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Old August 8th, 2008, 02:40 PM
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sugarcatmom sugarcatmom is offline
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Join Date: May 2007
Location: Calgary, AB
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Frenchy View Post
So I don't need to supplement. It will be either beef or chicken , cut into small pieces + one piece of liver + one chicken heart.
Not to alarm you, Frenchy, (well, maybe a little bit) but if that's just meat without any bone, you really need to be adding a calcium supplement. If the meat was only about 10-15% of their diet, it wouldn't be a problem, however it sounds like it makes up 50%. If that's the case, your cats are getting waaaaay too much phosphorus in relation to calcium. Ideally the ratio should be around 1.2-1.4:1, give or take, so if you are just feeding meat, it's probably upwards of 1:15, which is dangerous over the long term.

http://www.serve.com/BatonRouge/nutr...cium_suppl.htm
http://maxshouse.com/feline_nutrition.htm

Quote:
Unthinking or uninformed owners most often distort the calcium-phosphorus balance of their cat's diet by feeding a diet consisting almost exclusively of muscle meat or organ meats such as liver, heart, or kidney. All of these meats contain phosphorus but are devoid of calcium, which results in a calcium--phosphorus ratio of 1 to 15 or greater. Prolonged feeding of such a diet results in severe demineralization of bones, pain, and sometimes fractures or paralysis, a condition called nutritional secondary hyperparathyroidism. An adult cat may exist on such a diet for years without showing signs of disease, but the body changes are occurring nevertheless. Remember that the wild ancestors and living relatives of the domestic cat relied on a variety of foods found in the entire body of their prey.
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