Due to increasingly frequent enquiries about diet & litter we thought me might add this information to our website.
Diet
Cats are “obligate” carnivores.
This means they meet their nutritional needs by consuming other animals and have a higher protein requirement than many other mammals.
As such, we feed our cats a raw meat diet and the few (and they are very few!!) “biscuits” or “kibble” given to our cats are grain-free (we prefer Taste of the Wild).
Our cat’s meat is frozen solid for a minimum of 24 hours before being defrosted and fed to our cats. This helps (not guarantees!) to kill many bacterias present within the meat and can kill worm eggs.
To ensure our cats are receiving the necessary vitamins and minerals required to meet their nutritional needs, we add “Predamax” carnivore supplement powder to their meat. If you are unable to source Predamax, a suitable alternative is “Carni-Vite“.
We also add hot (not boiling) water to their meat as cats tend to live right on the tipping point of dehydration and by the time they go to have a drink, they are already slightly dehydrated. By using hot water this also reduces any chill left within the meat.
Many of our cats LOVE their chicken wings… which they typically get for breakfast and help keep their teeth clean as they crunch the raw bone. We cut a wing into two portions as a full wing is too often too much for a single cat to eat.
Some do not eat the entire bone – so make sure you find this uneaten section of the bone and throw it out, otherwise, I guarantee you will find it barefoot in the middle of the night when doing a mad dash to the loo!!
If you are unable to source the chicken wings, you can also give your cat entire drumsticks.
We DO NOT recommend chicken necks. Chicken necks have an extremely high bone-to-meat ratio and this can result in your cat experiencing painful poo which can in turn result in a fear of using the litter tray.
We “treat” our cats to tuna in oil now and again to help reduce furballs.
They also enjoy treats of cheese and Greek yoghurt…. or like all cats, anything “cat-safe” off a human plate!!!
Litter
At Rislani we use and recommend “CatMate” wood pellet cat litter and sieve tray.
CatMate is a 100% natural wood-based litter which when wet the pellet breaks down into sawdust. This sawdust is safe to use on your garden beds (NOT veggie gardens!!) as compost. It is therefore recommended you use CatMate with a sieve system litter tray (pictured right), which allows the wet (sawdust) material to drop through to the bottom tray leaving only clean dry pellets in the top tray. This not only makes CatMate and other wood-based litters significantly easier to change the litter tray but also very economical.
By the time you come to collect your kitten from us, it has been using this litter without any accidents. However being scared, and alone for the first time in its life, in a strange environment may result in a few “accidents” while your kitten is getting used to its new domain. To help reduce the number of accidents your kitten may have, contain the kitten in one room for the first 24 hours (48 hours is often better) to ensure it isn’t too overwhelmed within the new environment. If your kitten is using the tray after this timeframe, allow them to explore the rest of the house at their will.
If you are unable to source CatMate, Kitter and OzPet are very similar products and your kitten should easily transition to this litter.
The below video shows how to use this type of litter with a sieve tray:
