Found this one online while browsing for what cats shouldn't eat. However I feel like this area is quite controversial and opinionated. Also feels like half the websites are written by AI and riddled with ads. So if anyone has a good source as to what cats should avoid then let me know.
Anyways, I found this nice illustration, but wanted to hear with you peeps whether you have any experience regarding these food items.
Also what's your take on milk/sour milk for cats? My previous cat loved it so much, and she aged until she was 17 years old, and never seemed to have a problem with it. Also asked the vet at the time and she said it was OK. However every other website I visit tell to never give milk(dairy) to cats. So which is it? Does it just depend on the cat?
That list gets a few details right but is also full of nonsense. Grain is not appropriate food for cats. Fruit and anything else that contains sugar is also not appropriate. High quality cat food with at least 90 percent meat and no grain, no sugar is best. I sometimes serve fresh meat and fish too, like chicken hearts or cod. Just make sure there are no bones or bone fragments in the meat or fish and also that it has been frozen to make sure there is no risk of any infection.
Edit: removed a few details which I am not sure about
I'm not sure the sugar argument holds, plenty of animals naturally eat foods with sugar, and do not brush their teeth. Of course they don't eat nearly as much sugar as a typical human, but that doesn't mean that sugar should always be avoided.
For cats specifically though I am not sure, maybe all sugar is bad, but I don't think it's because of teeth brushing.
It's worth noting that cats are unlikely to be able to perceive sweet tastes. So while sugar is not toxic to cats, there's not really any benefit to letting them have it, even as a treat.
On a related note, there's a hypothesis that the mutation that caused them to lose the ability to taste sweet things in cat ancestors is what led to them becoming obligate carnivores, which is kind of interesting.
Then why the hell did one of my cats LOVE cantaloupe?
Heh, I knew a cat that would go through a pan of unseasoned cauliflower if you weren't careful. Maybe every cat is born knowing something they have no clear way of understanding, like how tasteless things are food or how to move in four dimensions or what electronics are.
More seriously, the article I linked to suggests cats can taste things we can't, so that's a possibility.
It could also be she was just a different sort of cat. She had 7 toe beans per foot and was a blue eyed tortois shell. So her liking cantaloupe was probably the least weird thing about her
I heard and read several times now that cats can not taste sweetness and that sugar is bad for cats. At the same time most low to medium priced cat foods have added sugar. I find it confusing and wonder why manufacturers do that.
It's filler. They can't taste it, and it's nutritionally void for them, but it's still calories, and sugar is cheap.
Edit:spelling
I'd bet it's because sugar is still calories even if you can't taste it. So, filler
Because manufacturers only care about making something that's just not poisonous enough to kill your pets.
Hell some of them don't even care about that when it comes to flea meds
Good point, fixed my comment.
I don't think the picture is about proper cat nutrition. I think it's about giving the cat a treat/letting it taste something you're eating. You're right that you should definitely feed your cat meat or proper meat-based cat food.
Never never never never lol at least for me. Maybe I'm a scumbag pet parent, but I've never let any cat eat what I eat and thankfully ive never had to deal with begging for anything I'm eating. :P
Lucky. Yesterday my cat stole a slice of my toast and ran off. I got most of it back but she growled at me :(
I had a cat that had irritable bowel disease and was very limited in what he could eat, and he didn't like his prescription food. He was very aggressive about getting our food. We had to be extremely careful around him, and forget eating a pizza while sitting on the couch. We had to lock him up when we had guests, because they would never believe how fast he was and would snag food from the table when no one was looking.
He's been gone 10 years now, unfortunately. But one of the cats we have now stole some sausage and cheese the other night while we were prepping dinner. He usually doesn't do that, so our guard wasn't up.
Thank you for sharing your stories about your food thief. Our theif has serious food insecurity from her previous home, and only weighs about 5 lbs, so it's extra funny to catch her dragging a slice of pizza the same size as her.
I'll try to appreciate her thieving ways, since I'll definitely miss them when she's gone.
Yeah, sure, that's a good strategy I'd say. But there are other possibilities. Some people find it nice to share a little bit of food with their pets from time to time. And this guide can help them not to poison the pet.