Very Picky Kitties...

[mangojuusu]

Hi everyone! Long post incoming, apologies in advance.

So, before I even got a cat I knew I'd be feeding them raw or homecooked food. I ended up with 2 kittens, and I thought great, they're young so they should be easy to transition to raw food!

They are the pickiest kittens I have ever seen. I exposed them both to a bunch of variety since the beginning, because I thought that might help them learn to accept different foods. Nope. I just now have a running list of raw/homecooked food they refuse.

Behold.

-They eat consistently (60%+ of the time): Stella and chewy's FD, vital essentials FD mini nibs, boiled cooked chicken with no supplements
-They refuse consistently: Tucker's frozen raw (any), Smallbatch frozen raw (chicken or duck), Primal FD (any), Primal frozen raw (rabbit), unsupplemented raw chunked chicken, cooked chicken with EZ complete sample, Vital Essentials frozen raw (any), Kiwi kitchens frozen raw (chicken or lamb)

Also on the refuse list is any canned pate food, or anything "soupy" that isn't a gravy (aka TikiCat). These aren't rapid food changes, as a note - they get something new slowly introduced every 5-7 days, usually after I make the walk of shame back to PetFoodExpress. I've tried heating it up or leaving it cold, no change. Tried "crunchier" food and smoother food, nothing. No toppers have worked. I have kibble (Open Farms lamb) out at all times now - not because I want to, but because they will only eat something they don't want if they are nearly starving, and I'd rather them eat anything than starve.

Now I want to try making a homemade food for them, but I am pretty stuck. I do not want to do the whole grinder route, and I don't want to do frankenprey (I doubt they'd go for that anyway...). I can work with 80/10/10 grinds from Primal or Smallbatch, cook meat from a grocery store, or grab raw meat from a butcher to supplement. Thing is, any of these things would require an investment of $60-80, and I don't want to take the plunge only for them to refuse it yet again.

tl;dr: For anyone who has had kitties who refused commercial raw/homemade, how did you get them onto 100% homecooked/raw diet?

 

[Azazel]

I’ve noticed that there’s a difference between fresh meat from a farm or butcher and pet raw food grinds. My cats often reject commercial raw food but they go crazy for any kind of fresh meat. If you have a good source for purchasing fresh raw meat, try just offering them pieces of raw chicken or turkey. You can try hearts, gizzards, livers, and other parts. If they like it and you are committed to making homemade you can do it without a grinder if you don’t use bones. It’s quite easier to use eggshell calcium actually. And it’s not too costly.

 

[She's a witch]

I’d buy some raw pieces of different kind of meat from the butcher and offer them to see if they accept. I don’t grind such pieces myself, just cut them into long strips, it’s better for their teeth if they can chew. If they do like the base, it’s a big chance that they will like it with all the additions. That will also give you some insight in what texture they like, my cats prefer pieces than finely ground meat. The downside is that they sometimes spit the pieces they don’t like (liver...).
My cats also prefer fresh meat rather than commercial. But out of commercial they prefer frozen one rather than freeze dried. Not sure where you live, but I recommend Natural Pet Pantry and Wild Coast Raw. And you can also use Darwin’s introductory offer to see if they like frozen commercial.

Edited to add: my girl was also difficult to transition; luckily I have a second cat that was into the raw from the beginning. So I kept offering her the raw meal next to her normal canned (mixing was out of question as she considered it not edible even with a small piece only) and one day, after several weeks, she just ate it and have loved it from now on...

 

[mangojuusu]

I’ve noticed that there’s a difference between fresh meat from a farm or butcher and pet raw food grinds. My cats often reject commercial raw food but they go crazy for any kind of fresh meat. If you have a good source for purchasing fresh raw meat, try just offering them pieces of raw chicken or turkey. You can try hearts, gizzards, livers, and other parts. If they like it and you are committed to making homemade you can do it without a grinder if you don’t use bones. It’s quite easier to use eggshell calcium actually. And it’s not too costly.

This is really interesting! Everyone always recommends food that's frozen immediately after grinding/processing, so I thought the specified pet food would be fresher... guess not.

As a little experiment, I went to the grocery store and got some ground pork and intact beef. I planned on cooking the ground pork for them but I gave the kitties a tiny amount of raw beforehand... they scarfed the pork down like they'd never seen food before! So I think you're right.

I'll probably try going to a butcher to source some ground meats, then, and order Alnutrin with eggshell to add to it. Thank you for the suggestion! And I'll let you know if that worked in a few days.

(Also, I find it interesting they'll only eat the freshest meats but they'll still fish gross food out of the trashcan... )

 

[mangojuusu]

I’d buy some raw pieces of different kind of meat from the butcher and offer them to see if they accept. I don’t grind such pieces myself, just cut them into long strips, it’s better for their teeth if they can chew. If they do like the base, it’s a big chance that they will like it with all the additions. That will also give you some insight in what texture they like, my cats prefer pieces than finely ground meat. The downside is that they sometimes spit the pieces they don’t like (liver...).
My cats also prefer fresh meat rather than commercial. But out of commercial they prefer frozen one rather than freeze dried. Not sure where you live, but I recommend Natural Pet Pantry and Wild Coast Raw. And you can also use Darwin’s introductory offer to see if they like frozen commercial.

Edited to add: my girl was also difficult to transition; luckily I have a second cat that was into the raw from the beginning. So I kept offering her the raw meal next to her normal canned (mixing was out of question as she considered it not edible even with a small piece only) and one day, after several weeks, she just ate it and have loved it from now on...

Thanks for the reply! I offered them a chunk of raw beef today - they looked at me like I was crazy. So I think they're ground-meat kitties. But that's okay, I brush their teeth anyway.

They actually dislike frozen raw more than the freeze dried stuff, which honestly surprised me. She'll give it a few licks sometimes but he barely sniffs it, and eats around it at best. Even if they were into frozen raw, those raw food companies in Seattle are a little too far away for central CA pet stores to have them, unfortunately.

But it's good to hear that your difficult-to-transition girl picked it up eventually. I'll head to the butcher's shop this weekend, and be as persistent as possible for alnutrin with ground meat.

 

[She's a witch]

This is really interesting! Everyone always recommends food that's frozen immediately after grinding/processing, so I thought the specified pet food would be fresher... guess not.

Freezing changes the texture/taste. When I offer my cats meat from the shop, that hasn’t been frozen before, they go wildly crazy about it. The same meat is not so appealing after it’s frozen, thawed and offered again. But I hear freezing might alegedly be helpful with managing bacteria so I guess feeding fresh (not frozen) meat is not recommended. I guess the pork you offered was not the frozen one?

 

[mangojuusu]

Freezing changes the texture/taste. When I offer my cats meat from the shop, that hasn’t been frozen before, they go wildly crazy about it. The same meat is not so appealing after it’s frozen, thawed and offered again. But I hear freezing might alegedly be helpful with managing bacteria so I guess feeding fresh (not frozen) meat is not recommended. I guess the pork you offered was not the frozen one?

Yep, it was fresh, not frozen. Unfortunately the nearest butcher is 35-45 minutes away, and I really don't want to make that trip more than once a month at most. So freezing it is the only practical way to feed that.

But I can't feed grocery store ground meat (at least, not confidently) and I don't want to buy a grinder, so... I might be outta luck...

 

[mangojuusu]

Update: Did experiment 2. (Never imagined my science degrees would be useful here...)

Cooked the ground pork, gave them a bit. Both ate it, with slightly less enthusiasm than raw ground pork. A good sign.

Froze the cooked pork, and gave it to them again a few hours later. Both ate it, her with more hesitation than him. So it (likely) isn't the freezing that they object to, unless raw meat freezes differently than cooked. That means it's either the liver/organ, the bones, or the commercial supplements they dislike. Which is at least it's a list I can narrow down from.

I'll probably start with some homemade cooked meals for now, and once I'm sure they'll eat that I'll start looking into raw at a butcher shop. Thanks everyone for the insight!

 

[lisahe]

Our cats have somewhat similar tastes. Among commercial raw foods, they love freeze-dried (Primal and Northwest Naturals) but won't eat Primal frozen. Though they happily eat Stella & Chewy's Selects, the newer frozen medallion-shaped foods that has much simpler ingredients. They love their homemade cooked foods best of all, though.

I cook meat and use the EZ Complete and Alnutrin supplements. I feed one meal of EZ a day and one of Alnutrin. (Their other three meals are: one of freeze-dried, one of S&C Select, and one of canned food.)

You definitely don't need a grinder for homemade food, particularly if you're making smallish batches. I chop, slice, dice, shred, and use a food processor, which works really well for what I do. (I have a Cuisinart Pro Custom 11" and it can chop/mince raw meat pretty well, for use in patties and the like...) If you do buy ground meat from the store to use cooked, be sure it doesn't have additives; unfortunately, they're very common!

Good luck!

 

[mangojuusu]

Update 2: My alnutrin arrived. Followed the recipe for pork in the Cooked Recipes thread on this site. This is the same brand of ground pork from earlier, prepared in the same way (stovetop with a lid).

He ate half of it, she licked the sauce and ate a tiny bit, but walked away from it. I thought, hey, that's a relatively good sign since they didn't reject it. I stored it in the fridge. 5 hours later, I heated a bit of it up for them. Now, neither of them will touch it. Which is not surprising, just disappointing.

I want to start phasing out the kibble and leaving freeze-dried raw at night (since the kibble doesn't react well with either of their stomachs) but I can't do that if they won't eat the stuff I cook, it's just too expensive. I'm still scared of them not getting enough nutrition (I've heard of cats refusing food until they starve), but I guess I'll just be as persistent as possible for now...

 

[lisahe]

If you still have some of the Alnutrin food around, you might try sprinkling a little freeze-dried food dust on top. I think you said toppers didn't work before but, well, cats are mysterious creatures and what doesn't work on the other foods may just work on this one. I put a little FD on most of our cats' meals and it goes a long way in making the pickier cat happy. Good luck.

 

[mangojuusu]

If you still have some of the Alnutrin food around, you might try sprinkling a little freeze-dried food dust on top. I think you said toppers didn't work before but, well, cats are mysterious creatures and what doesn't work on the other foods may just work on this one. I put a little FD on most of our cats' meals and it goes a long way in making the pickier cat happy. Good luck.

I tried using a little kibble as a topper when they first refused to eat the alnutrin cooked. The first time I topped with kibble they ate about half of their (admittedly large) plates, the second time I topped with kibble they wouldn't touch it.

I'll try topping it with some crumbled up freeze-dried tomorrow and see if that makes a difference, but this is pretty demoralizing. I have another 1.5lbs of this alnutrin pork, plus other frozen ground meats, and I can't do anything else with them since I don't eat meat myself.

 

[Azazel]

I tried using a little kibble as a topper when they first refused to eat the alnutrin cooked. The first time I topped with kibble they ate about half of their (admittedly large) plates, the second time I topped with kibble they wouldn't touch it.

I'll try topping it with some crumbled up freeze-dried tomorrow and see if that makes a difference, but this is pretty demoralizing. I have another 1.5lbs of this alnutrin pork, plus other frozen ground meats, and I can't do anything else with them since I don't eat meat myself.

Fortiflora also works really well as an appetite stimulant if you sprinkle a little on their food.

 

[mangojuusu]

Fortiflora also works really well as an appetite stimulant if you sprinkle a little on their food.

I don't currently have FortiFlora, but someone has said parmesan cheese is kind of similar in flavor? I gave them a little bit of it alone and they ate it. I also have baby food lying around but he doesn't like that as much.

Tonight I gave them half-canned half-alnutrin food, sprinkled with a little parmesan. They ate the canned food parts, which were the same texture as the cooked alnutrin, but left behind the part I cooked. When I gave them freeze-dried raw as their "kibble" for the night they dove in.

This is really frustrating! I would just give up and feed canned food if I could afford it, but the only brand they'll eat consistently would cost $20/d to feed exclusively...

 

[She's a witch]

if They have canned food they really like, you can add a little bit of your home prepared meal and mix it together, then increase its amount if they eat it. That’s how most cats are transitioned to raw food. (Although my girl would never touch such mix, so I was usually placing new food just next to her, sometimes on her plate, sometimes on the separate one. She also didn’t want to eat the raw part until one day she started).

I know how you feel, I also don’t eat meat and I hate throwing it away. Your kittens are young and with time and patience you’ll make it work. I wouldn’t give up just yet.

 

[mangojuusu]

if They have canned food they really like, you can add a little bit of your home prepared meal and mix it together, then increase its amount if they eat it. That’s how most cats are transitioned to raw food. (Although my girl would never touch such mix, so I was usually placing new food just next to her, sometimes on her plate, sometimes on the separate one. She also didn’t want to eat the raw part until one day she started).

I know how you feel, I also don’t eat meat and I hate throwing it away. Your kittens are young and with time and patience you’ll make it work. I wouldn’t give up just yet.

Okay, I haven't given up quite yet. I'll try to do more mixing of canned food. The thing is, there isn't a canned (or wet food, really) that they both consistently like every day, so even that might fail, but... oh well.

If I go through the rest of the meat (~4lbs total) while mixing it with canned and FD raw, and they still won't eat it, I'll make a very small batch of the raw ground. If they refuse that too, I'll probably just put them on kibble and a little FD raw until they're adults. I hate worrying about whether I'm stunting their growth by pushing the healthy wet food habit.

 

[Azazel]

I don't currently have FortiFlora, but someone has said parmesan cheese is kind of similar in flavor? I gave them a little bit of it alone and they ate it. I also have baby food lying around but he doesn't like that as much.

Tonight I gave them half-canned half-alnutrin food, sprinkled with a little parmesan. They ate the canned food parts, which were the same texture as the cooked alnutrin, but left behind the part I cooked. When I gave them freeze-dried raw as their "kibble" for the night they dove in.

This is really frustrating! I would just give up and feed canned food if I could afford it, but the only brand they'll eat consistently would cost $20/d to feed exclusively...

Fortiflora smells different than Parmesan. Its primary ingredient is animal digest. You can probably get a sample from your vet to see if it works.

 

[lisahe]

I hope the crumbled freeze-dried helps. It can take some time to get cats to eat new forms of food but homemade food freezes very well! Sometimes it's best to just shelve (literally!) a food that cats aren't eating and then take it out again a few weeks later.