Is ground beef good for cats?
sen...@webtv.net
I am a disabled person who has made it my business to aid as many lost
cats as I can. In my small apartment I currently have eight cats who
were abandoned by people or were lost. I am fortunate to live near a
supermarket that sells 93% lean hamburger for only a dollar a pound when
its about to be outdated. I have been cooking the hamburger and mixing
it with cat food on a ratio of twenty percent cat food to 80 percent
canned commercial cat food. I have been able to save considerable money
on my expenses doing this, and I feel that the lean red meat is probably
good for the cats health. I am not sure Im doing the right thing
however. Is this a good diet to feed cats? Also I have a cat with
reacurring urinary tract infections. Is this ok for him too?
Mary Schmidt
There are some excellent books that can give you great factual advice ..
receipes .. sources .. everything you would need to "make" the animal
food from scratch .. it has been my experience that when I make the food
all the time, I actually spend less money .. the initial "start up" is a
little more but it's real easy to figure out the cost savings .. Oatmeal
flakes, in bulk cost me $.79 to $.84 a pound .. plus I eat and like
oatmeal .. In my opinion, the ground meat .. meant for human consumption
is probably much better for the cats than the cat food that was, in all
probability, made from ingredients that were labeled "unfit for human
consumption" .. Mary Schmidt
mfg
In article <61qfkv$fvl$1...@newsd-101.bryant.webtv.net>, sen...@webtv.net
says...
>
>I am a disabled person who has made it my business to aid as many lost
>cats as I can. In my small apartment I currently have eight cats who
>were abandoned by people or were lost. I am fortunate to live near a
>supermarket that sells 93% lean hamburger for only a dollar a pound when
>its about to be outdated. I have been cooking the hamburger and mixing
>it with cat food on a ratio of twenty percent cat food to 80 percent
>canned commercial cat food. I have been able to save considerable money
>on my expenses doing this, and I feel that the lean red meat is probably
If you look on the label of the canned cat food, you will probably see an
ingredient called taurine. Cats require higher levels of this than we do.
They also require higher fat content in their diet than we do, preferably no
less than 20% by dry weight. Cooking the hamburger just makes it less
suitable for cats unless you save the grease and mix it in afterwards. I
buy good-quality canned cat food, 3 6-oz cans for 89 cents, sometimes 4 cans
for a buck when on sale. (Safeway's Select brand is excellent, so is
Friskies and Kal-Kan and others.) That is cheaper than your lean hamburger
and better for cats. I mix some dry cat food with it to help keep the teeth
clean. These provide everything a cat needs, including adequate levels of
calcium and other nutrients not found in ground beef in adequate amounts.
I commend you on your humanity. Always remember that cats are cats and
carnivores, we are humans and omnivores. We don't need taurine supplements
as a rule, and we certainly don't need 20% fat by dry weight in our diet.
We ***do*** need vitamin C, of course, but cats do not -- they make their
own. And so on. Pay no attention to those who advocate feeding cats (and
dogs) as though they were children. They aren't, and their needs are
different from those of children. I have much more faith in veterinary
nutritional research than I do in home-spun "holistic" vegan bullshit
applied to the feeding of nonhuman animals. Again, I admire your humanity
in caring for abandoned critters.
Dave
> >
> >I am a disabled person who has made it my business to aid as many lost
> >cats as I can. In my small apartment I currently have eight cats who
> >were abandoned by people or were lost. I am fortunate to live near a
> >supermarket that sells 93% lean hamburger for only a dollar a pound when
> >its about to be outdated. I have been cooking the hamburger and mixing
> >it with cat food on a ratio of twenty percent cat food to 80 percent
> >canned commercial cat food. I have been able to save considerable
you would be better off lightly boiling the meat just enough to kill
bacteria on the surface and feeding it close to raw. raw beef would have
enough taurine to help balance the ratio. when adding the meat, though,
you might want to puree some raw peas in the blender (or canned if more
convenient) to make sure the meals are not too high in protein.
Vick
ooops!
if you have a "beef' with what I wrote, please address replies to me:
_mad...@geocities.com and not my boyfriend!!
k...@fern.com
In article <61qfkv$fvl$1...@newsd-101.bryant.webtv.net>,
sen...@webtv.net wrote:
>
> I am a disabled person who has made it my business to aid as many lost
> cats as I can. In my small apartment I currently have eight cats who
> were abandoned by people or were lost. I am fortunate to live near a
> supermarket that sells 93% lean hamburger for only a dollar a pound when
> its about to be outdated. I have been cooking the hamburger and mixing
> it with cat food on a ratio of twenty percent cat food to 80 percent
> on my expenses doing this, and I feel that the lean red meat is probably
> however. Is this a good diet to feed cats? Also I have a cat with
> reacurring urinary tract infections. Is this ok for him too?
The rec.pets.cats "misc" FAQ at
http://www.zmall.com/pets/cat-faqs/misc.html has good recipes for
homemade cat foods, including one for cats prone to struvites, the most
common cause of recurring UTIs. I've tested all the recipes on my crew,
and they were fairly well accepted -- the "kidney patioent" reduced
protein version was the only one they really weren't wild about.
These recipes are well balanced, and based on ground beef, ground liver,
and rice.
Cats need much more fat in their diets than people do... it's the primary
source of energy for them (they really don't use carbohydrates well).
Cats that actually have kidney damage need a reduced protein, much higher
fat diet than ordinary cats. Cats without kidney damage who hae
struvites typically benefit from a diet much lower in plant products and
higher in meat products... the meat makes the urine acid, which dissolves
the struvites and also makes it harder for bacteria to grow in the
bladder.
If I had to pick a wise way of allocating money for cat food, I would
choose either a complete homemade diet, such as the recipes in the FAQ,
or a good quality dry food like IAMS or another "premium dry" with very
low ash content and high meat content. It looks more expensive than
grocery store cat foods, but the cats eat less (and there's less in the
litter pan), so it winds up costing less than the grocery store foods;
much less when you count the lowered frequency of vet bills compared to a
cat prone to bladder stones eating ordinary cat food. Canned cat food is
a nice treat now and then, but you're paying a lot for the can and the
water in the food.
Kay Lancaster k...@fern.com
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M. Warshaw
The rec.pets.cats "misc" FAQ at
living with a cat for people who are allergic to them.