Transitioning rescued dogs and cats to healthy vegan diets: practical tips

[red dog]

This was inspired by another "pet" discussion, which unfortunately generated a lot of nasty accusations and unsubstantiated rumours. I hope this thread will be a place to discuss the practical matter of feeding our dog and cat babies in a supportive and non-hostile atmosphere. My own dog has been nearly vegan since 2008, but occasionally she's had nonvegan cat food and other stuff she shouldn't have had. Once this summer, I panicked and intentionally fed her some nonvegan food because she was refusing foods she normally likes--fortunately it was just a temporary reaction to the stress of too many foster animals being introduced at once. My fosters have all been adopted, and I've decided I'm going to focus on my own three babies for now.

 

My dog's main food is Natural Balance Vegetarian Formula, but lately she's been having some digestive problems and I'm thinking of switching her over to homemade food. I just bought some VegeDog supplements and I can see that the enclosed recipes are very simple (but will need to be cut way down because she's so tiny). I'm a bit nervous because I'm not used to preparing food and worrying about how long it's been hanging around, etc., but my dog does seem to like home-prepared food better than kibble. I'm also concerned because Natural Balance has vitamin D, and I don't see that listed on the VegeDog label ... plus I was surprised to see that the recipes call for salt. My dog is on heart medicine, but the vet says her problem isn't serious enough to require a special diet. Still, should I *add* salt to her food or would it be better to omit it from the recipes? She can be a picky eater at times, but nutritional yeast and baby food are usually enough to entice her to eat.

 

My cats still eat flesh, but the kibble portion of their diet is vegan now (Amicat). At first they really seemed to hate Ami, but when I finally tried again and sprinkled it with some nutritional yeast they started eating. Now they'll eat it even without the yeast, but they *really* like canned food and beg for it often.

 

I'm really hesitant to make them eat nothing but kibble, and I'm afraid they may be eating too much kibble as it is ... I've heard this can cause kidney problems, but I don't know how reliable that information is. I've bought some VegeCat and was glad to see the recipes are very simple.

 

BUT my cats are super finicky eaters. I'm not sure if they'll eat what I prepare--so far I haven't had much luck getting them to eat fruit, vegetables, grains or tofu.

 

There's also the question of medicines/pesticides and which ones are really necessary. My animals were vaccinated recently, mainly because I was planning to take in fosters, but I really wonder if I should allow future shots. What are everyone's thoughts on these matters?

[red dog]

Don't worry, I always check the label for onions and I'm sorry to hear about your cat. :(

I think feline leukemia isn't that common here, but it's something to consider when taking in fosters ... unfortunately, as I said, three is all I can handle right now. I'm thinking it may be best to avoid future shots *and* future pet hotels, but I'll have to give it some more thought.

Thanks for the feeding suggestions too ... maybe the kitties would be fine on Ami alone, but I feel as if I should do some research. Vets don't seem to know anything about it.

[red dog]

The AR group sounds great and I'll look it up. About the onions, I second what Susan said. Many of the fake meats here have onion powder and I look specifically for the ones without it ... sometimes I can get the cats interested for a second, but then they realize it's fake and turn up their noses.

[DEN FRIEND]

I didn't know about onions being bad for cats and dogs. Thank you for that, I will def avoid them in the future.

[Susan Cho]

Good, I'm glad to hear that. :)

[Flor De Oro Cabrera]

 

Hi,

 

A good source of info about vaccines for our pets and people is this yahoo group http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/TruthAboutVaccines/.

[red dog]

Thanks for the link.

[Flor De Oro Cabrera]

 

You welcome :)

[red dog]

Mark this day on the calendar--semi-positive coverage from a mainstream source:

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/LIVING/03/10/vegan.dog.diet/index.html?...

[DEN FRIEND]

Thank you red dog. Very interesting, have posted it on my fb page and to UK animal rights network.

My companion animals all doing well. None of them have left home!

[red dog]

Unfortunately my dog has gotten extremely picky lately and her heart condition is worse than before. I don't want to feed her the remains of slaughtered animals, but I may have to reluctantly go along with the vet's advice and use a prescription diet--at least temporarily until I can find appropriate vegan recipes.

 

The kitties eat mostly Ami but I haven't completely stopped using canned. This is partly a compromise with the way they were raised. (Their previous guardians fed them treats constantly.)

 

I'll see how it goes tonight, but I'm getting more and more worried that my dog won't get enough calories from kibble or homemade food and that she'll get too much salt from the one veg canned food she likes. It's very frustrating.

[DEN FRIEND]

Red dog

That's a worry for you. You just have to follow your instincts. One of my cats is 11 and as you know has only been veggie for 6 weeks. 8 out of nine of the cats seem to really like Ami, although they may be suplementing their diet elsewhere! The trouble with vets (and doctors) is that they have a very conventional approach to diet. Jerry Valask told us in a workshop, that only one week of a doctors training is devoted to diet/nutrition. I do hope your dog gets well soon. Until all are free. Den

[red dog]

Thanks Den, I haven't given up for good, but maybe for this week I have ...