Vegans who own carnivores

I'm surprised NOBODY knows this!

It's actually very black and white.

Cats CAN be easily vegan, dogs even more. It's relatively easy and they live up to full health, often better health than the pets that live off rendered meat, that has almost no nutritional value.

There are plenty of vegan pet owners around the world and there is a facebook group about it.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/126322004672/?fref=ts

All it takes is a little care and research. This is a group with 4000 people and lots of pictures of vegan animals.
And before anyone says "they're obligate carnivores, they'll die immediately": there is a LOT of people that had animals on a vegan diet living to their full health span with no complications.

I was surprised by this, didn't expect it could be like this. Most people is informed by this only from stereotypes and very very outdated information. I encourage everyone to do research on this.

It can be done and it's relatively easy.

No, you cannot feed your cat vegan if your idea of vegan cat is giving him/her a random dish of pasta or baked beans of course, there needs to be a little bit of research in the diet. But it can be done. And there are also commercial solutions for who doesn't have time to prepare the food.

No, they won't be sickly.
No, they won't die.
See for yourself, they do it with CATS and with dogs is even easier.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/126322004672/?fref=ts

No need to feel stupid at all! Barking heads changed their ingredients on me and I only realised when looking it up when someone mentioned it on here. Every time I am ordering food from now on I will look it up before I do even it's the same brand I got before.

ganmo wrote: »

I find it very strange that vegans keep pets at all. My understanding of veganism is they don't want to use animals for anything, is keeping pets for companionship not using animals?

I would find it strange and contradictory for a vegan to buy an animal from a breeder but rescue animals are a different matter entirely.

hearts no issue, can be a tough muscle - should be used by human more (mmm roasted)
liver - very nutritious used to be the hunters prize, definitely should be used by humans(fried with rashers
kidney - from organic animals I'd have no issue with. they filter the blood so i have them as a lower quality food item (grilled/in a stew)

I've never eaten stomach so I don't know. I imagine would be tougher to digest but the other 3 are high in nutritional value(esp the liver) so maybe it adds balance

If you are considering feeding a food that is not organic anyway, why not just stick with the one you were feeding already?

I seem to remember reading somewhere that too much organ meat can cause complications. I'm not sure where, maybe it was in relation to raw diets somewhere.

Nody wrote: »

My main problem with Yarrah is that they are high on the cereal content (which simply should not be there) as a cheap filler. Taking Yarrah Organic Pâté for example it's 23% cereals to make it cheaper. Taking Chicken with Nettle & Tomato in sauce you have 37% meat* and animal derivatives* (chicken* 33%), with unspecified cereals* which is going to be in the low 30s most likely.

Simply put while I'm all for organic it should not come at the expense of lowering the quality of the food. Cats are not omnivores, they do not process plant protein in a good way compared to proper meat protein and that amount of filler should not be there imo.

Please look it up cats can survive healthily on a vegan diet. See my previous post. There are owners worldwide, hundreds of them, with healthy cats, it's just nobody knows cause it's seems obvious they are "obligate carnivores"

If the science is there then post some links to it please.

Why would you even get a carnivorous pet if you weren't prepared to feed it meat? I wouldn't get a rabbit and make it eat steak because I don't want to eat vegetables.

stillalive88 wrote: »

Do I really have to reply to this?

Ok fine. You decided it's not true. Go with it. Don't look into it. Just leave it there. You know best. Don't even think to check on it.

When I lived in America, my cats were always seen by the vets at Memorial Cat Hospital, a dedicated cat veterinarian's office with very high-powered, well-qualified, respected vets who were pioneers in scientific research and members of the Winn Feline Foundation. Two of my cats were study participants.

I was a vegan for part of the time that my cats were patients there, and I asked the vets about the possibility of a vegan diet for cats. No, they said, it was impossible to provide a purely vegan diet because it lacked essential nutrients that could only be sourced from meat. Even commercial "vegan" cat foods, in order to be complete in nutrition, had to supplement with these meat-derived substances. Homemade vegan foods also had to be supplemented in this way.

Cats fed primarily plant foods (including cats fed cheap grain-heavy grocery-shelf cat foods) tend in particular to have urinary tract trouble that can be severe and even life-threatening, because plant foods tend to make the urine alkaline in contrast to the acidity of a meat diet. As a human who sometimes suffers from alkaline urine myself, I personally know how painful and dangerous such a condition is. There are, to be sure, plant foods that tend to acidify the urine, but since many of those foods are high in oxalic acid, the possibility of urinary tract obstruction due to that kind of stone is also high. Dr. Armaiti May, in an article on veganhealth.com, says, "For cat guardians who find it too tedious to monitor their cat's urine pH, they should perhaps consider feeding a non-vegetarian cat food or not keeping a cat as a companion".

If the cat is ill and needs to be on a special diet, it is going to be even less likely that the proper diet is going to be a meat-free one. Prescription diets are not meat-free. If the cat requires an overnight stay at the vet, such as might happen with surgery and recovery, it is unlikely the vet will consider a vegan food adequate for the cat's nutritional needs. Kittens and senior cats also have increased nutritional needs that are unlikely to be met by vegan foods.

Cats fed vegan diets for the first time often refuse their food. It takes only two or three days of food refusal, or a little longer of partial food refusal, for a cat to develop a critically serious condition called hepatic lipidosis. In essence, the cat's liver enters a cycle of attempting to maintain blood glucose that causes damage to the cat's body. They turn jaundiced and must often be force-fed because the condition itself makes them feel very unwell. Two years ago I had two cats with this condition at the same time after a neighbor "forgot" to feed them while I was away. It cost a total of five thousand dollars, with five pills twice a day, a feeding tube for one cat, and six-daily force feedings for both cats for a month before they showed sustained improvement (not to mention the time I had to take off work). One cat fought pancreatitis as a complication. They both lived, because we used a mixture of established and experimental treatments, but few cats survive this.

It is possible to be a human vegan by eating chips and drinking Coke. Some people might not suffer any unusual health problems from a diet like that for a very long time, if ever. It might improve health in the rare event a person is allergic to something normally found in healthy diets. Vegan diets for cats are like that. They're very bad for cats in general, no matter what they might do for this cat or that cat in specific.

I'm doing a module on cat nutrition for an ISFM distance learning course at the moment, and this was my response to a question on vegan diets for cats. Anyone who wants the footnotes, feel free to ask.

Unlike dogs and people, cats are obligate meat-eaters; every aspect of their physiology and behaviour reflects this. In fact, cats need 2-3 times more protein than dogs and this need cannot be met by plant protein alone. A quick internet search provides countless, clear, science-based arguments as to why a vegetarian diet is thus inappropriate for cats. Only a few search results will advocate a meat-free diet for cats. These proponents are mostly the manufacturers themselves, who obviously have a vested interest in promoting the idea. Some even make hazy claims that a vegetarian diet “gives the cat more vitality.” More truthfully, these diets are produced to allay the ethical concerns of vegan and vegetarian cat owners, not to promote cat health. Indeed vegetarian diets do not support optimal health and can be very dangerous.

Digestibility: Even if a vegetarian cat food meets the percentage protein requirements with plant sources, it is open to question if these ingredients are as easily digested and absorbed by the cat as the animal protein they are designed to eat. Likewise, vets have been suggested that vegetarian diets for cats are too high in carbohydrates such as potato or rice, that cats have not evolved to process.

Risk of FLUTD: Anecdotal reports suggest that cats fed a vegetarian diet have a higher risk of feline lower urinary tract disease than conventionally-fed cats, due to their abnormally alkanised urine. Urine pH should be checked twice-yearly.


Nutritional deficiencies: Cats get essential nutrients from meat that can't be sufficiently obtained from vegetarian ingredients. These include the amino acids taurine and arginine, and the vitamins A, D and some B vitamins. Deficiencies in these and other nutrients can be severely debilitating, or even fatal. Vegetarian diets compensate for their absence by adding synthetic versions of these and other nutrients. At least one vet has questioned if such formulations are as easily absorbed as “the real thing.” Moreover, a 2004 study of two American commercial vegan diets found that both were nutritionally deficient. The manufacturer's subsequent reassurances that the ten to twenty thousand dogs and cats being fed their vegetarian brand are healthy and long living rings hollow.According to the 2012 US Census Bureau, the pet cat population in the USA is 74 million. Not only that, but these vegetarian diets are a new phenomenon and very few studies have been carried out to test if they can be safely endorsed.

In short, quoting vet Jean Hofve,

“The truth is that science just doesn’t know enough about the cat’s nutritional needs to ensure the long-term safety of vegetarian and vegan diets for cats. While there are many anecdotal tales of cats thriving on vegetarian and vegan foods, it is a path that requires great commitment and a willingness to be flexible on the part of the guardian.”

I can't survive on a vegan diet, I know this because I tried a vegetarian diet for 6 weeks. As it turned out I am allergic to a lot of the meat alternatives.