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Guest Petra S

Vegetarian Food For Pets

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Guest Petra S

Hi,

 

on the Slovene forum I asked where in Slovenia we can buy vegetarian food for pets. I can't imagine many foreigners are interested about it, but Gigu asked to put it on the English forum so here it is:

 

Shopping places for vege food in Slovene towns: http://www.vege4.si/index.php?page=static&id=86.

 

Best regards,

Petra

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Guest Ani.Chödrön

Tashi Delek,

 

I found also English site of Ami food: http://ami.aminews.net/index.php?lang=en. In the chapter on Ethics and Health you can find some useful information about harmful ingredients of usual pet food and their effects to animals. This might be useful for all pet owners.

 

All the best,

chödrön

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Guest Petra S

Hi,

 

did anybody try Ami? I have only positive experiences with it: my cat likes it from the beginning and she looks better than before. I've thought that she would become temporarily weaker, but she didn't, on the contrary - she behaves like a real puma when she plays, but when she doesn't, she's a lovely purring kitten. :laugh: Before she was restless all the time, but didn't have any real strength, even though I was feeding her with a high quality food.

 

But maybe this is the case with only my cat. What are your experiences?

 

Bye,

Petra

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Hello,

did anybody try Ami? I have only positive experiences with it: my cat likes it from the beginning and she looks better than before. But maybe this is the case with only my cat. What are your experiences?

The cat I take care for, switched to Ami without any problems. I am not a veterinary so I cannot really say if there are any health improvements and it is probably too early for such observation in my case. Nevertheless, the cat seems happy and judging by his excrement, I would say he is better off than before.

 

Btw - the vegetarian food for pets Ami is not to be mistaken with the pet food Bonami, which can be bought also in the big shops. In fact, even if one is not in favour of vegetarian pet food, it might still be better to buy pet food in specialized shops. It has healthy ingredients instead of human food remains as it is the case with some of the populars brands on the supermarket shelfs. Also in the long run quality food is probably cheaper, since it indirectly reduces costs for the veterinary treatment.

 

Best regards,

Draftsman

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Good morning,

 

I've tried this product and my cat obviously likes it, no problems. What I like about it is the "cruelty free" label, that it is a balanced and complete food for the cat, and the smell is kind of pleasant (not so strong as in the meat foods). :no1:

 

Best regards, K

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Hello,

 

I have to reconsider & renovate my old post in this thread :angel: . I feed the cat with Ami on one day and with another high-quality-but-non-vegetarian-pet-food the next day. After months of combining both, it became clear that the cat eats Ami, but is not satisfied with "Ami only diet". In fact, if I feed him only Ami for like two or three days, he will eventually puke or have diarrhea :// . This happened quite a few times, so it cannot be a coincidence. Also, after a few days, he will slowly start to reject Ami. Yet, when combined with another food, he doesn't have a problem eating Ami every second or third day. Also, the cat doesn't seem to mind eating only high-quality-but-non-vegetarian-pet-food all the time (as he minds with Ami).

 

Does anyone else have a similar experience (with Ami or another vegetarian food for cats/pets)?

 

Best regards,

Draftsman

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Hi,

 

my cats love Ami food, but one of the cats gets diarrhea. I decided to mix them Ami every day. So one of the cats gets more Ami (the one that does not have digestion problems), the other one less. I like that their feeding is balanced every day, so this is why I mix, rather then give them one day one sort and another the second.

 

Actually because of Ami food I managed to put some weight on one cat, which was too skinny after eating just meat food.

 

Kind regards,

B.

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When changing your pet's diet you should be careful to do it very gradually. An animal's digestion system gets used to one type of food, so when the diet is changed abruptly, this often causes digestion problems.

 

The diet should be changed gradually over the course of one week. First you add only a very small quantity of new food to the old one in the animal's feeding bowl. Gradually and very slowly you increase the quantity of new food and dicrease the quantity of old food. If any problems occur, you sould decrease the quantity of new food, wait for a few days and then start again. It might happen that the animal will not be able to digest new food. In that case it is better not to force it in order to avoid severe damage to the animal's digestion system.

 

Billytiss, I suggest you go back to the start with the cat who has problems and try to change his diet gradually. If it does not work, I suggest you go to the old diet not to damage the cat's health.

 

Good luck!

 

Oh, I just noticed Draftsman's post! So the recommendation in my post actually goes to him...

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Hello,

When changing your pet's diet you should be careful to do it very gradually. An animal's digestion system gets used to one type of food, so when the diet is changed abruptly, this often causes digestion problems. ... Oh, I just noticed Draftsman's post! So the recommendation in my post actually goes to him...

Thank you Dechen ;) . I think the problem with Ami might be more complicated for some cats, like mine. He got used to the food months ago, but cannot stay only on it without digestion problems.

 

Best regards,

Draftsman

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Then it is clearly not suitable for him as his only diet. Better for him to eat other food than suffer permanent damage to his digestive system.

 

Have a nice day!

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Does anybody have experience with an outdoor cat eating Ami? I tried to give her Ami food mixed with ordinary meet (fish) food and it would eat only the meat food, leaving Ami on the plate. It would eat Ami only in the case of great need (read: hunger, for ex. - when I am absent from home till late in the night, it would eat also Ami). So, my cat does not like Ami. I decided not to press it with it... But: could it be that I made a mistake in offering it Ami food when cold days began (in the middle of November)? That is why I decided to wait for a little bit and try for a second time when it's warm.

All the best.

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Our cat needed some time to adjust from usual food to Ami food. She had a mild diarrhoea, and was asking for other food.

But finally, she adapted to it ie. digestion came back to normal and she started to eat again normally. Well, almost normally, because with Ami food she seems to eat less "compulsively" than with other type of meat food, probably because there are less chemicals meant to attract cats into that vegetarian food than others.

 

I would think that it can't really damage cat's digestive system, though the adaptation might generate a bit of diarrhoea. Human can adapt to almost any kind of diet; surely cats can too.

 

All the best

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Guest tata

Hello everyone!

Our Manju, now about 2 years old cat, got diarrhoea which seemed will never end. We took him to the vet, trying to find and remove the cause, but all the tests (blood and parasites) were ok. By the vet's advice we put Manju on anti diarrhoea diet (special pet food, based on rice but meat included). Didn't help. The vet said we should put the cat on hypo alergenic food, because he might be alergic to some usual pet food substance, and I said that he already is on such food (which Ami is). The last thing the vet said was that we will have to make some liver tests, take the sample from the liver.. I said I will think about it first.

While I was thinking the time passed (about 3 weeks) and by this time the diarrhoea was gone. Manju simply got used to the Ami food.

Now he is okay with Ami food for about half a year or so, being completely healthy and playful :clown: Not to mention how smart he is, this is where his name comes from ;)

 

Regards,

Khetsun

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Hello,

Our Manju, now about 2 years old cat, got diarrhoea which seemed will never end. ...

Now he is okay with Ami food for about half a year or so, being completely healthy and playful :clown: Not to mention how smart he is, this is where his name comes from ;)

I had a similar experience with my cat. Also, the cat was perhaps a bit less ecstatic about Ami compared to other food, which might be a good sign, as mentioned. All in all the cat has no more problems with Ami food :applause: .

 

Best regards,

Draftsman

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Hi,

Thank you for latest reviews. I actually gave up on Ami due to not knowing the adaptation period and was giving it to cats sporadically. Will do it again :)

 

With best wishes,

B.

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Hello,

 

I know a biologist, who knows a biologist... So I inquired about vegetarian food for cats, specifically Ami.

 

Below is the summary of (a bit lenghty) answer, which is in my opinion worth checking ;) (while reading, keep in mind that I am just the messenger :dontknow: ):

 

- adequate vegetarian food for dogs exists already, while for the time being cats can be fed with vegetarian food only in 'laboratory conditions'. Vegetables don't contain or don't contain enough of the following substances needed by cats: e.g. argynine, lysine, niacin, cobalamin, taurine, arachidonic acid (Omega 6), or sulphur aminoacids like methionine or cystine (some of the listed substances might be spelled incorrectly). These substances cannot be bought by an individual in a chemical store.

 

I double-checked this with a chemist and he confirmed that the listed substances are essential. So, the vegetarian food for cats should be enriched by them. I don't know if Ami has these substances - it surely has taurine (I doubt it has all of the other substances). It seems, that there haven't been many tests done on vegetarian food with added taurine (or at least articles on the subject are not easily available).

 

- Even if all of the substances listed above were added to the vegetarian cat food, it might not be enough. Nowadays, we surely don't know all of the needed substances or their appropriate concentrations. So, theoretically it would be possible to make a perfect vegetarian food for cats, but in practice not - at least for now. Some producers of vegetarian food object to such scientific findings for ideological reasons and they sell what they sell, believing whatever they want to believe - to paraphrase the Matrix :sage: .

 

- Cats can survive in the long term on the food like Ami, but that doesn't prove that it is totally suitable - similarly humans can survive on junk food but the quality of their life might not be perfect. Of course, 'mainstream' meat food for cats can also be junk food, but this is another story. Even in the case of severe deficiencies of some nutrients (e.g., calcium, vitamin A, taurine), signs in an adult at maintenance may take months to years to become clinically evident, especially if the body stores of that nutrient are ample prior to starting the deficient diet. If the cat spends time outdoors, it might catch a mice or a bird here and there, giving the false impression to the ignorant owner that the vegetarian food is sufficient.

 

- How could a deficient pet food ever get on the market? No problem, it happened before (not to mention junk pet food that the market is flooded with). See this http://www.animalagalliance.org/images/ag_...t_Nutrition.pdf for details (I quote the article in the previous point).

 

- Cats are not omnivorous (feeding on both animal and vegetable substances) like humans, but carnivorous (feeding on animal substances). Yes, cats have been bred by the people, but not for making them vegetarian. Even oppositely, many humans bred cats for catching mice.

 

- Cats are predators and have these instincts in themselves (as can be observed when they mercilessly play with the mice they just caught). They search for a predatory way of life. Some of it can be substituted, when they play with toys, but not all. Their metabolism is, as it is - carnivorous. And the body in general knows very well, what it lacks - just observe the appetite of the pregnant women. In contrary to what many people believe - many animals actually choose food in à¢-Ëœan active cognitive decision-making process'. So, their preferences shouldn't be underestimated. (I admit that craving for junk food kind of speaks against this argument - but junk food is given aromas that fake the body, so this doesn't take the whole weight off the argument).

 

- This argument is relying on the previous one and is ethical in nature: a human should not impose his own (vegetarian, à¢-Ëœanimal-loving') ethics on a cat. This would be ethical violence. Those humans, who cannot accept cats as they are (i.e. as they would be, if not limited in their actions by humans), shouldn't have them for pets :verysad: . Instead, they should have pets like tortoises that can live on vegetarian food.

 

- Cats eating only (meat or vegetarian) briquettes are in a way deprived, since they cannot use their jaws to dismember pieces of meat. A human would feel similar, if someone tied his hands before eating the meal, since primates' and many other mammals' hands are meant to help with 'food manipulation'. A veggie cat might not be aware of its deprivation. But that doesn't mean that it wouldn't feel 'liberated' once the jaw is given a piece of meat to dismember. So, the least a cat owner could do, is to serve a piece of meat to a cat from time to time (if possible baked, so that germs are not on it).

 

A coherent list of arguments, waiting to be disproven ;) .

 

Best regards,

Draftsman

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