How Much Per Month Does Feeding Raw Cost You?

[_spadekitty]

Hello all!

My cat currently just eats wet food with a little kibble here and there as snacks.

I would like to switch him to raw (I'm not sure if he'll like it, but might as well try and see) but I'm not sure if I could afford it with my current budget. I hear a lot of people saying raw is actually not that expensive, so maybe it could even save me some cash.

Right now, I spend about $40-50 a month on cat food. He eats brands like wellness, taste of the wild, and natural balance. He has a poultry sensitivity/allergy that rules out a lot of canned foods for him, so that also has me interested in raw. Almost every common pet store brand has poultry in it, and if not poultry, fish. I'm worried about his mercury levels because of that.

I'm pretty busy with school and work, so I'd love a pre-made option if possible within that budget, but I'm not against getting the meat and adding all the needed vitamins/minerals myself.

He's an 8 lb cat that eats about 250 calories per day, give or take.

Any help is appreciated

 

[sarah430]

Depending on what's available to you locally I think you could feed your kitty commercial raw on that budget. Small Batch sells 3 lbs bags of frozen raw sliders (48 per bag) for ~ $15 in my area. (That's for chicken - other proteins are higher, I think.) Based on the calorie content per slider - average ~50 cals depending on protein - you'd probably go through about 3 bags per month. Vital Essential frozen raw might be even cheaper.

Of course making your own would be the cheapest - something I plan to do someday.

 

[maureen brad]

I think I spend between $120-$150 a month for 3 cats. I usually order from www.hare-today.com. Sometimes when I grind my own and mix my own supplements I spend less. I absolutely believe you could save money buy feeding a raw diet.As far as commercial raw there are many good options, I think RadCat and Northwest Naturals are the best, with NN being less expensive for more food.Keep in mind raw fed cats typically eat less than canned/kibble fed cats. This is because raw is pure food, a kibble etc,usually has so much filler that cats need to eat more of it to get what they need.Keep doing your research and start slow at whatever comfort level you are at. I started by using Primal chubs and adding Alnutrin , I progressed to adding freeze-dried and then ordering from Hare-today ( second easiest method after commercial complete diets) now I make recipes of Chicken/Cornish hen in a grinder ( Tasin 108 from www.onestopjerkyshop.com $150)You should check the following sites www.catinfo.org and www.feline-nutrition.org. They have recipes that are used by many, many raw feeders. You will find tons of info on these sites. Good luck to you. I think you will feel good about the change. It really is not difficult once you do the research. I wanted to add that you could always use boneless meat with EZ Complete from foodfurlife.com, I do that sometimes and the cats love it.

 

[Ardina]

I work a pretty busy schedule, so I choose to pay more for convenience by getting pre-ground raw meat from Hare Today. Between two cats (a growing, voracious kitten and a 12-lb fairly active cat), it costs me $90/month and 4 hours of actual work mixing in supplements and portioning to make a month's supply of food. And I can still get a fairly good variety of proteins - chicken, rabbit, turkey, and occasionally duck and cavies.

With homemade raw, the easiest way to cut costs is to mix your own supplements. I used Alnutrin for my very first batch, but that can add $0.50-$1.00 per pound of food. It's much cheaper to buy the individual supplements in the long run. And it takes me an extra two minutes to mix my own rather than use a premade supplement powder.

 

[abby2932]

My 2 cats (10lb & 8lb) eat approximately 9 pounds of balanced raw a month. I order from Hare Today as well and save money by making my own supplement premix instead of using a commercial premix.

I spend on average $90 per month, including shipping. I order 3 months of food at a time. This was the same cost (for me) as when they were on quality canned. Better food for the same cost.... win.

The proteins that I rotate between are rabbit, turkey, pork, llama & goat. The monthly cost could be cheaper if one sticks with less expensive proteins like chicken, turkey, pork & beef. But (of course) my cats vomit beef and have serious allergic reactions to chicken.

 

[maureen brad]

Abby, is the 9 lbs of food you mention per cat? I just wondered because my 3 cats eat almost 10 lbs of food each per month. Each of them weighs 10 lbs. They are super active though.

 

[orange&white]

9 pounds of food per each cat every month sounds about right.

My two cats combined are eating 3.5-4 pounds of food per week, but my overweight senior would eat 50% more food than the 4 oz per day I give him if I let him. (He's on a restricted diet.)

My 8.75 pound kitten is averaging 4 ounces a day (and I give her all the food she wants), approximately 200 calories.

If you're budgeting for your cat to eat 250 calories per day, figure on 5 - 6 ounces of raw food per day. That should more than cover your needs for planning purposes. Your cat probably will eat fewer calories of raw food per day to meet his nutritional needs.

 

[Purr-fect]

Greg and Arnold (currently 17 and 22 lbs), cost us about 8 dollars a day for food. That is high quality grain free wet food, grain free kibble and expensive (supposedly healthy) treats.

But im in toronto and cat food here is more expensive than in some other countries, especially the States.

 

[valentine319]

My cat has allergies. We use hare today whole carcass rabbit. Until i find a second protein we're at $75 a month. She was on natures instinct lid rabbit canned. That was running over $130 a month. She is 11.6 lbs and eats 6 ounces a day.

 

[lalagimp]

Rabbit and turkey run us around $115 a month. I think this last month I made about 25 lbs of food (after water) for my two boys weighing 12 & 13lbs. If I used only chicken I think I can do about $60 a month to grind it myself, which would be excellent for the girls. They eat canned w kibble. Homemade raw is so much cheaper than quality canned.
I get skinned whole ground rabbit from Hare Today and turkey thighs from the grocery store.

 

[EmersonandEvie]

I feed both of mine from Hare-Today for under $1.50/cat/day (I use a variety of proteins, so I can't speak for a single type), which is much cheaper than the canned varieties that run $2+ per can. Feeding raw, especially if you pay for, say, 45lbs up front, seems crazy expensive, but when you break down all the math it comes out significantly cheaper and better for them.

Also as far as making it...I struggled a bit the first few times time-wise, but I literally found a rhythm in making my food. I buy the 5lb chubs and defrost them one at a time so about once a week I'm making 5 lbs of food, which literally takes 30 minutes if not less.

 

[sebeegram]

My little dude is around 13-14lbs and eats between 3-4oz/day. He's only active around mealtime and inactive most of the day. Every feeding calculator tells me he should be eating 6oz/day but he's never eaten that much in his life and his vet says his weight is fine for his size. He eats 5-6 small meals a day instead of two meals; I could never get him on a two meal schedule. And I spend on average $30/month. I spend as low as $15 some months and as high as $50 other months, but I usually try to stay around $30.

I rotate Smallbatch 2lb (frozen raw) chubs with Alnutrin supplements added to it(my guy hated the Smallbatch sliders), Primal freeze-dried nuggets, and Rad Cat (frozen raw). Based on the amount I think I'm feeding him every day, he should be eating 5-6lbs a month but I'm only buying 3-4lbs of food a month. So he might actually be eating less. He LOVES pork, but he also gets beef, duck, rabbit, lamb, and venison for variety. He's finicky about turkey and developed an allergy to chicken. But when he was eating chicken, I was getting pre-ground raw with all the meat, organs, and bones in it for $3.99/lb and I just needed to add supplements to it.

 

[abby2932]

Abby, is the 9 lbs of food you mention per cat? I just wondered because my 3 cats eat almost 10 lbs of food each per month. Each of them weighs 10 lbs. They are super active though.

No, actually they eat 9 pounds total between the two of them. Malibu (10-10.5lb) eats 5lbs a month and Kali (8-8.5lb) eats 4lbs a month. I used to feed them both 5lbs but when I went in for their annual in March, my vet said that Kali was a little too pudgy and should not weigh 9lbs so I cut hers to 4lbs a month and she's a healthy 8-8.5lbs, depending on the protein that I feed that month. I do weigh them both once a week on a baby scale.

In addition to the 9lbs of meat/bone/organ that they eat per month, I also include the following in their ground food:
- 2 cups of bone broth (lamb, turkey or pork)
- 1 cup of raw kefir (sheep or cow) or raw goat milk [healthy source of probiotics]
- 8 egg yolks

So those things add some nutrition and extra calories to the batch of food as well. If I fed my cats 6oz of food a day, they would be obese.

 

[maureen brad]

Hmm, I also add bone broth and egg yolks. My cats are young (1,3 & 5) and very , very active so that may account for their 6 oz each, a day.Well, not every single day but, that is an average so there are months that they eat less than 10 lbs each.They are not in the least overweight so I won't worry.

 

[orange&white]

I calculate only the meat, bone, organ weight before adding gelatin/water/egg yolks. Makes a big difference (obviously)...water or broth or kefir weighs a lot. Still my cats are each eating about 7 pounds of "just meat" per month.

 

[maureen brad]

I calculate only the meat, organ before adding eggs. I do not use bone broth all the time. I usually on use broth to hydrate freeze dried food.I make 30 lbs a month , I know some is still in the freezer when I make a new batch but, wow, I am surprised my cats are eating so much more than other cats.Overall, 18 oz(total between 3 cats) a day so, that is actually a total of 24 lbs a month give or take.That is a lot more than 7-9 lbs a month.Yikes- had to come back and edit. I just realized I had not been including the little feral cat I feed every day. She gets raw and kibble, so that accounts for some of it.

 

[Ardina]

I go through 20 lbs of meat a month for my two cats. Admittedly, one of them is a skinny 5 month old kitten who eats so much that I have no idea where all that food disappears. My 2-year-old cat eats a lot too though, at least 9 lbs a month. I started a thread at some point worrying about her gaining weight, but I've been feeding her as much as she wants for the last couple of months and her weight has stabilized nicely (and she has a nice waist tuck!).

 

[orange&white]

Tangent, my senior, is on a diet at 4 ounces/day. He would happily eat 6-8. My kitten is almost 11 months and only 8.5 pounds. She's slowed down to eating 3.5-4 ounces a day, as much food as she wants to eat.

 

[riley1]

About $120 for one cat. I am too lazy to make food and this makes the cost go up. She gets 3 oz of Rad Cat and 1 oz Primal per day. The Rad Cat is $15 for 24 oz container.