Im thinking about changing my cats to the raw diet any advice?

My dogs already are fed raw and i have had great results,i recently heard that you can feed cats raw do you have any advice on how to start and what meat to feed them.Im thinking about changing my cats to the raw diet any advice?
I have used a raw diet for 50% of my cats diet for over eight years now - the other half is canned. I use organic ground turkey and organic ground chicken with a supplement powder I get from Feline Instincts. According to their recipe I use liver and heart from the chicken or turkey. I never buy the meat in a package, the market I use grinds the meat several times a week so it is ';fresh';, You have to have a calcium supplement when you use ground meat. My cats would not take to chewing chunks or noshing on bones.





You might look up the powder at http://www.felineinstincts.com There are also many Yahoo groups about raw feeding. Whole Cat Health is a good one - the members either feed raw or are converting their cats.Im thinking about changing my cats to the raw diet any advice?
With a raw food diet for cats, it is rather precise and also complicated. You need to find a reliable site, and not scrimp or take shortcuts. Omitting a crucial ingredient, such as taurine, will result in the death of your cat over several months to a year, and your cat will suffer in the meantime.





Cats are carnivores, so they must have meat. And in preparing that, you need to be careful about bacterial contamination.





And how do you know if the site is reliable? If they give a recipe, and then want to sell you a specific 'special ingredient' that is a clue that I would quickly click away from that site.





And the last thing to consider is that, if a cat doesn't like the food, they will starve themselves rather than eat it. So if you go to a raw food diet, I hope it is a proper one, and that your cat likes it, or you have expended a lot of effort for nothing.
What are they getting now? You need to transition over a couple of weeks, first replacing canned food with ground meat, then reducing the kibble, and increasing the size of the meat from ground to chunks. Most cats will take well to eating chunks. (If they might mess the kitchen floor with dragging the chunks around, put their food over a large square of flooring vinyl about 3 ft each side).





You can buy cat meat at all good pet stores. Don't buy frozen, buy the fresh and freeze it yourself (as soon as possible) in meal-size portions. Defrost them inside the fridge, not on the counter. You can also feed meat sold for human consumption, such as chuck steak, chicken, and an occasional meal of offal (brains, liver, beef heart etc, sometimes sold in supermarket meat sections). Never feed ground beef sold for humans, as they contain preservatives cats don't handle well.





Bones such as chicken necks or wings are also good for cats, partly for calcium and partly to keep their teeth clean. Don't feed chicken legs as the long bones can splinter and cause choking. Mine like a few pieces of ox tail or osso bucco to chew the gristle from.





They need one meal a week of fish, an oily fish such as tuna being best. Some cats also love small bait fish or sardines (including tinned sardines sold for humans......the packed in oil kind together with the oil, which cats handle very well in their diet).





Feed them milk (half and half with water at first, if they are not used to it) and plain yoghurt goes down well with most cats, too. This is for their calcium requirements, and also provides some protein. Most cats also love cheese.





Many cats will also try fruit or vegetables in small quantities. Carrots, corn, broccoli, mango, sultanas, apples. Consider these a treat or party trick, not a major factor in their nutrition. In the wild they'd be getting some vegetable matter via the stomach contents of their prey.





Feed twice a day, taking away anything they didn't eat in half an hour, as raw meat will go off very quickly. For quantity, be guided by how much they leave....most cats will not eat more than they really need. Leave milk or water available all day. Also get a nutritional supplement from the pet store.
Of course you can feed cats raw food. It's what they should be eating anyway seeing as though they are carnivores.





This website, http://www.mypetcarnivore.com is where I purchase my cats raw food. We've tried beef, deer, turkey, chicken, duck, fish. I have not tried lamb or hen. My cats liked turkey, chicken and duck. One liked deer and the other liked beef. Neither liked fish. You'll have to try all different meats and see which ones they like. My cats readily accepted turkey. All other meats, I had to mix in with the turkey and slowly wean out the turkey with each feeding. This process however, didn't work for the meats they truly didn't like. In the beginning, they will most likely eat a lot. My 2 ate 3/4 cups each day plus one 3 oz canned food; 1/2 cup in morning and 1/4 cup in evening and one 3 oz canned food overnight. As time passes (about every 2-3 mos), they eat less. It's been 8 mos since I started and they are down to 1/4 cup in morning and 1/4 cup in evening with nothing overnight. They will eventually get down to 1/4 cup once a day but they are still young, 16 mos and 9 mos old, so they still eat more than older cats.





I will say that you have to be more clean with cats than dogs. Cats will not eat spoiled meat. They only like fresh and they will not eat until you give them some fresh food, no matter how long it takes you to figure out. Also, you have to keep their bowls clean with antibacterial soap each day or they will get sick from the bacteria. Good luck and thanks for considering raw food for your cats and already feeding your dogs raw!
go for it