10 months - April 23, 2009

We have now entered our 10th month of raw feeding and I really do not know where the time has gone? What really amazes me is the interest that the raw feeding diary seems to have generated because since starting it, I have received countless emails and phone calls regarding the raw feeding by both pet owners and breeders.

I'm not even sure where to begin with this entry as we have had some up and down with the raw feeding, mainly with the kittens, not the adults. We also lost one of our own family members, Amaretto, to a kidney disease called CRF (Chronic Renal Failure). If anything, anything at all has strengthened my resolve to continue raw feeding it is the loss of our darling girl. In Amaretto's case CRF was inevitable in that it is most definitely in the line, we found that out after her death, however, had she been on a natural diet for the whole of her life I do firmly believe that we would have had her for a few more years.

Our own adult cat family, as you can imagine, are well and truly used to their natural diet now and I don't think a great deal has changed with our own cat family although energy levels do seem higher these days but that could actually be attributed to the fact that the weather is warming up now. Stools continue to be totally and utterly perfect, litter tray duty has been an absolute pleasure for months now. It's funny actually because during the past few months, we have had a couple of queens not owned by ourselves, here for honeymoons with Ashanti and I have to say that the difference between the stools of a commercially fed cat and a raw fed cat is huge. So much so that the moment I entered the stud room during the honeymoon periods, it was very obvious that these girls were commercially fed because the odour, and the texture of the stools was totally disgusting and not what I have been used to seeing for the past 8 months or so.

As for the kittens, well we have had a number of issues and if I'm being honest, a total lack of confidence on my behalf. Since October we have had 3 litters born in the home, the October litter have left home now obviously but we still have the majority of the other 2 litters here as they are in the throes of leaving home at the moment. With our first litter, the Magic Roundabouts, it was a litter of 5, a totally raw fed litter, no commercial foods, massive, massive babies, the biggest I have ever seen, and we had no problems at all, not a single one. At the time even our vet commented on their size and vigour. As you can imagine, I was totally thrilled that our first raw fed litter was so successful. Then, in December, along came Litter Number 2, the Boxing Day Babes. Just like our previous mum, Drambuie had been on a totally natural diet throughout her pregnancy and in the space of 2 hours, at 5 years of age, she delivered 7 babies! It was instant panic, we had been hoping for a litter of 3 or 4, not such a massive litter and with a litter this size, birth weights are smaller, and not all babies will latch on straight away. There was also the fact that a litter this size would be early weaned, starting at around 3 weeks of age.

Well we got to the 3 week stage, we had 8 days or thereabouts of syringe feeding a couple of the smaller babies but by 2 weeks of age, the kittens were all thriving, all 7 of them were doing incredibly well. We introduced weaning onto a mixture of raw Prize Choice mince and an evaporated milk/baby rice mixture. Again, no problems with this and I was pleasantly surprised to see that such a huge litter was doing so incredibly well. The boys in the litter were an excellent size, the girls in the litter were also very robust. Then.............

along came Litter Number 3, our Curries. Again, a large litter of 6 and once the labour was over but this time around the babies birth weights were smaller than I was used to seeing from Ashanti children, Lucy's mammary glands were huge, swollen with milk, and the babies were latching on and feeding however by the following day, approximately 12 hours after birth, I weighed all 6 as I felt something was not right and all 6 babies had made losses, some of them huge. I was horrified and could not understand it. We phoned our vet and told her we were bringing in mum and newborns and my thought at the time was whether or not Lucy had mastitis. I've never seen a queen with mastitis before and wasn't really sure what I should be looking for but she was just so incredibly swollen and I wondered if it was the start of mastitis. Anyway, Jo thoroughly examined Lucy, and the babies, and reassured us that she didn't have mastitis and was just fine however she had loads and loads of milk and that's why she looked swollen. Jo was concerned about a couple of our smaller babies and did not actually hold out much hope for them. So we went back home with mum and babies and syringe feeding started for our smaller babies.

A few days later there was still a problem in that the babies were latching on and drinking very well, however there were minimal, minimal gains. At this stage I made the decision to start syringe feeding all 6 kittens every 2 hours. We continued with this for the first 3 weeks of their lives and during those first 3 weeks the babies started making very good gains and were thriving. They were still feeding from Lucy as well but were just not getting what they needed. These 6 babies in comparison to the Roundabouts, were very small however and obviously they did not receive the colostrum from their mum due to not feeding from her for the first 3 days etc.. We had some ups and downs and exhausting weeks with this litter but they were worth it, well they always are.

At 3 weeks we went straight onto early weaning and again, this was pretty successful, using the same raw/milk mixture that we used for the Boxing Day Babes. All 6 Curries were progressing well, smaller than I would like to see but perfectly happy, healthy, and active. So why on earth did I make the decision to include wet commercial cat food in their meals? I have thought long and hard about this and there are 2 reasons, the first being between the 2 litters, we suddenly had 13 babies, that is a lot of babies and I very stupidly panicked, in a nutshell that was it. I figured that as they were from massive litters there was no way they would thrive solely on raw food and that they absolutely must commercial foods to help them grow more. Yes I know that was idiotic and not once did I ever have those thoughts with our Roundabouts so why these 2. Solely because one litter was hand fed for the first 3 weeks of their lives, and the other litter had 7 babies. There really is no other reason and even that is not a reason at all. In my defense, it comes down to still being a novice raw feeder and having pure panic at the litter sizes. Also I guess, there was the fact that the majority of our Roundabout's new families were not going to continue with the raw feeding, at least not as a staple part of the diet so I did realise that at some point the babies should really have commercial foods prior to leaving home so that when they move in with their new families they would not have major tummy upsets by going onto commercial foods. Having said that, I have been adamant with all new families that they MUST not just put their baby straight onto commercial foods and have been supplying each of them with raw, frozen meals and information sheets on how to change baby onto commercial if that is what they choose to do.

Both litters then had wet commercial foods mixed in with every single meal, I hated doing it but was convinced I was doing the right thing and our youngest litter is now 14 weeks of age and the babies have all been having commercial/raw for the past 7 weeks. Then, it came to vaccination time, the babies all passed their first health check with flying colours and were all vaccinated. Approximately 3 days after first vaccinations, some of the babies were not doing well, they were losing weight, and were not as active. So what did I do? Panic even more and stuffed even more commercial foods into their bodies, I even tried to put them onto kitten biscuits, something that I spoke with Gwen about at the time because I was just feeling so upset about it all and because I just didn't know where I was going wrong with these 2 litters in comparison to the Roundabouts. Gwen was amazing, totally supportive, and being a raw feeder herself she was a massive help and she managed to talk me out of going down the biscuit route again and she was right. I did however, stick with the commercial wet foods. It came time for 2nd vaccinations and I was not happy at all with the size of a few of the babies, neither was the locum vet that we saw as our own vet as away and he would not vaccinate 5 of the 13 but was happy to vaccinate the other 8. After this, I concentrated a lot of effort into getting the babies to eat more, trying to give more raw than commercial and after another week, I was seeing changes in the smaller of the babies, their appetite had picked up, they were very energetic, and most importantly, after they were fed their own meals separately in the kitchen, they were then joining the rest of the family and would spend the next couple of hours tearing at meaty bones and chunks of meat. Even our 2 tiny Siamese babies and our own little Tandoori. By 13 weeks of age, they were back to normal, they were going in and out of the cat run, and even though they are certainly not the largest litter we've had, to say the least, but they are doing well and they all love their raw diet. They are still on wet commercial as well and the brands I am sticking with are: Hi Life, Pets At Home own brand, Natures Harvest which seems fantastic, and Natures Menu.

Even now I am wondering what on earth happened that made me go from feeling so incredibly confident about a natural diet for kittens to just totally panicking and I know it's the size of the 2 litters, I have no doubts about that. Having gone through the Roundabouts leaving home now, with the other babies leaving throughout the next month, I do realise the importance of including some wet commercial at some stage during their last few weeks with us because otherwise it will be a huge shock to their digestive system when they move in with new families. It's not something I want to do, but for the sake of the new families and the kittens themselves, it can't be avoided. Of if it can I have no idea how and would welcome any thoughts :)

We do have a brand new raw feeding challenge in that on April 17 we collected the newest addition to the Schimmel home, in the form of a puppy. This little girl was raised on a commercial doggy diet obviously so our aim will be to get her onto a natural diet as soon as possible. Our Rottweiler, Jag, is on a totally raw diet and has been for quite a long time now and we want to do the same with our new puppy so that is going to be fun and games.

I have included a couple of raw feeding photos, not many and nothing exciting, just some of the babies eating their raw meals.