The Ethics of Vegetarian Cats and Dogs

[Fortis in Arduis]

As National Vegetarian Week gets underway, is it reasonable to expect our pets to forego meat too?

This week is National Vegetarian Week, the annual celebration of all things vegetarian. Taking the veggie option has never been easier for people, but what about vegetarian pets?

Jonathan Safran Foer's recent polemic Eating Animals makes much of the contrast between our love for our pets and our complacency at the horrors of the factory farm and the abattoir. That contradiction is no more keenly felt than by the vegetarian dog or cat owner, supporting the meat industry they abhor every time they stock up on pet food.

Of course, I should say the vegetarian owner of a cat or dog. Even my preternaturally clever Border collie, Charlie – a dog perfectly capable of expressing disdain – doesn't have the intelligence to base his culinary choices on a critique of the industrialised system of meat production. So is it ethical to impose a vegetarian diet on your pet? And for a start, is it healthy?

The health issue is simpler for dogs than cats, as dogs in the wild are omnivores whereas cats are obligate 'true' carnivores, getting all of their nutrition from meat.

But cats require specific nutrients, not specific foodstuffs. A 2006 study (pdf), carried out somewhat bizarrely by Nestlé, found that the 34 vegetarian cats it examined were healthy. One of the biggest concerns for cats is the risk of taurine deficiency, which can lead to blindness and death if not treated. Most meaty cat food has taurine added back, because the processing of meats removes it. Another essential for cats is arachidonic acid. Both these substances are available as supplements.

There are commercially available veggie options. Ethical Consumer's recent pet food report (pdf) gave 'best buys' for vegetarian dog food to brands Ami, Benevo, Yarrah and Wackidog and for vegetarian cat food, to Ami and Benevo (both of which contain taurine and arachidonic acid). Yarrah, which is organic, is currently investigating bringing out a vegan cat food too.

But even among animal rights organisations the jury is still out on the health implications feeding cats a veggie diet. Some, such as the Vegetarian Society, are equivocal, while others are keen backers of such a switch. A sensible compromise might be to feed your cat half vegetarian biscuits and half organic wet meaty food. Even dogs may struggle to get the nutrients they need from commercial vegetarian pet food. Some dogs require extra taurine and L-Carnitine, not usually added to commercial dog food (Ami dog food contains L-Carnitine).

No doubt this talk of a vegetarian dog will have many people apoplectic with righteous indignation that it's "not natural".

They'd do well to consider whether there was anything "natural" about conventional pet food.

Pet food is not covered by the same labelling requirements as food for humans. "EC permitted additives" covers a multitude of sins, including 4,000 chemicals and artificial colours banned for human consumption. "Meat and animal derivatives" can cover anything scraped off the slaughterhouse floor, while "derivatives of vegetable origin" is so broad as to include charcoal.

The Campaign for Real Pet Food is calling for a change in the labelling legislation – particularly important for pet owners with allergies. And just as there are concerns around the impact on human health of Bisphenol A (BPA) in can coatings and plastics, there's evidence that BPA in canned cat food may harm feline health.

It may also come as a nasty surprise to pet owners that many pet food companies have been involved in invasive tests on animals. Another advantage of the above veggie brands is that they are either on PETA UK's non-animal tested list or, in the case of Wackidog, approved by anti animal-testing campaigners BUAV.

Beyond animal rights, there's another motivation to reduce your pets' meat intake – the wider environmental impact. Last year saw a flurry of headlines following a book which claimed that owning a dog could have twice the environmental impact of driving an SUV. But pets are not the problem – a meat diet is.Today, greenhouse gases from livestock outweigh those from the entire global transport system.

If you do consider giving your dog or cat a veggie, or even vegan, diet, do your homework first – and consult a vet if you have any concerns about your pet's health.

• Dan Welch is co-editor of Ethical Consumer magazine. Katy Brown is the author of Ethical Consumer's recent buyers' guide to pet food.

http://guardian.co.uk/environment/bl...week-cats-dogs

I have been looking into this because I distrust meat because of potential poisons which accumulate further up the food chain in higher concentrations, and it seems that pets are at our mercy with regards to their food, unable to complain or refuse. Animals are capitalism's primary victims, and commercial pet food is of poor quality.

Raw meats might be a better option, especially for cats. Debate?

[Fortis in Arduis]

Can cats be vegetarian?


Yes, on a well prepared diet cats can in fact be vegan.

Unlike dogs, cats can not normally survive without meat. As domestic cats are part of the wider cat family including Lions and Tigers, etc. they have inherited many characteristics from their meat eating ancestors.

All cats are often described as 'obligate carnivores', which means that in the wild, if they did not eat meat they would become seriously ill and even die.

This is because cats are unable to produce certain nutrients, such as Taurine, within their body which they normally find within the meat they eat.

However these nutrients can be found in non animal sources in low quantities. The secret of a vegan cat diet is to use highly concentrated nutrients from these vegetable sources.

Some of these nutrients are synthetically produced - in fact, many commercial cat foods use these synthetic nutrients too because they are often destroyed in in the production process.

Currently we stock Ami Cat and Benevo vegetarian complete cat foods as well as the Vegecat range. Vegecat is a powdered vegan food supplement that can be added to food that you prepare. It contains all of the nutrients that your cat requires to stay healthy. Each pack comes with recipes included.

http://www.veggiepets.com/acatalog/v...formation.html

[Albion]

http://guardian.co.uk/environment/bl...week-cats-dogs

I have been looking into this because I distrust meat because of potential poisons which accumulate further up the food chain in higher concentrations, and it seems that pets are at our mercy with regards to their food, unable to complain or refuse. Animals are capitalism's primary victims, and commercial pet food is of poor quality.

Raw meats might be a better option, especially for cats. Debate?

Toxins concentrated higher up the food chain isn't really a valid argument when one considers all the toxins in vegetarian staples such as quinoa, potatoes and most other vegetables. Meat provides more protein and of a higher quality than the same amount of vegetables.

Forcing animals to become vegetarian just because some humans are is cruel. Dogs are omnivores but lean more towards carnivores, humans are omnivores leaning more to herbivores but cats are rather strict carnivores and cannot thrive without meat. I'd like to see studies regarding the activity levels of those cats - house cats that never go out on veg vs active cat doing as nature intended fed on meat is what I suspect.
I don't think pet food is as bad as you say. It's obviously not as good as proper meat, but it is essentially waste products from meat and veg that humans don't consume and is still better than feeding them on biscuits all the time. Do an experiment - give your cat a choice between processed cat meat, biscuits and good quality ham (not this square shaped excuse sold these days) and they'll run to the ham first, then to meat, then biscuits as a last resort if they're still hungry. It says it all really.

Forcing animals to turn vegetarian is just more vegetarian preaching and it goes too far.

[Fortis in Arduis]

^ I suspect that the vegetarian cat food might be of better quality than the processed meat cat food.

A taste test would seem fair, but feeding the cat cooked meat would fail because it would lack Taurine and the cat would go blind.

Is ham not always cooked or processed in some way?

[Albion]

Is ham not always cooked or processed in some way?

I don't think so. It's not hard to feed them raw meat.

[Fortis in Arduis]

I don't think so. It's not hard to feed them raw meat.

Ham is never raw.

Raw meat > vegetarian cat food > processed meat cat food

Something tells me that "mechanically recovered chicken" is not a chicken which has been rescued from a ditch by a friendly farmer using a tractor, yet humans and animals eat this crap, every day.

[Albion]

Ham is never raw.

Raw meat > vegetarian cat food > processed meat cat food

Something tells me that "mechanically recovered chicken" is not a chicken which has been rescued from a ditch by a friendly farmer using a tractor, yet humans and animals eat this crap, every day.

Processed meat contains a lot of water and often wheat and other cereals to bulk it up. It's purely profit motivated - less expensive meat + cheap cereals and water = cheap product which retains good profit margins.
I don't really care too much, it's still better than subsisting on plants alone. Vegetarian products aren't always as pure as people like to make out, they often contain rather industrial products to give them consistency and a pleasant appearance. You can call me pessimistic if you want, but one is never going to be free from crap entering the food chain. Even organic veg will accumulate anything that has been in the soil and the packaging will leech chemicals into the food chain whilst water used to irrigate crops in some countries will contain traces of hormones and pharmaceuticals. I forget the number of chemicals that are estimated to accumulate in average human body, but I remember it being in the thousands.