A lot of vegans and vegetarians want to feed their cats a vegan or vegetarian diet. Feeding a cat a vegan or vegetarian diet can have severely harmful or fatal results.
Unlike humans, cats are true carnivores, meaning they must eat meat to survive. Cats need taurine which they can only get from meat sources. Humans can produce taurine themselves, but cats cannot. Cats must get their vitamin A from meat sources. Unlike humans, cats cannot convert beta carotene which is from plant sources to vitamin A.
Cats require high levels of protein in their diets. They cannot store protein and must eat high amounts of protein daily. Cats also need high amounts of fat in their diet. Cats cannot produce certain essential fatty acids themselves and they must get them from a meat source.
The vitamin, fatty acid and protein requirements that cats can only get from meat sources are essential to a cats health. These are not things that can be left out of their diet.
Cats, like all true carnivores, have short intestinal tracts that are not designed to digest vegetable matter. Omnivores and herbivores have much longer intestinal tracts. Longer intestinal tracts are needed to break down vegetable matter.
There are people and pet food companies that say a cat can be fed a vegetarian or vegan diet. This is dangerous information that can lead to major health problems and even death. Some of the vegan cat food manufacturers utilize supplements in their foods to try and provide everything cats need in their diets. These vegan diets, even with supplements, can cause urinary tract problems and other severe health problems.
Most veterinarians are stronlgly against cats being fed a vegan or vegetarian diet, because it is truly not a suitable diet. Even if your cat can survive on a vegan or vegetarian diet, they most likely will not thrive well. Long term, a cat on a vegan or vetarian diet will most likely develop vitamin deficiancies.
Vegans and vegetarians often want their cats to live meat free as an act of humane concerns for animals. In reality to feed a cat a vegan or vegetarian diet is to treat the cat inhumanely.
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