Can I steam my cat's raw food? Will it still have nutrients?

Hi Jamie, There are a lot of people who advocate for a raw food diet, but you are right that there are a lot of risk factors. There is not a medical benefit to feeding raw food over cooked food. I think a balanced homemade (cooked) or canned food diet are the safest for cats. Making a homemade diet and keeping it balanced can be quite a bit of work, so I currently feed my cats canned. I have attached a link below that may be useful for you. It has a lot of great information about cat food. http://catinfo.org I hope that was helpful. Thanks for using PetCoach.

I don’t recommend raw food diets as they can be very difficult to formulate, balance and also to safely provide without risk of gastrointestinal infection from contaminated meat. I would suggest a home prepared diet if you are interested in avoiding mainstream packaged food brands. Here is a link explain what a Home prepares siet it. There is also a source which will help you formulate a home prepared diet. https://www.petcoach.co/article/how-to-create-a-balanced-homemade-diet-for-your-pet/ For any diet change, we recommend slowly switching over to the new food by adding increasing amounts of the new food to the old food during meal times over a week. Hope this was helpful and thank you for using PetCoach!

Thank you for submitting your question regarding Lily. Raw diets are very trendy and unfortunately, there is a lot of inaccurate information available on them. First of all, there is no scientific research proving any health benefits to them. The reports you will read are anecdotal evidence. There is substantial research though showing the risks. The diets are frequently improperly balanced leading to nutritional deficiencies over time. As you mentioned, the risk of Salmonella poisoning and other pathogens is very real for both you and Lily. If you are interested in preparing her food at home though, this can be done. I use www.balanceit.com as the website is staffed by veterinary nutritionists. They will formulate a specific diet for and her individual nutritional needs. Then you can use the recipe to prepare the (cooked) food at home. I hope this information helps! Here is the AVMA (the governing body for veterinarians) position statement on raw foods: https://www.avma.org/KB/Policies/Pages/Raw-or-Undercooked-Animal-Source-Protein-in-Cat-and-Dog-Diets.aspx

Dry food labels give the amount of nutrients that are contained in the finished product. Period. Be aware that pet food marketing is a serious business. And unfortunately, buzzwords and trend diets are generally used to sway your views towards whatever product is attempting to be sold to you, and these buzzwords don't have your pet's best interest at heart. I would encourage you to explore some sites published by those who have dedicated their careers to advancing veterinary nutrition. This is a great article about raw food: http://vetnutrition.tufts.edu/2016/01/raw-diets-a-healthy-choice-or-a-raw-deal/ Scroll down to the 2nd 1/2 of the page for some common questions regarding pet foods. http://www.acvn.org/frequently-asked-questions/#choose This one is a bit long, but has some really good information: http://dels.nas.edu/resources/static-assets/banr/miscellaneous/dog_nutrition_final_fix.pdf Thank you for asking PetCoach!

I personally support raw feeding diet but for most owners it will usually not work out. there are some good points in your posts, dehydration resulting from dry food can become a problem especially with cats (in theory, it has not been proven), many commercial foods contain many by products indeed and i personally believe those are very unhealthy. in my mind, if you afford and are willing to feed your cat a raw diet- then you should definitely go for it.

This should not make a difference. Please check with your veterinarian if in view of the renal disease, it is advisable to change to a raw diet, as this means a lot of protein is being fed which can negatively influence your cat's kidneys, It would be ok in a healthy cat, but a cat with renal disease may not be the right candidate . lso, please do not , under any circumstances, feed beef neck parts or poultry necks, as they contain thyroid glands and your cat would be eating thyroid hormones which would make his hyperthyroidism much worse.

If you are not giving a vitamin and mineral supplement, I would recommend going to www. balanceit.com to formulate an adequate diet and to purchase a supplement of vitamins and minerals. I hope this helps guide you in the right direction. Please let me know if you have any other questions or concerns.