Study comparing cost of Raw to canned/kibble

New and extensive comparion of cat food prices (raw vs cannved vs kibble) finds that feeding commercial raw is affordable! When comparing the actual cost of feeding at the recommended amounts, delivered commercial raw can often be cheaper than commercial canned foods, specifically the analyst says cheaper than Friskies. (note: feeding home made raw is cheaper still, and has much better ingredients...)

Worried about feeding raw? Don't be! Domestic cats have been eating raw prey for thousands of years; their short, highly acidic gastrointestinal tract is made to handle raw food and efficiently kills an estimated 98% of pathogens. Check out Dr. Lisa's www.catinfo.org and this Catcentric article.

Worried about feeding raw to your immune-compromised cat? This article explains why these cats need the proven immune-stimulating effects of raw even more!

here is a comparison chart, regarding various commercial raw options. I do notice that Hare-Today.com products are left off... perhaps because they need supplements added?

I feed home-made raw to my horde, including FELV+ fosters, and they are all doing beautifully. Most of the cats switched to raw with little to no fuss. Raw cured Cole's horrible IBD after all the vet suggestions failed. I can make 30 lbs of top notch nutrition in an hour, for way cheaper than canned food! And to top it off, the 'end' results are much smaller, more infrequent, and less stinky. Yay! :lol:

(thank you, Dr Lisa!)
laur

Thanks for posting this

There was a similar thread posted on Catster a few months ago about how much raw feeding costs. I feed my two civies NV frozen raw. It comes out to approximately $0.35 per beef nugget and $0.44 per organic chicken nugget, depending on which store I buy the food from and/or if I have a NV coupon and/or if the store has a sale on raw. Daily cost to feed my boy civie is $1.05 (3 beef nuggets, the only thing he'll eat besides the plain raw chicken I give as treats :roll: ) and either $0.88 (2 chicken nuggets) or $0.79 (one chicken and one beef nugget) for my girl civie. I do feed a little canned and pouched foods once in awhile as treats or to hide liquid medicine in.

Homemade raw would be even cheaper and you can control what goes into the food. I think Dr. Lisa's web site says it costs $0.63 to $0.87 per day for an approximate 5 ounce serving.

Another good web site to learn about raw pet food is http://feline-nutrition.org/index.php

Since I've switched to home-made raw, I've saved a TON of money. With careful purchasing, I'm often able to make my own raw for around $1.00 usually, to at most $1.50 a pound (a pound feeds 3 cats a day). The other day I scored 25+ lbs of whole cut-up chicken (including liver, gizzards) at Food Lion for 97 cents a pound. Thighs and legs were on sale too at 99 cents. After the holidays, I stuffed my big freezer with turkey and turkey breasts for an awesome 55 cents a pound, so that cost me way less than a dollar per finished pound of raw food. I even save a bundle on the Platinum Performance supplements by getting the autoship discount. Wooo hooo!

Liver and gizzards/hearts are surprisingly typically more expensive than whole chicken or chicken parts, costing around $1.39/lb. They aren't required in my recipe but I like to use the fresh source whenever possible. And the gizzards are supposed to be good for cleaning teeth. The cats certainly enjoy them! So when I can get them, it's worth the couple extra pennies per serving. It still costs me less than 50 cents a day per cat.

When I can get tuna-in-water on a good sale, I stock up on that too. Now and then I'll mix a can of tuna into the raw as a treat. Recently I read about using nitrite-free bacon as an occasional flavor treat too. I'll see if I can find it, and how much...

My only regret? That I waffled so long due to my vet's disapproval and my worries about time/cost and cat acceptance.

laur

I have and use the Nature's Variety raw chicken, but one medallion per meal doesn't seem like enough for my cat. Plus he seems to have a different personality on the raw food -- kind of crazy looking. Not sure what that's about. Anyway, so I've been mixing it with other food liek Fancy Feast or Before Grain. The other cat doesn't chow down her food right away (takes half a day to finish) so I don't give her the raw food. NV says it shouldn't be out more than 1/2 hour. Not a problem with Spot, but a big one with DeeDee.

Do you have an Asian market in the area? You can get gizzards and liver and other organs for cheaper than at regular supermarket. BJs, Costco, Sams Club, etc have meat in huge bulk packages which may also make the cost of homemade raw cheaper.

ammonzon said:

I have and use the Nature's Variety raw chicken, but one medallion per meal doesn't seem like enough for my cat.

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ECID. I only have civies so their needs are different from that of a diabetic. Both cats are at ideal body weights and are doing great

It's cheaper for me to feed raw as well. I watch for BOGO sales and buy several flats of thighs then and freeze until I need to "cook" up a batch of food.

Initially, I thought I wasn't feeding my cats enough either. The servings are smaller than canned, and they were begging for more food. As they adjusted to the new food, they want the servings I give now. I think canned has so much filler, that's why the servings are bigger.

I break the rules about how long I leave food out. I'm in nursing school so I get little sleep as it is, so ripping off lids and throwing food down as I run out the door is the best I can do. They have only thrown up if they ate too fast, but never from eating food that has been down several hours. They're fine, and it's the best I can do. I follow Dr. Pierson's recipe, but I add a little extra taurine and I set my oven at 550 degrees to deal with bacteria on the outside of the chicken. Otherwise, I leave it pretty raw.

Oh, and my cats have SO MUCH ENERGY on raw...they are still on a mission to destroy my house even months later. I tend to agree with one of the articles posted in this thread. Cats aren't that lazy, what we've been feeding has had them sick!