look fat; I’ve heard it theorized it is actually an advantage in a fight and will protect their abdomens from the famous “disemboweling move” we are always seeing kittens practice.

Our cat might be a stocky breed, like my Maine Coon mix. My own vet, weighing Reverend Jim at two years old, exclaimed, “And none of that is fat!” He had thought it might be; actually handling RJ told him it was not overweight. He’s simply a big-boned, muscular, and very furry cat.

But even if our cat is truly chubby, there might not be much we can do. I once rescued an adorable black and white cat we named Natasha. When she came meowing over to me, she looked overfed; it wasn’t until I petted her that I felt her ribs and realized she was starving. Natasha had a set of DNA that gave her thick, ripply, fur and skin that made her look very plump, even when she was in desperate need of food. Once she had filled out her muscles, she was even rounder and more doll-like.

This look made her, and her ancestors, quite cuddly looking, which was a big advantage in getting homes with humans. But it also made it impossible for her to become a slim cat.

Missed meals. If we have rescued our cat as a stray, or they have a past where there wasn’t enough food, they might have security issues with their food. This can lead to them eating too much and too often.

This same response is known to happen with humans; volunteers who were fed a very low calorie diet became obsessed with food, and the effects lasted long after the experiment was over. And so it is with our cats.

We can inadvertently prolong the recovery period by becoming upset over our cat gaining weight, and attempt to restrict our cat’s food. This only trips the anxiety all over again.

I’ve rescued many cats who got quite round during their recovery period. Left alone, they became secure, and stopped stuffing themselves. If we have previously made attempts to restrict our cat’s food, (which I’ve found is a favorite item for vets to lecture us on,) we should stop. Give our cat at least a few months of eating “catkins” and see if proper nutrition, including their vitally needed protein and fat, will shut off their “hungry” switch and let them actually listen to their bodies again.

Find out more with my post The Hungry Problem.

Stress response. Cats who are anxious often do not become thin and nervous. They will become fat and nervous. Our “fat cats” are often ones who are having a hard time calming down, for whatever reason.

Being in a constant state of stress upsets their adrenal/thyroid axis. They can have too much cortisol; which can lead to excess body weight. We make this problem worse by restricting food and conveying our worry and concern over the cat’s weight. This increases their stress, and their anxiety about food.

Such cats can be the hardest to persuade to give up their dry food, since they can self-medicate with it to try and calm themselves down. This is due to the “opiate effects” of lectins in grains. These are called exorphins, and are found in wheat, corn, and dairy.

Pieces of milk and wheat proteins (peptides) can act like the body’s own narcotics, the endorphins, and were described by Zioudro, Streaty and Klee as “exorphins” in 1979. Trigger Foods and Opioids

If we have a nervous cat, we can ask our vet to check for thyroid and cortisol to see if this is preventing them from losing weight; just as it does in humans. If we can reduce our cat’s stress, we often fix their weight problem, too. See all my posts on cat stress to see if one of them will help.

Veterinarians are rightly concerned about our “fat cats.” Overweight cats are at risk of developing heart disease, diabetes, and arthritis. But this is mistaking a symptom for a cause.

Fat cats get sick because they are eating too many carbohydrates, a macronutrient they have no way of digesting. Because this is still not widely known, vets push low fat foods, small portions, and extra exercise. Only the extra exercise is beneficial. Even that won’t work by itself.

So let’s evaluate our present and prospective food with my Cat Food Calculator. Try my strategies to switch our cats to the new foods with my post, Why is my cat so fussy? Complete the move to better health by contemplating what we can do about their special water needs.

I know the new foods are going to be more expensive; that’s because there is actual food in them! I found my cats ate less of the higher quality food; and I know it will result in fewer vet bills, down the road.

After all, that is the hidden cost of “cheap food.”

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If all these mammals have the same symptom, it makes sense to look for a common denominator; in the case of humans, and the rats who eat from our dumpsters, I showed that the proportions of macronutrients (protein, fat, and carbohydrates) in our diet has shifted substantially over the last three decades, showing no support for the “calorie-dense” possibility mentioned in the article. But while this might have some effect on those dogs fed from our tables, what about our cats, who are far less accepting of table scraps? Cats still get cat food, don’t they?

Yes, they do. But it’s not the same food it was thirty years ago, either. My research led me to this long, but highly informative article, What’s Really in Pet Food. This is what it says about the nutritional content in modern pet foods:

The amount of grain and vegetable products used in pet food has risen dramatically over time. Plant products now replace a considerable proportion of the meat that was used in the earliest commercial pet foods. This has led to severe nutritional deficiencies that have been corrected along the way, although many animals died before science caught up.

So dry animal food has made a similar transformation that our human food did; and with similar results on our bodies. Replacing fat with carbohydrates, in an attempt to make our food less “calorie-dense,” is not working as intended.

The commenter who brought the study about the animals around us becoming more overweight closed by saying:

At any rate, most phenomena in biology are multifactorial.

True, and our bodies are amazingly complex. But our cars are complex too; yet something as simple as an empty fuel tank will keep them from running. It doesn’t take a lot of different and complex things if something so simple and fundamental is missing.

What this means to our fat cat is that the conventional advice to restrict their food is only going to frustrate and annoy our cat; and ourselves. After all, this has been shown to not work very well on humans.

Newly published research by scientists at Oregon Health & Science University demonstrates that simply reducing caloric intake is not enough to promote significant weight loss. This appears to be due to a natural compensatory mechanism that reduces a person’s physical activity in response to a reduction in calories.

Of course! weight loss gurus tend to say. That’s why you have to exercise, too!

Except that still isn’t shown to be true. In the article, Why most of us believe that exercise makes us thinner—and why we’re wrong, this very possibility is explored, without much success:

In other words, despite half a century of efforts to prove otherwise, scientists still can’t say that exercise will help keep off the pounds.

For at least two decades, we humans have actually done what we are told regarding a healthy diet, and have replaced fat with carbohydrates. This has placed us squarely in the middle of an “Obesity Epidemic,” and has impacted our cats, as well.

Even though we are biologically omnivorous, and our cats are obligate carnivores, we have come to believe what is good for us, is also good for our cats. Unfortunately, we are wrong on both counts. It’s not good for either of us.

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So please, don’t starve the fat cat. It won’t work, and will drive both of us crazy. Feed more canned food that has only a 3-5% carbohydrate content. It worked for this commenter.

As a safety note, the pet food article also advises:

Although the cooking process kills bacteria in the ingredients, the final product can pick up more bacteria during the subsequent drying, coating, and packaging process. Some experts warn that getting dry food wet can allow the bacteria on the surface to multiply and make pets sick. Do not mix dry food with water, milk, canned food, or other liquids.

Just another reason to keep the dry foods in our cats’ diet to a minimum; or eliminate them entirely.

Coming next, Part III; when some cats are still too fat on the same diet that our other cats do well on.

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You might want to look into the research being done on other causes of obesity in cats as well as other mammals. Lab mice, street rats and human infants have ballooned in recent years, which suggests there is more to it than too many carbs, lack of exercise or lack of “willpower.”

I was intrigued, and I did look into the research. Here’s the original article in question: Lab Animals and Pets Face Obesity Epidemic.

It’s not just people that are getting fatter.

A statistical analysis of more than 20,000 animals suggests that the obesity epidemic is spreading to family pets, wild animals living in close proximity to humans, and animals housed in research centers–perhaps indicating that environmental factors beyond diet and exercise are at least partly to blame for expanding waistlines.

It’s true: the statistical analysis shows fatter animals. But I came to an actual conclusion, and it wasn’t the ones my commenter and many scientists apparently came to. I still believe these varied obese mammals all have the same root cause, and it is extremely simple; it is what they eat.

That’s the common denominator in all of the organisms described. As I delved into the article, what was the only thing lab mice, street rats, and human infants have in common, along with our pet cats? We humans, directly or indirectly, feed them.

After all, the subtitle of this article is: Animals in human care are fatter than they were 20 years ago. It’s the “human care” part that is significant; animals in the wild show no such changes. And it goes on to say:

In some cases, the explanation might be obvious: the more than 40 percent jump in body weight in feral rats scavenging on the streets of Baltimore may reflect the increasing richness of their diet as they feed on our more calorie-dense refuse.

Here’s a solid assumption we can actually fact check: Have our food scraps become more calorie-dense? Let’s see.

According to the American Heart Association, as of 2001:

The current average macronutrient composition of the American diet is 12% to 16% of calories from protein, 34% from fat, and 49% from carbohydrate.

I have decided the protein figure must be 17%: this is how the proportions will add up to 100, and it’s the only one they indicated they are not sure of. Also, I have not run across any data on people radically juggling their protein the way they have their fat and carbohydrate consumption since the New Food Pyramid appeared in 1988.

How far back can I find another such data item for comparison? I found data from 1965-66 quoted in a paper devoted to the macronutrient composition of the American diet:

The protein:fat:carbohydrate distribution of energy was found to be 18:44:38%.

Now, we calculate the calorie density using the established ratios: protein and carbohydrate equal 4 calories per gram, while fat equals 9 calories per gram. This accepted fact is one of the tenets of the calorie restriction theory of obesity reduction: reducing fat will reduce the calorie density of the foods we eat, because fat is more than twice the density of either protein or carbohydrate.

That’s easy math, as seen here, expressed in spreadsheet format:

1965: =(.18*4)+(.44*4)+(.38*9) results in a caloric density of 6.5
2001: =(.17*4)+(.34*4)+(.49*9) results in a caloric density of 5.9

And they are right! Our caloric density has gone down. Well, that actually wasn’t the theorem: they figured it was our caloric density going UP. Since that is NOT what is actually happening, what is going on?

Well, first of all, this theorem has support:

Caloric density is inversely correlated with mammalian obesity.

Yes, that’s what the longitudinal studies show: over thirty six years, a decrease of calorie density, expressed in a preference for carbohydrates over fat in the diet, shows an increase in bodily obesity.

Yes, I know that’s the opposite of what we’ve been told. But here we are, working with SCIENCE; a totally different creature than what the popular media works with. So what does SCIENCE tell us to feed our cats?

This web page lays out some often-ignored principles of feline nutrition and explains why cats have a better chance at optimal health if they are fed a canned food diet instead of dry kibble.

That’s a start.

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Cats are actually the opposite of vegetarians. They are obligate carnivores.

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“Obligate carnivores” means they can’t help it. They can’t eat anything else but food from an animal source. They can eat some grass for digestion, and maybe odds and ends like mandarin oranges or marshmallows as treats. (I’ve had cats who liked such things.)

But that’s it.

It’s the taurine. Cats without an organic acid known as taurine develop liver, heart, and vision problems; and will eventually die. Cats can only get taurine (and vitamin A, B12, and arachidonic acid) from animal foods.

It’s the pointy teeth. Cats have teeth which are all pointy; not capable of grinding tough plant material into a form suitable for mammalian digestion. Horses have broad, flat teeth, as do all herbivores. Omnivores, like humans, have both flat teeth for grinding, and pointy teeth for tearing.

It’s the digestive tract. Cats have a short length of intestine, and none of the specialized enzymes or fermenting vats that will break down cellulose in plants and make it available to cells for nutrition.

It’s the enzymes. Cats completely lack the enzymes which allow for conversion of carbohydrates into body energy. The carbohydrates break down into blood sugar, but then can only be ushered into cells to form fat. So when we feed a cat grains or grain byproducts, we are only making them fat.

It’s the eye placement. Cats have their eyes set on the same plane, on the front of their head. This gives them depth perception; this lets them hunt. While deer, rabbits, antelope, and other prey animals have eyes set on the sides of their head; so they can look in more places for the predators who want to eat them.

It might seem strange that an animal rights activist (and I am) would not be a vegetarian or something like it (and I’m not.) But such a mental linkage comes from a connection that is neither accurate or sensible.

An animal lover can conclude it is wrong to eat animals. I admire such conviction; and once upon a time, I tried to embrace it. But it turned out to be bad for my health; I’m an omnivore, and need to eat both animals and plants.

We can’t hold it against cats, or me; it’s the way we are.

So I strive to help all animals be treated humanely; I rescue cats, I’m against factory farming, and I think our society should consider more sustainable forms of agriculture and animal husbandry than the one we are presently pursuing.

For those who wish to delve into this subject further, I can’t recommend a better book than The Vegetarian Myth: Food, Justice, and Sustainability, which is available on Amazon:

And on Kindle:

Idealism is a wonderful thing. It tells us what to strive for. But it’s wrong to use idealism as a hammer on reality, to impose an artificial construct onto actual living beings. It’s the living beings who get hurt, for nothing more than being unable to react the way an Idealist believes they are supposed to.

I see articles on the web claiming that we can feed our cat a vegetarian, or even a vegan, diet. Most admit these diets should supplement with taurine and many other essential nutrients; some even acknowledge that cats are designed, far more than most, to eat only meat. But their idealistic principles are not compatible with letting their pet cats eat in a way that is contrary to the goals they have set for themselves.

So what do I think of their claims that their cats are happily, and healthily, managing on such a diet for many years? I’m sure that some of these cats go outdoors, and a hungry cat outdoors will supplement for themselves. How is that different from adding missing items to a cat’s vegetarian food — to make it more like meat? These are supplements that have to be added because they do not appear in plants.

So it’s a bit hypocritical, isn’t it? An animal source is an animal source.

I understand the drives, be they for humanitarian, political, or health reasons, which lead people to embrace vegetarian or vegan diets. But they freely chose this for themselves. Their cats have not.

So instead of trying to convert a carnivore into a herbivore, such people should explore the joys of bunnies and birds as pets. Science has shown that cats cannot live on a meat free diet.

Pretending otherwise is simply animal cruelty.

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