Your expericences, good or bad with your cat on a vegetarian/vegan diet?

I am thinking about switching my cat %26amp; dog to a vegan diet. Please let me know your experiences with this, if you have done the same. This is not an invite to bash me for my freedom of choice.Your expericences, good or bad with your cat on a vegetarian/vegan diet?
I'm sorry, you can take this however you want but your cat IS A CARNIVOR! therefore it NEEDS MEAT! if you do not want to provide a quality food for your cat that has MEAT then please give her to someone who will, your cat will DIEYour expericences, good or bad with your cat on a vegetarian/vegan diet?
We are not giving you opinions, we are giving you a fact - Nature made cats to be obligate carnivores. You as a human have a choice in whether or not to eat meat. Your cat does not. With you it is a moral issue, with cats it is one of survival. It isn't a cruel act when the lion brings down a deer and eats it. It is a fact of life, part of nature. The lion isn't being immoral when he eats the deer - he is doing what he was born to do. Humans can live quite well on a vegan/vegetarian diet - they are omnivores, not obligate carnivores. I have several friends who are vegetarians, yet their cats eat a premium organic food filled with the meat they need.



Fact - cats need meat to survive. If you choose to ignore that, your cat will eventually start to suffer from malnutrition. And that is animal cruelty. We can't change the laws of nature, no matter how much we'd like to.
If you are vegetarian because you don't like the way animals are treated (like me), then you should just buy high quality brands that treat the animals well and humanely slaughter them. If your pets don't have an allergy to meat, there is no reason to switch them to a vegetarian or vegan diet. It's not natural and can end in disaster. I feed holistic brands to my cats because I know where the meat is coming from, and I mostly feed them fish that is wild caught. Hope that helps.Your expericences, good or bad with your cat on a vegetarian/vegan diet?
Cats are obligate carnavores and cannot survive on a vegatarian diet as they have to have certain nutriants that can only come from meat to survive.



Dogs on the otherhand can survive (but not generally thrive as they do on a balanced diet that contains meat protine and vegtables) on a vegetarian diet if necessary. There are specially formuated vegetarian diets designed for dogs that are allergic or sensative to meat protiens. If you must have your dog eat a vegatarian diet please use on of these to insure proper nutrition.
Without the experience you can still know what the facts are and as has been said, a cat is an obligate carnivore and needs a meat diet to survive. I understand your moral dilemna but we have no right to cause the death of an anmal because of that belief. I think that is why many vegans will not have pets



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_food



Not only do they need the meat

it took the vet community over 20 years to find out that the cats need the bone too otherwise they died of congestive heart failuresYour expericences, good or bad with your cat on a vegetarian/vegan diet?
I had a foster cat with a meat allergy (poor little guy) and had to feed him a vegan diet. My cat and my other foster completely ignored the vegan diet in favor of the regular cat food.



This is what I noticed...He wasn't defecating as much as the other cats, and not in a good way. Often he'd cry when he was using the litter box. He was slower and slept even more than the other cats did. (he was the youngest too) His coat condition was shot.



Whether or not this was due to his diet or to other problems, I couldn't really tell you. But I do know that cats are obligate carnivores and their system is set up for eating meat. That he was allergic didn't change the way his body processed foods.



I will never feed a cat vegan diet again, but if you choose to do it for your cats, I'd like to recommend doing it under the guidance of a vet with a background in nutrition (not all vets are nutritionists) and put a lot of research into it.
People can handle vegetarian/vegan diets but cats cannot. Because cats are naturally carnivores, not omnivores. So it would not be very healthy to do this. I am a vegan but I feed my cats meat because they cannot handle a vegan/vegetarian diet, it would hurt their health and I want them to be healthy.



You can look up cat foods that are "cruelty free" though, I know there is a list of them online somewhere.
A cat will not do well on a vegan diet. They are obligate carnivores and require meat as their diet. This isn't a matter of choice for a cat.

Dogs are carnvores as well and will do better on a meat diet. People can do well on a vegan diet but unforturnately this is not the for dogs and especially cats
BAD IDEA!! Both Cats and Dogs are natural born hunters and need meat in thier diet. Although in some cases the animal seems to be fine it won't be getting the propper amount of nuitrients it needs to fully function. This could result in hair loss, being more prone to infections or colds, or multitudes of other problems.
Yeah I agree, bad idea. I'm a vegan and I still give my pets non-vegan foods. Some health food stores sell organic, cruelty-free pet foods though (a little spendier, but very good for them, and they seem to really like it). Try Wild Oats, Whole Foods etc.
IT IS BAD, IT CAUSES A NUTRITIONAL DEFICIENCY. THEY NEED MEAT IN THEIR DIET, OR ELSE THEY WILL DIE. THEY NEED OMEGA THREE, CALCIUM, RED BLOOD CELLS, AND ALOT OF OTHER VITAMINS AND MINERALS. IF YOU ARE A VEGAN, TRY NOT TO FEED YOUR PETS VEGAN, IT COULD KILL THEM!!
might be your freedom of choice, but if you put down a bowl of meat and a bowl of veggies, they will eat the meat and ignore the veggies.