Can cats get protein poisoning?

Joshua Wheeler

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I'm considering getting an F1 savanna cat and I'm curious if I could feed it (or any cat, really) rabbit most of the time. I'm a rabbit breeder and have lots of rabbit meat available for my future feline friend(s) I intend on feeding them a raw meat diet mostly of rabbit which will include the organ meats for the extra nutrients and the little bit of fat they may have. However I can't seem to find anything online if cats can get protein poisoning aka rabbit poisoning like us humans do. I'd appreciate any info on the subject.
 

LTS3

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Rabbit meat is low in taurine, a necessary amino acid cats need in the diet. If you follow a good raw recipe and include a taurine supplement, there will be no issue with a deficiency. Many people like to rotate different proteins in a raw diet so the cat is exposed to a variety of proteins.

UC Davis Vet School did a study where they fed a group of cats exclusively ground raw whole rabbit with no additional supplements and many of those cats developed deficiencies and health concerns, https://ccah.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/sit...iles/role-of-diet-feline-health-Glasgow_0.pdf
 

mschauer

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I had never heard of protein poisoning but a quick Google search tells me it is caused by eating a very low fat diet. Cases in humans resulted from eating a diet very high in rabbit. The USDA food nutrient database shows wild rabbits are very low in fat but farm raised rabbits have much more fat. That's just the muscle meat and doesn't include the organs which could add more fat.

Sounds pretty risky to feed an exclusively rabbit based diet.
 

goingpostal

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A huge part of a raw diet is variety, you don't want to feed only or mainly one protein. My animals get rabbit in rotation but not solely that. Farmed rabbits are also a completely different story than lean wild rabbits but still a lean meat, you would want to offset that by feeding a fattier meat also.
 
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Joshua Wheeler

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Hey thanks for all the great information folks, I really appreciate it! ;)
 

Willowy

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Raise a few chickens, too, that should do it ;).

I'm fairly sure a bobcat's main diet is rabbits, so I doubt it would be a problem (also because cats will eat the brain, too, which is high in fat, and humans don't, usually). But because our cats are captive and can't just go out and find what they need, it's definitely something to pay attention to.
 
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