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You are here: Home / Health & Wellness / The Dangers of Feeding your Cat a Vegan Diet

The Dangers of Feeding your Cat a Vegan Diet

Updated 8 October 2020 By Pawesome Cats 29 Comments

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No matter how good your moral intentions, it is important to remember that your cat is an ‘obligate carnivore’ and they MUST eat meat | The Dangers of Feeding your Cat a Vegan Diet Being vegetarian or vegan is a personal choice, and often one that a person reaches out of their love and compassion for animals. But whilst you choose to eat a plant based diet, it is important to remember that your cat is an ‘obligate carnivore’ and they MUST eat meat. Unfortunately, no matter how good your moral intentions, feeding your cat a vegan diet is a recipe for disaster.

The Cats’ Unique Metabolism

Cats are unique, but heck you knew that already. Character aside though, cat digestion evolved along different lines to ours. Their ancestor cats survived by hunting small mammals and ate a meat-rich diet as a result. Their bodies learnt to be as efficient as possible and make the most of the available food (which was rats and mice). For thousands of years cats lived life as if all they had to eat is meat…because it was true…and their metabolism made no allowance for the need to turn vegan.

These metabolic adaptations are both a cats’ strength and their weakness (and why they are unable to detox and breakdown many human pharmaceuticals.) It’s why they were able to survive in arid environments (their kidneys harvest water from their prey) and created a highly efficient way to survive in an environment of limited resources.

The major metabolic differences are:

  1. Cats require high quality protein to be healthy.
  2. Cats require a supply of taurine in their diet.

Let’s cross reference this with a vegan diet.

No matter how good your moral intentions, it is important to remember that your cat is an ‘obligate carnivore’ and they MUST eat meat | The Dangers of Feeding your Cat a Vegan Diet

Image: mararie via Flickr

 

What is a Vegan Diet?

A vegan diet is vegetarianism taken to the next level by excluding any animal-derived ingredients, such as eggs, milk, and dairy products.

All bodies need protein to function, and since meat is off the menu vegans get their protein from grains, pulses, beans, and legumes. These plant-derived proteins are technically known as being of ‘low biological value’ when it comes to nourishing the body. The latter is a term used by nutritionists to describe how useful a food is. The lower the biological value, the less likely it is to be a good source of nutrition.

Low biological value with regards to plant proteins means they don’t contain all the ‘amino acids’ necessary for tissue growth. But the good news for us humans is our bodies found a way round this deficiency. As omnivores, our bodies have learnt to use plant-based proteins as building blocks with which to manufacture those missing amino acids. Thus, although pulses don’t contain taurine, we dodge the issue by manufacturing our own from the raw building blocks in the protein.

Amino acids and proteins are vital for body functions such as tissue growth, repair and healing, making haemoglobin, myoglobin, and as part of the vital immunoglobulins that make up our immune system. So switching back to cats, they need protein of ‘high biological value’ such as meat, with all the amino acids ready supplied. If they don’t get everything they need, there is no compromise; they become taurine deficient and extremely ill.

No matter how good your moral intentions, it is important to remember that your cat is an ‘obligate carnivore’ and they MUST eat meat | The Dangers of Feeding your Cat a Vegan Diet

Image: Konstantin Merenkov via Flickr

 

Taurine Deficiency in Cats 

If you feed your cat a vegan diet there is no doubt that they will become taurine deficient. Taurine is needed for:

  • Platelet function (deficiency leads to impaired blood clotting)
  • Growing healthy bones (deficiency leads to skeletal deformities in kittens)
  • Hair growth
  • Healthy heart muscle (deficiency causes dilated cardiomyopathy or DCM)
  • Healthy eyesight (deficiency leads to retinal disorders and blindness)

Of these, the most serious are dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) and blindness.

It was as late as 1987 that the link between a lack of taurine and DCM was first made. For decades it had been recognised that cats on a vegetarian diet fared badly, of which a classic sign was early death from heart failure. This was also around the time when cardiac ultrasound scans were in their infancy, and vegetarian cats supplied a steady source of cases to veterinarians to study.

But it was UC Davis, Veterinary teaching hospital that realised all the cats they were studying with heart failure were also testing taurine deficient. Then, to their surprise when the cats were given taurine-supplements for 2 – 3 months, their heart function started to improve. The response was so marked that they named this new condition ‘taurine deficiency induced myocardial failure’, but this being a bit of a mouthful to say, the shorter name DCM (which describes the appearance of the heart) took off.

No matter how good your moral intentions, it is important to remember that your cat is an ‘obligate carnivore’ and they MUST eat meat | The Dangers of Feeding your Cat a Vegan Diet

Image: Rainer Stropek via Flickr

 

Long story short, if you genuinely want the best for your cat, then please respect their need to eat meat. If you are tempted to get round the problem by supplementing a vegan diet with taurine, remember the latter is only part of the picture. The proteins are still of low biological value which means your cat is liable to have a poor coat, weak immune system, and be at risk of problems with their circulation and blood clotting.

Embrace the cat as a carnivore and know you are doing the humane thing by feeding them the diet that nature intended.

This blog post is part of the quarterly campaign for Be the Change for Animals – advocating to make the world a better place for all animals. 

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Comments

  1. Dan Brasher says

    19 January 2017 at 10:04 am

    Firstly, I don’t believe in forcing my ethical beliefs into others – especially pets who have no choice in the matter.

    However, I would ask if synthetic proteins can provide adequate nutrition for cats?

    From the articles I’ve read the consensus is that they can live a healthy sustainable lifestyle for up to 8-9 years at least on these synthetic foods like the Australian pet food brand Vegan Pet. However the long term studies are still out for the time being as no research has been done.

    Obviously some pet owners are dumb and dangerously feed their pets tofu and vegetables. But if there were a palatable, nutritious and digestible meat alternative would you consider it?

    Reply
  2. RatCentral says

    16 May 2016 at 6:37 am

    Great article, I’ve been telling people the same thing about rats. You really wouldn’t believe the amount of people who insist on giving their rats a ‘healthy’ vegan diet. The issue is that, well, as you know rats are omnivores.

    Cats being carnivores and all it just seems utterly mad to me that anyone would do it, but yeah as I say I guess I’m not surprised!

    Reply
  3. Cathy Armato says

    22 April 2016 at 6:17 am

    Cats are definitely meat eaters for sure! They need that protein. Great info here, thanks.

    Reply
  4. Sandra Lee says

    21 April 2016 at 10:48 pm

    What an awesome post on something I have always wondered about! I have vegan acquaintances that I know from rabbit rescue whom I know feed their cats vegan diets – this post makes me really sad for them.

    Reply
  5. Dogvills says

    21 April 2016 at 8:57 pm

    My mother has cats and never fed them vegan diet! So important to raise awareness

    Reply
  6. WherePetsAreFound says

    21 April 2016 at 5:02 pm

    There is no way my girls would accept a Vegan diet…. which is just as well from what you’re telling us! Thanks for the insight. Love the new look of your blog btw, been meaning to say!
    Annette

    Reply
  7. Erin | Tossed Cookies says

    21 April 2016 at 2:22 pm

    Super important topic. With veganism being the latest health craze among humans, we’d seen a shift to people wanting to feed vegan diets to their cats. There are so many health problems that arise from such a switch, and if you’re going to own a cat and treat it well, they can’t conform to your standards.

    Reply
  8. agirlandherhusky says

    21 April 2016 at 1:51 pm

    I love this post. I am vegetarian and would never make my carnivore pets vegetarian. I feel like it defeats the entire purpose of caring for animals if you don’t feed them a proper diet. If you don’t want to have buy and handle meat for your pets, then get a pet that doesn’t naturally eat meat like a rabbit or horse.

    Reply
  9. Sweet Purrfections says

    21 April 2016 at 11:54 am

    This is such an important topic to share with cat owners.

    Reply
  10. Jane says

    21 April 2016 at 10:35 am

    This is a very informative article, great job.

    All of my cats eat meat, wouldn’t have it any other way. & Mr S will try to eat our meat if he has the chance to sneak it off our plate, haha ?

    Reply
  11. rosadoodle says

    21 April 2016 at 10:32 am

    This is a great post! I think so many people are trying to change the diets of our pets to fit their lifestyle or need. Our pets need meat in their diets period!

    Reply
  12. Elizabeth Keene says

    21 April 2016 at 7:29 am

    The thought of someone making a cat to be vegan makes my stomach churn. Dogs, too, for that matter. I saw a vegetarian dog food in a store recently (though, I guess there could still be dairy/egg in it), and it gave me GREAT pause. Dogs don’t need taurine like cats, though. I hope your post helps someone who’s thinking about this and googles it!

    Reply
  13. Tenacious Little Terrier says

    21 April 2016 at 6:56 am

    Yeah… I don’t believe in feeding cats or dogs vegan diets! They’re not meant to eat that way… plus I’m pretty sure Mr. N would starve himself before going vegan.

    Reply
  14. Talent Hounds says

    21 April 2016 at 1:20 am

    We’ve been looking into raw diets a lot on the blog too. It’s amazing the difference giving your pet a natural diet can make. Interesting to see that is also makes an impact on cat’s too.

    Reply
  15. amyshojai says

    20 April 2016 at 11:28 pm

    Great information, and very important to remember that the choices humans make for themselves must also be balanced for the pet with what’s physiologically ideal for the species.

    Reply
  16. Kelly says

    20 April 2016 at 10:30 pm

    In the past year the humans in the house have opted for a diet with less meat and we get our proteins from other sources. But saying that, I believe when it comes to our pets nutrition we must be very careful and understand their needs completely before making changes. Great post, thank you.

    Reply
  17. Denise Yoder-Gruzensky says

    20 April 2016 at 6:11 pm

    Wow, what a great article. I learned so much! We are a dog household and don’t have cats at the moment but I found this information really interesting and shared it. Thank you!

    Reply
  18. Miss Molly Says says

    20 April 2016 at 4:55 pm

    Even though I am vegetarian, I would never think to make my cat eat only veggies. Cats are meant to have meat! Great post and lots of good info!

    Reply
  19. FiveSibesMom says

    20 April 2016 at 12:36 pm

    Thank you for this great and informative article! Just Pinned this on my Mews News board!

    Reply
  20. Sue says

    18 April 2016 at 3:34 am

    Such a great post! My cat, Skeeter, is shocked! I’ve never understood why anyone would try to make their cat a vegetarian and you’ve explained the health reasons why not to so well. Thanks for blogging the change for animals.
    Sue
    Be the Change for Animals
    Talking-dogs.com

    Reply
  21. The Daily Pip says

    18 April 2016 at 3:22 am

    Really important post …I sure hope there aren’t many people who are trying to feed their cats a vegan diet.

    Reply
  22. AthenaWiseKitty (@AthenaWiseKitty) says

    17 April 2016 at 6:21 pm

    Mum’s a vegan but she will never ever feed me or any cat a vegan diet. She respects the fact that I’m a carnivore and feeding me vegan food will do me no good at all.

    Reply
  23. Glogirly and Katie says

    17 April 2016 at 1:14 pm

    WONDERFUL post! It’s such an important topic. Thank you so, so much for writing this. Our cats have been absolutely thriving since switching to a whole food, all protein diet.

    Reply
  24. Cathy Keisha says

    17 April 2016 at 11:52 am

    Bravo! Bravo! A few weeks ago, I chronicled the life of a neighbors cat who wasn’t fed meat by her human. She had to scrounge the hood for cat food. I’m gonna share this.

    Reply
  25. Dawn Miklich (@PetFaves) says

    17 April 2016 at 10:23 am

    I always wondered what made people think vegetarian/vegan diets were okay for cats. This is good information for anyone considering it.

    Thank you for joining is for Blog The Change For Animals!

    Reply
  26. Seville at Nerissa's Life says

    16 April 2016 at 10:24 pm

    My peeps are veggies. Not vegans but definitely vegetarian. But us cats? Our cats are carnivores, for sure. No veggie diets for us. Peeps know that whereas being veggie might be quite good for them, it’s NOT OKAY for kitties, at all. Not okay, not safe and totally unacceptable, for sure. MOUSES!

    Reply
  27. Summer says

    16 April 2016 at 2:06 pm

    Thank you for this! I’m just galled anyone would endanger their cat’s health by foolishly feeding them a vegan diet.

    Reply
  28. Connie says

    16 April 2016 at 11:55 am

    Here here! Along with this, a lot of commercial cat foods that aren’t veg or vegan are still very high in carbohydrates and are not good choices for cats.

    Reply
  29. Lola The Rescued Cat says

    16 April 2016 at 9:05 am

    Hey guys! Sorry we haven’t been around – life is busy. This is a great post with a lot of good information. Mommy was a vegetarian, but now she’s a “flexitarian”. She’d never make us eat a plant based diet, that’s for sure. She knows meat is important for us.

    Reply

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