Trying to convert Kyle & Kegan

[dan32]

Kyle and Keegie are two 4yo brothers who eat like horses, love canned food and flirt around with licking things like bloody chicken packages and raw eggs, so I thought it would be a snap to get them to eat raw.  Well wrong.

I have tried putting out sample pieces of Primal beef and vension before (my friend's cats eat these flavors) and Kyle ate a few chunks.  Last night, I tried serving NV rabbit and they gave me a look like what could this possibly be?  It sat there forever untouched.

Later that night, I tried NV chicken with some canned chicken flavor cf on top then mushed together - ate it pretty well, but left some which they never do.

I stopped and got some canned NV rabbit today thinking maybe I will introduce them to the taste (I have never served rabbit ever) in a more familiar format, then add the raw NV rabbit to it in successive feedings.  We'll see how that goes.

As an experiment, I cut up some strips of chicken thighs and baked them with a tiny bit of butter.  Surely, they would love this.  Not so much at all.  I see the juice got licked up, but that was all.  I'm disappointed this is so much work.  The chicken strips were delicious by the way...

 

[mrsgreenjeens]

None of my cats ever ate any rabbit, and they've been on raw now for 1 1/2 years.  I have tried a couple of different commercial raws, then tried farm raised and they still wouldn't go for it. 

With your two, since they aren't taking to it as easily as you hoped, why don't you try just adding a tiny bit of the primal and mixing it into their beloved canned food?  Just 1/2 of a teas or so.  Then if they eat that, next meal up the amount to a full teas and so on?  That's the way many people get them to accept raw.  Once they accept the first "flavor", then you can start on another flavor the same way, either mixing it with the last raw flavor, or mixing it with canned again. 

Or you can just try putting some raw in their bowl next to the canned food and see what happens.  Sometimes they will eat it since it's there, and sometimes they won't.  If they won't, they try the "mix it in" trick. 

 

[maple syrup]

I found the 'Oops factor' worked with mine... especially for trying a new meat.  Just the next time you are cooking for yourself and your cats are watching/begging.  Cut a piece of the raw off and say  'Oops' and throw it over your shoulder onto the floor.  This is usually lure enough that they are getting something that you eat for them to try/gobble depending on the state of their hungriness!  LOL

 

[ldg]

:nod: Which proteins cats like differ for each cat. And as each commercial raw has different stuff in it, they may like one brand of protein, but not another.

If you have one they've eaten before, I'd do the small amount next to or mixed into food you know they'll eat.

The thing with raw is that it isn't as strong smelling as their canned (or kibble) is/was, and they don't necessarily recognize it as food. I know that "You want me to eat THIS?" look well - I think many feeding raw now do. :lol3:

The main thing (as I learned the hard way) is just to not stress yourself or your cats over this. If they don't like it at first, persistence pays off. Carolina and mrsgreenjeens converted kibble addicts just by putting down a little bit of raw with each meal. Carolina put out little blobs of meat covered in a powdered treat her kitty LOVED - and it took her over a month to even just lick the stuff she loved off the top. But once THAT hurdle was crossed, she licked more and more, and then it was only like a week before she didn't want her kibble any longer.

So don't feel like you have to force it or rush it, and just keep offering it to them.

OH - for us, at the beginning, the temperature of the raw food made a big difference. It had to be slightly warmer than room temp. Now they'll eat it practically frozen, but at first they needed it body temperature warm.

 

[dan32]

Thanks all.  I stopped and got a Primal sample pack today and there are raw duplications to canned flavors they eat, so I will stick with matching canned to raw flavors that they are familar with.  I tried turkey today, tiny cubes underneath the canned and they ate some of it.  Usually they would lick the bowl clean, but they mostly left the raw.  I will persevere with this approach.

Now who would think that if there were ever a nuclear war or something and the kibble and cat food factories closed down, that our kitties would starve to death?  So conditioned to manufactured food that they no longer recognize the real thing.  What a scary thought.

 

[mrsgreenjeens]

Yes, well I think that's why so many of us have transitioned to raw, because there have been so many recalls, which basically HAVE closed the manufacturing plants, at least temporarily.  But I get what you mean...what don't cats recognize what they are supposed to be eating

.

But don't' worry, they'll get it sooner or later.  I thought mine  would NEVER get there, let alone eat Frankenprey, and now my Darko looks at me like I'm crazy if I give him the ground up stuff.  As a matter of fact, tonight I was so tired I accidentally set Tinky's bowl (he still eats ground stuff)  in front of Darko, and Vice Versa, and they both looked at me like "what the %$&@?" and just sat there meowing at me.  I looked at them and said "what?"  Then I realized what I done

Are you putting the entire Primal nugget in their bowls with their canned, or just a small portion?  I would start with just a teeny bit, since they aren't really going for it yet. 

 

[aprilprey]

Try try and try again.  One website put it this way: if you keep offering a new food every day - eventually it won't be new.  I also agree with the others - add it to the canned food they already like.  Be very precise: weigh everything so you know you are at 75/25 canned/raw; once they like that, leave it be for a while to be sure, then go to 50/50 canned/raw, see how that goes, then 25/75 canned/raw.

Also - I did not try this but others might have: if you feed them 2x a day, what would happen if you skipped a feeding - like the pm feed (or cut it down) and see if the extra hunger the next day makes them more willing?  Maybe they will be so happy that the feeding schedule has resumed, they won't even notice the raw mixed in with the canned?

If a cat were to have a fasting blood test the next day, or surgery (spay/neuter) - its typical to skip a feeding the night before, correct?  Are not predators designed to gorge/fast at times - sometimes hunting is good, other times, not so much.   If they are healthy - have access to fresh water, ect...

Just a thought for very stubborn cats.  But you are in early days yet.

 ETA: I was talking to a friend today about her dear, deceased cat Foogie.  She and her husband also had large snakes, so they had live mice to feed the snakes in the house all the time. One day, they decided to give Foogie a tiny, LIVE mouse.  HE WAS SCARED OF IT!  Full grown cat afraid of the prey its supposed to be chasing.  HA - talk about being resistant to raw food.  Your cats sound like a breeze compared to Foogie - they will come around I know it!

 

[dan32]

I find it hard to believe that the smell of raw turkey or chicken is so different from canned turkey or chicken, yet they seem to be turned off by the smell when the raw is there.  I will keep offering them up small amounts.  Do you think I should put small (I mean tiny) cubes of raw under the canned - or - offer the raw to the side of the canned in the same dish?

As I said, I had the same reaction from fresh chicken just cut from a thigh and presented - like it was something foreign.  Yet they have eaten cooked turkey or chicken from my plate before and liked it.  What can be so different about the smell to them?

I keep thinking Kyle will lead us into the new way - he is at least willing to try it.  Keegie gives me this pitiful look like "why are you doing this to me?" 

I saw my friends again yesterday who feed raw to their guys and they said they just went for it right off.

 

[aprilprey]

I find it hard to believe that the smell of raw turkey or chicken is so different from canned turkey or chicken, yet they seem to be turned off by the smell when the raw is there.  I will keep offering them up small amounts.  Do you think I should put small (I mean tiny) cubes of raw under the canned - or - offer the raw to the side of the canned in the same dish?

As I said, I had the same reaction from fresh chicken just cut from a thigh and presented - like it was something foreign.  Yet they have eaten cooked turkey or chicken from my plate before and liked it.  What can be so different about the smell to them?

I keep thinking Kyle will lead us into the new way - he is at least willing to try it.  Keegie gives me this pitiful look like "why are you doing this to me?" 

I saw my friends again yesterday who feed raw to their guys and they said they just went for it right off.

Texture counts!  If I were in your shoes, I would mince the meat so as to mix it into the canned so that YOU could not even see it.  I too had a very stubborn cat - she would only eat a certain texture of canned pate.  The raw had to match the pate texture of her canned food - when both foods are of the same texture, hard to separate it out.  You have to make its so if the want to get canned into their bellies, they are forced to eat the raw. Cooked meat has a different texture - that's my guess as to why the won't eat it.  Go figure - see my posting about the cat afraid of a live mouse!  That's how far away from primal our modern environment can push our cats to.

Treat your cats as individual cases - don't stress yourself out by comparing them to your friend's cats.  Read more "case studies" of how long it can take which will give you a broader set a data in which to assess your cat's progress - your experience is typical.  It is your friend's cats that are the outliers.    

 

[ldg]

I find it hard to believe that the smell of raw turkey or chicken is so different from canned turkey or chicken, yet they seem to be turned off by the smell when the raw is there. 

To me the smell of raw chicken is quite different than the smell of cooked chicken - especially if I've seasoned it at all. And canned proteins have stuff added to them (to make them more palatable). The fat ratio is often higher in the canned foods, and most cats love fat, so that may be a factor as well.

Do they have any favorite treats? Do you still have some of the kibble you were feeding them there? I'd either try mushing the raw INTO the canned food, or putting a very small blob on the side next to their canned food, and coat the little dime-sized blob of raw with crushed treats or kibble. And just keep putting it out at every canned meal.

I also like the "oops" factor. :lol3: Maybe try it with just some of the chicken skin next time, instead of breast meat. :dk:

 

[dan32]

I hate to say that with my third (sick) cat Kinney still a kibble addict and needing to put weight on desperately, we have not eliminated the kibble bowl.  Yet, the brothers have always eagerly looked forward to their two canned meals a day and usually lick the plate clean, so I thought I might be able to mutate them onto raw in place of their canned meals without starving them into it.  My friends' cats eat a mix of raw with some kibble, so it has not been an either/or situation for them.

I will keep it going, tonight trying beef with salmon - Primal with Friskies.  I only took out a half a cube of raw (pretty dinky), so should be no pressure.  Kyle ate the undisguised Primal beef the other night, so I am hoping he will lead the way.

I usually rotate them between four flavors, so am going to stick with that except add raw amounts into it.  I'm not stressing - these two are big eaters.  I just find it fascinating that they can smell the small amounts of raw in the dish underneath the canned and get turned off by it.  It seems even the canned that has touched the raw becomes tainted to their noses - they get so far into the layering and quit.  "Oh, oh - this is terrible!!"

Kinney-Kins could tell there was one microscopic cube of raw in his dish today (off to the side) and voided the whole thing.  Now that is a sense of smell!

I am finding this funny...  and god knows I could use some humor

 

[vball91]

You should read some of the other transition threads for more hilarity. The reactions of some kitties to raw food have been comical. Oh, the things we do for our eccentric furry companions.

 

[ldg]

:lol3: Lauren (Feralvr) has a kitty, Perla, that was exactly the same way. I remember once she took a bite of canned food Lauren fed her and realized there was raw in it and spit it out onto the wall and ran away. :lol3: I was fortunate in that mine apparently loved the pork fat in the NV rabbit. NV had a problem sourcing rabbit, and it wasn't available for a while. I freaked, and bought some other frozen raw rabbit. It was just rabbit. My cats looked at me like I was trying to poison them.

They're so funny.

 

[dan32]

The beef with salmon wasn't too much of a disaster, althought they did leave a small amount from their evening and morning meals.  It seems as if I refrigerate the mixed raw/canned bowl and re-present it a half an hour later, they go for it a second time.  Oddly, the remaining remnants look to be canned bits and not raw - maybe contaminated somehow by touching the raw (hehe).

I wonder about experimenting on mixing the canned and raw together the night before and letting the two meld in the fridge..  Sort of like making potato salad in advance so all the flavors get to know each other.

I rotated in their first taste of rabbit (canned from Nature's Variety - very expensive) and it was a bowl licking hit.  We will see what happens tomorrow morning when I add in a few pieces of the raw NV rabbit.  The canned and raw will both be from the same mfr. so one would think be similar tasting...

But those noses can tell my trickery!!

 

[ldg]

I can speak from experience. Canned NV rabbit and raw NV rabbit are nothing alike. But the idea of thoroughly mixing it and refrigerating together is a good one. It really helps to have a "base food" of something they really like.

 

[dan32]

Hmm.  They loved the canned rabbit, but put a few pellets of raw NV rabbit underneath and they ate down so far, then quit.  Kyle picked at it all day, so it was mostly gone by dinner time.  He is my best chance at a convert, but nothing robust at all.

Tonight was back to turkey again - same thing.  Eat down so far then quit. It was only 1/2 piece of a Primal square (trivial) that soured the bottom layer, cut into very tiny pieces and moved out to the perimeter.  I had thought that way, they would still eat the uncontaminated center - but no once they can smell it, it's turn-off time.

I have tried mixing the raw and canned together thoroughly and the reaction is worse.   Then they void the whole thing right off.  It has to be something about the smell.  I have tried cooking the raw slightly - equally bad.  Whatever could the canned cat food mfrs. be adding that is missing from the raw?

These guys are usually plate lickers.  Keegee is moping around like I am punishing him.  I'm getting disheartened.

 

[mrsgreenjeens]

OK, here's what I would do. 

First, i would stick with ONE flavor raw for awhile, just until you've got them kind of converted to at least one meal of raw.  You said above that they ate NV chicken mixed with canned and did pretty well.  That might be the one you can go with

.  I would start smaller than 1/2 a nugget of  Primal (I know I'm saying to use NV, but can't remember how the NV comes

).  The "experts" say to start with as little as 1/4 teaspoon raw mixed into their canned food, and since your guys are being particularly picky (join the club), I would definitely start there, and I WOULD mix it in really well.  I think that's actually what you did for their first meal, if I read you correctly, only maybe you put in more than 1/4 teaspoon.  Once they are eating everything you give them, then and only then, increase the amount of raw little by little, but only after they wipe their bowls clean should you increase the amount of raw you are giving them.  Once they have taken to eating all raw NV chicken, THEN you can try putting in 1/4 teaspoon some other raw into the NV chicken  and see what happens.  This is how some people add in new proteins for the first time.  

Also, I would definitely NOT leave out raw for more than an hour, AT MOST.  sounds like you are leaving it out all day, mixed in their canned food.  The raw can go bad,.  That's just like leaving a piece of chicken you're planning on having for dinner, already thawed, on your counter all day before you have it for dinner.  Except you would probably cook it

(and you might STILL get sick from it )  

Now, another thing you could try, if you don't like the above suggestion, is, IF they eat any kibble (since you leave kibble out for Kinney, is to take some of the NV chicken and roll it into little pea sized meatballs, crush up some of the kibble they eat, and roll the meatballs in the crushed kibble and see if they'll eat it that way.  That's how I got mine started, only instead of using kibble, I used Wholelife 100% freeze dried chicken.  It turns into a fine powder which is perfect for rolling meatballs in.  Problem is, I still have to use it for a topper for one of my guys a year and a half later.  All I need is a sprinkle, but i still have to go thru the motions

I know you're discouraged.  Been there many times

.   Have you read thru some of the transitioning threads.  Many of us threw our hands up in the air many a time and said we were going to go all the way back to kibble and just forget it!  (and one of us actually DID, but only temporarily, and then her furbaby went directly to raw with no issues) 

 

[dan32]

Thanks.  1/4 tsp?  OMG that's tiny!  I'll have to get out my microscope.  Alright I'll try peeling it back to that..

 

[dan32]

Tonight's "ration" of raw...  LOL

Raw Food Ration.jpg

• dan32
• Aug 4, 2013

 

[vball91]

LOL! Did it work? Did they eat it?