I will never be a vegetarian in my entire life, but I'm just curious about the pets..

[sophistacavy]

...that you guys have. I think vegpeople have a wonderful idea, but what do you do about the welfare of your carnivore pets(dogs, cats), and especially obligate carnivore pets like ferrets? And I've seen eggs used in supposedly "vegetarian" dog foods, but if I were one of you, in my opinion, an egg is still an animal. It's just unfertilized, but it easily could've become a lovely chicken or other such poultry, except someone stole it and mushed it up into dog food. Is the idea that the essential missing amino acid is present in eggs?

Also, I just have to voice my opinion that you are being SO cruel to a ferret if you're trying to make it into a "veggie-fuzzbutt". Consuming fruits and veggies, and starches, and fibers, amongst other things, can even be deadly sometimes to ferrets! And they can't live on eggs alone! So, I hope that if you are a vegan/vegetarian & you own a ferret, that you never ever try to force him/her to do the same. That is so horrible. Read "Ferrets for Dummies" and you'll understand. Be kind to fuzzies, or just don't adopt one at all! Save it for someone like me who will feed it the BARF diet, along w/ other things that would probably = total terror for you all(so I'll leave it at this). Try reading "Ferrets for Dummies"!!! (don't read it if you're queasy, for example: it tells you how to offer live prey to your ferret)

Thats all! Please don't take offense, as I certainly do not mean any, and I fully respect your opinions, and keep up the good work!

[PrayerWarrior]

First off, I definitely don't appreciate your title or the way you approached this and wrote it.

All that aside and focusing solely on your question, I have two cats and two dogs, and they eat dog and cat food. They are carnivores to my knowledge, and that's what they're supposed to eat. So they get the food they need.

Humans are not carnivores, and meat is not needed. So I don't eat it.

For me it's all about what's needed in nature. I don't accept or appreciate live animals being fed to snakes kept in captivity, but if the snake catches live animals in the wild, I have no problem with that. That's the way it's supposed to be. Dogs need meat, so they get the dog food they need.

[Haley0489]

There was a thread about this once. http://www.guineapigcages.com/forum/...ighlight=vegan

I'm not vegan or vegetarian and even I found your post a bit brash.

[PiggieMamaKelly]

"I'm not 100% in love with your tone right now" - Caveman commercial

[Autaven]

Can I just say that first, the egg wasn't 'stolen' away. It wouldn't have been fertilised at any point after being laid. It's basically like - if you will - a chicken period. It HAS to lay an egg, whether or not it becomes a chicken depends on if there's a rooster. You're saying it as if someone is almost giving the chicken an abortion and taking it out of it's stomach - it doesn't work like that.

I'm vegetarian but my long term boyfriend who I live with isn't. He has his own separate place in the fridge for meat, and if he wants it he can cook it. I still love him all the same and won't force anything on him if that's what he requires/likes for his diet. Same goes for pets.

I find your post, like others, a little harsh. You're not vegetarian and I don't really know who it's directed at, at that. I personally wouldn't make my carnivore pets vegetarian, but that's just me.

[dra&pigs]

I'm not a vegetarian but I still think your post was unnecessarily harsh. To my knowledge, dogs and cats are carnivores (and, I guess, so are ferrets, I wouldn't know, I've never owned one), so to provide a proper diet, meat should be included. If a human doesn't *need* meat to survive, and eating it promotes bad things (I'm not going to go into all the "bad things" I could rant about) then, why should they. But just because a human can survive and thrive without meat doesn't mean another species can. So considering this website is animal-friendly, I would assume the people here would feed their animals whatever food they need to stay healthy and happy, regardless of their own meat-eating choice.

[AnimalHouse36]

I am a strong vegatarian and I feel that was a very rude post. I personaly don't own ferrets but if I did and I saw what you just said I would be even more offended. You came on here and assumed how people kept their animals. People tent to put their own beleifs behind when it comes to their animals diet. I know I feed my dog a meat friendly diet!

But first you decide to state you would never want to be a vegatarian and you say it in the way you did was very offensive. And you need to get your facts straight. EGGS ARE NOT FERTALIZED THERE FOR THEY COULD NEVER HAVE BEEN BABIES! I have gotten into so many arguments that it just gets me angry to assume they know what they are talking about.

[Newpiggiemom]

I think one thing that is missed here is social consciousness. Animals can't think of the consequences of their eating. They don't take into consideration the fact that something had to die for their dinner. They're not supposed to think that way, that's not the way they were made. They were made to be meat eaters and so they should eat it.

I personally decided to go vegetarian about 7 months ago. It had nothing to do with health reasons but the fact that I felt guilty about some animal having to die for me to eat. I couldn't drive past the cattle farm 2 miles from my house every day and listen to my children talk about which cow was their favorite and how cute that one was and then eat one for dinner. It just wasn't working for me.

My dogs don't care. And that's OK.

[PrayerWarrior]

I totally agree, Newpiggiemom. When I said it should be in nature, I meant for wild animals. I went vegetarian for the sake of animals as well.

[PIGGYMAMMA495]

I would like to know what gave the writer of the post the idea that people here on gpc.com are trying to turn their pets into vegiatrians? I think it is uncalled for to slam vegitarians with no evidence of posts to back it up.
I am not a vegan, however I am researching it, and I am interested in giving it a shot. My kids do not eat much meat, and I think it would be easy to cut out meat and meat products easily. And if we can't do it all together we can just cut back majorly. This post opened my eyes to the fact that I need to save animals by not eating them and standing up for them.
And although this post was quite offensive to vegans, it made me mad enough to get off my butt and quit eating meat, or well try to as much as possibble. SO tommrow is day one.
And I wont pressure my animals to be vegan either. ALthough all i have is fish and piggies who love veggies so.

[PIGGYMAMMA495]

OOPs Id like to clarify my post a bit thanks to being a little educated by Prayer Warrier , so thanks LOL.
I am offically vegitarian.(sp). I want to go full out vegan since we are crazy hippies. So the vegan is no animal by products and no meat. Which I feel is totally awesome. But for now I will go meatless and be a vegitarian.(sp)
BUt soon to be a vegan.
Im still p.o.ed about that post though LOL.
Thanks Prayer warrier for helping me with my terms LOL.

[guineapigluver1]

First off, like all the others, I found it was a very rude post. An egg cannot, under any circumstances, be an animal unless fertilized. The yolk is just the protien that it would need (if it was fertilized) to grow and live, the anatomy is complicated, so I won't go into detail. Anyway's we have three cats and they eat like carnivores because that is how they are supposed to eat, no vegetables, no grains, no fruits, just meat, bones, and organs like they are supposed to eat. We still aren't sure, but they are either eating Wysong canned Au Jus or a raw food diet for cats recipe we found. I don't think that animals that are carnivores should have to eat a vegetarian or vegan diet because it just isn't right. Read this: http://www.catinfo.org/commercialcannedfoods.htm
I think it applies to dogs to.

[caviecrazie]

Despite the fact that cats go blind and eventually die if they don't eat meat, like people have said, they are carnivores. We [humans] are supposed to be vegetarian and they are supposed to eat meat.

[guineapigluver1]

I just saw someone on another forum say how our digestive tracts and teeth are that we are really more along the lines of not eating any meat, because it's harder for us to digest meat, and that no animal ever cooks it's food yet humans do. But she eats meat.

[Taboo]

We are omnivores and can not eat meat, that is if someone is so unselfish they give up meat to save countless lives. i mean, really, is meat worth it? its in your mouth like 2 seconds. Its all about stupid tastebuds. If you couldnt taste you wouldnt care whether you ate meat or not would you? Why cause billions of animals every year to be tortured and killed so that you can eat a "tasty" hamburger or something? Frankly I find the human race to be sick and selfish that they could eat meat KNOWING what happens to those animals you're eating.

And eggs that arent fertilized arent living and never were so theres nothing wrong with it. I dont even like eggs much myself though.

And my dogs, cats, eat meat, which is fine because they are carnivores and have no choice (though i would like to find cat/dog food thats meat was humanely treated and killed). I plan on getting ferrets soon and they'll eat ferret food. I'd NEVER feed a live animal to any animal. Or a dead one for that matter (like thawed rats, mice, etc) which is why i'll never own a mammal eatting snake.

[CherryCake]

I have been vegetarian for 6+ yrs and feed meat to my animals that eat it.I would NEVER make a carnivore or even omnivore,eat a strictly veggie diet.Thats cruel to the animal IMO.

I am very against vegetarian diets for dogs and cats.

[Weatherlight]

Guess I'll have the unpopular opinion here yet again. I'm a bit short on time so I'll paste part of an email to a curious vet:

http://www.vegetariancats.com/study.htm is the study done by people at the University of Pennsylvania:

Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association
July 1, 2006, Vol. 229, No. 1, Pages 70-73
doi: 10.2460/javma.229.1.70

One manufacturer in Australia had their products evaluated: http://veganpet.com.au/articles/?page_id=10

http://www.vegepets.info/ depends a lot on anecdotes for some stuff, which I don't like, but it did collect a lot of information. With the knowledge void, I understand that anecdotes and extrapolation are sometimes all that's available.

Obligate Carnivore by Jed Gillen has some inaccurate information but I liked the views on the effects of veganism and the advice for switching over animals to new foods. I personally wouldn't let a cat go over 12 hours or so refusing food as I'm afraid of organ failure (and I think it's mean to starve someone into accepting a food that tastes too strange or unpleasant). At one shelter I volunteered at, the cat employee told me she'd lost cats who were so stressed they wouldn't eat. I went around with her as she forcefed cats so that wouldn't happen again.

http://www.vegepet.com/stories.html and http://www.dotphoto.com/go.asp?L=veg...ID=1422707&G=Y are galleries of cats and dogs who eat vegetarian food, including cats who were vegan for 10+ years. Some people like personal stories like that. I thought http://www.vegepet.com/Stories/twokittens.html was very cute


The earliest commercial product for vegan cat diets is Vegecat from 1986, to my knowledge, followed by Evolution from 1989.


I hope this is helpful.

To a non-speciesist, the answer is obvious. If my cat suddenly develops bad allergies to all plant foods (rather unlikely), I'd kill humans to help hir if I had to. I'd kill gpigs, elephants, other cats, fishes, horses, whoever. Because I might not be speciesist but I am selfish and familyist. Good thing my cats can be very healthy on an appropriate vegan diet. They do not go blind (as many meat-eating cats did and do from lack of taurine) because they eat food that is designed for cats (and contains vegan taurine). They also get preformed vitamin A, arachidonic acid, etc.

I also don't think it would be cruel to my gpigs to feed them meat, provided the saturated fats are removed, fiber is added, excess vitamin A is removed, vitamin C is added, etc etc. Basically, if it's healthy for them, then that works.

I force my beliefs on everyone every day. Especially going to the vet. No one around here especially loves the vet. If left up to them, they'd probably prefer to not go. Same with food. I force them to not eat antifreeze even if they'd prefer to eat it. Too bad for them. (ie, health and ignorant taste preferences are two different issues.)

[Paula]

Originally Posted by Weatherlight

Guess I'll have the unpopular opinion here yet again.

I don't think it's so much an opinion as it is a fact - animals need to be fed an appropriate diet.

Feeding an herbivore meat or a carnivore strictly vegetables, while perhaps not cruel, is at least irresponsible. Animals need a natural source of the vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients that are essential to them. A synthetic diet just doesn't provide that. If you have an animal that has health issues and needs a modified diet, then by all means, you should do whatever is necessary to find a diet that works for them and keeps them happy and healthy. Otherwise, in my opinion, it does absolutely border on cruel to feed an animal a diet that is not appropriate from an evolutionary standpoint.

The fact that you might be able to make it work, doesn't necessarily make it right.

[Sammy and Peanut]

Originally Posted by sophistacavy

...that you guys have. I think vegpeople have a wonderful idea, but what do you do about the welfare of your carnivore pets(dogs, cats), and especially obligate carnivore pets like ferrets? And I've seen eggs used in supposedly "vegetarian" dog foods, but if I were one of you, in my opinion, an egg is still an animal. It's just unfertilized, but it easily could've become a lovely chicken or other such poultry, except someone stole it and mushed it up into dog food. Is the idea that the essential missing amino acid is present in eggs?

Also, I just have to voice my opinion that you are being SO cruel to a ferret if you're trying to make it into a "veggie-fuzzbutt". Consuming fruits and veggies, and starches, and fibers, amongst other things, can even be deadly sometimes to ferrets! And they can't live on eggs alone! So, I hope that if you are a vegan/vegetarian & you own a ferret, that you never ever try to force him/her to do the same. That is so horrible. Read "Ferrets for Dummies" and you'll understand. Be kind to fuzzies, or just don't adopt one at all! Save it for someone like me who will feed it the BARF diet, along w/ other things that would probably = total terror for you all(so I'll leave it at this). Try reading "Ferrets for Dummies"!!! (don't read it if you're queasy, for example: it tells you how to offer live prey to your ferret)

Thats all! Please don't take offense, as I certainly do not mean any, and I fully respect your opinions, and keep up the good work!

Ok, first off, bad idea to go onto a pro vegetarian forum and pretty much bash vegetarians. I've been a vegetarian since January, vegan since August. Eggs are vegetarian, but not vegan. There is never a living creature inside the egg unless a rooster is around to fertilize it. And most farmers, or people with chickens, don't even keep the roosters near the hens, unless they are intent of having chicks.

Another thing. Why the heck are accusing people of trying to turn their ferrets and such into so called "veggie-fuzzbutts"? Most people on this forum think it's cruel and harsh to cut them off from what they need. I feed my cat beef and turkey, stuff like that! Yes, I may gag through the process, but I still do it! Just becuase we have one belief, it doesn't mean that we will force our animals to have the same. What kind of monsters do you think we are? You might as well just kill the animal right away, because it's not gonna last long with that kind of diet! "Read "Ferrets for Dummies" and you'll understand". What does that mean? That we don't know how to take care of our ferrets? Because if that's what you mean, you couldn't be more wrong. I don't have a ferret myself, but many people on this forum do! So please, next time you wanna ask a question like that, don't.

[crazywiggy]

I am strongly of the belief that seeing as keeping animals is a choice, it is our responsibility to give them a proper diet. I would not feed my guinea pigs meat or dairy products, and I would not try to feed carnivorous pets a veg*n diet for the same reasons.

I completely agree with Paula - even if it is possible to keep a carnivorous animal on a vegie diet I do not bieleve you should - it is so completely unnatural, and has to go through so much modification to make it safe and suitable. (Sorry Weatherlight - nothing personal!)

As to the wider issues.... I believe humans are by nature omnivores so I see nothing wrong with eating animal products. However, I am aware of the cruelty involved, and that it is possible for a human to be healthy on a veggie diet, so I have no problem with anyone who chooses to go vegetarian or vegan - full respect to them. But this is personal choice. I do not agree with inflicting an unnatural and potentially harmful diet on other animals.

Finally - I do think this came across as a very offensive post. I'm not veggie, but even I found it insulting.