Your Cat and Eating Christmas Dinner
By: Tippy & Alfred
Christmas dinner is a wonderful time for you to get together
with your friends and family. And of course your cat is
considered to be part of the family. However, feeding your
cat any food from the Christmas dinner table is not only
harmful for it but reinforces bad habits.
Humans like to put butter, salt and sugar on their food,
which is fine in small quantities for humans. But it is very
bad for animals, especially in the quantities that humans
put in their food, both because of the size difference and
the fact that if it is bad for us it is especially bad for
them.
Cats are carnivores and are not designed to eat any cooked
food. This is especially true of the vegetables we normally
eat; they are not a part of any cat's diet at all. Wild cats
eat the stomach and guts of their prey that has pre-digested
grass, leaves and berries for their vegetable dietary needs.
You will never see wild cats eating corn or wheat.
The cooked meat that is served on your dinner table is also
unsuitable for your cat, not only because of the salt,
butter and sugar that is put on the meat but because there
are cooked bones in the meat. When bone is cooked it softens
and can easily shatter when chewed. These shards of bone can
get stuck in your cat's digestive track and can lead to
expensive medical emergencies or even kill it. Not only
that, but cooked meat is not suitable for cats because the
long slow cooking meat kills vital nutrients that your cat
needs.
Feeding your cat from the dinner table also enforces bad
habits. You are essentially telling your cat that human food
is cat food and it will act accordingly. Some
cats will jump
up on the counter or table during the meal or meal
preparation and eat food right in front of you. Some cats
have been known to raid the trash can in search of food. It
is next to impossible, once your cat learns this behavior,
to get it to stop. You will always have to be on guard
against you cat when eating or preparing a meal.
There is a reason that there is commercial cat food
especially made for cats. Cat food manufacturers, if they
are responsible match their cat food as much as possible to
the cat's nutritional needs. (Although there is also the
issue that some manufacturers of cat food use corn, which is
very bad food for cats and dogs. They use this because it is
cheap and filling, although it has no nutritional value for
your cat and can lead to allergies.)
If you want to include your cat with the rest of your family
in the Christmas celebration you can get some
canned cat food
for your cat or mix some gravy in with your regular cat
food. This will give it a special treat and not cause any
health problems for your cat or enforce bad habits. Happy
holidays everyone, and to all good health.
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