Veg*n Should cats and dogs be vegetarian?

Interesting question, I wonder if there is a dog or cat food that contains no animal by products that provides a balanced diet and if there is I don't see the harm in that.

In my opinion no. It's hard to raise a healthy dog or cat on a vegetarian diet and if you get it wrong it could cause HUGE problems. Unlike yourself where you know first hand how you feel, your pet can't tell you it's sympoms easily.

I would say definately not. Just as you said, they are meat eaters by nature. They have hunting instincts and their whole entire digestive system was built for meat, including the shape of their teeth and jaw. Cats and dogs are built the way that they are, for that exact purpose.

I don't know if anybody here is a fan of Futurama, but there's an episode where a group of hippies are protesting the eating of Popplers. Leela says,"Animals eat other animals. It's nature." The hippie replies,"No it isn't. We taught a lion to eat tofu." And then they show the lion who is reduced to skin and bones, looking sickly and coughing.

I personally am not a vegetarian, but I respect and understand why others would choose to be. In the future, I even may become one. However, making that choice for your dog and cat, who are carnivorous, is an extreme thing to do. Would it even be healthy? Even the dried dog and cat food contain meat. I doubt that they would thrive eating nothing but vegetables.

If your dog and cat were not in your household, they would be hunting their own food. I know it seems tough that animals are dying for their food, but that is the way that animals live. As much as we love our pets, they do not have the ability to reason and consider things like animals rights. Perhaps you could have your family members buy and feed the food so you wouldn't feel bad?

Dogs are omnivores. Cats are obligate carnivores. That means if they don't get taurine from a meat source, there are grave consequences. Dogs are easier to force on a vegetarian diet, but I don't think it's healthy for them. They have some taurine issues as well. Dilated Cardiomyopathy (DCM) is one of the best documented disorders caused by feeding vegetarian diets to dogs and cats. Not a good deal.

I do, however, believe in feeding quality ingredients and non-grain-based diets to dogs and cats. It is what they're designed to process and will help them live past their 15-20 year life expectancies healthily.

There is actually a great well balanced vegetarian dog food made by Nature's Recipe. I have heard that dogs don't need meat to survive as long as they are fed a very well balanced dog food. Cats I think have to have meat to live.
I feed my dogs and cats Nutro food. It contains no animal byproducts or fillers. It has meat but no byproducts. Byproducts are feet guts and other left over peices of the animal. Nutro has no byproducts, they only use the actual meat.

My dog eats vegetables as well as meat. I am myself a vegetarian and I do feel bad somtimes about going to the butcher and buying meat. But I think of my dog as having a healthy diet the most important thing.

To cut down on buying meat all the time I buy a bulk load of mince. I cook this and add in vegetables. It also very very healthy for them, better then dog food in cans by far. My vet recommended this to me.

Thank you all so much. Quite a while back our vet put all of my animals on a very good dry food that the number one ingrediant is meat. Chicken and brown rice for the dogs and beef for the cats. There is no meat by-products and no corn. I have some old dogs who get canned and liver every day and some very old cats who also get canned and liver. (Maybe that is why they have all lived so long). Anyway, I will continue to do what I have been doing for the animals. They are all healthy.
I will continue my lifestyle for me. I just wasn't sure about my animals.
The hardest part is cooking liver every day. I don't think there is anything more disgusting than liver, raw or cooked. UGH!
Anyway, thanks again. Suzi

I have thought of putting my dog on a vegetarian diet, but I haven't been able to find a suitable dry food that contains all of the necessary vitamins.

Someone has recommended Nature's Recipe as a good vegetarian dog food, but actually it isn't that good, because it lacks two important vitamins, taurine and I can't think of the name right now, but it's L- something (sorry, that didn't help much).

As with any pet food, vegetarian or not it should be high quality.

tiny_maggs said:

Someone has recommended Nature's Recipe as a good vegetarian dog food, but actually it isn't that good, because it lacks two important vitamins, taurine and I can't think of the name right now, but it's L- something (sorry, that didn't help much).

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Taurine is actually only necesary for cats (important for their eyes). Dogs don't need it.

I could have swore that I read somewhere that dogs need it, just not as much as cats need it. Now I must find where I read that.

No! It is not healthy for a cat or dog to be vegetarian. It is completely unnatural and in my opinion unethical. People have a choice. I applaud those that are chose not to eat inhumanely raised and slaughtered animals. Pets do not have a choice and in my opinion it is not fair to them to expect them to conform to our ethics. My answer for people who are veggie and feel bad feeing their pets meat is to not have pets that require meat diets. The "best" diet for dogs is a raw diet consisting of raw meat and bones supplemented with small amounts of fruits and veggies. There are lots of "back to basics" breeders and pet owners out there that feed this type of diet. It is called BARF (bones and raw foods).

Ok, I found where I read that. It states that some dogs need two amino acids, L-carnitine and taurine. A deficiency in the two can cause dilated cardiomyopathy, a illness in wich the heart becomes large and flabby and can no longer function.

If anyone decided to put their dog on a vegetarian diet it's important to find a vegetarian dog food that contains those nutrients, if you can't find a food that contains them or chose to make the meals yourself it's important to get a good supplement that contains them and other important vitamins.

This is an interesting debate/conversation. On PETA's website, they have a fact sheet devoted to this subject: https://www.helpinganimals.com/Factsheet/files/FactsheetDisplay.asp?ID=34

Basically, it says that the benefits of a human vegetarian diet can be applied to our companion animals as well, as long as the necessary steps are taken to provide a well-balanced diet for dogs and cats.

The suggestion seems to be to make your own dog and cat food. Here is what PETA says regarding the taurine/L-carnitine needs of dogs: "Additionally, some dogs need two amino acids called L-carnitine and taurine which are not generally added to commercial dog foods and can be insufficient in homemade dog food as well. A deficiency of these nutrients can cause dilated cardiomyopathy, a serious illness in which the heart becomes large and flabby and can no longer function. This illness generally strikes young or middle-aged dogs who are deficient in L-carnitine or taurine because of breed, size, individual genetic make-up, or diet. Supplemental L-carnitine and taurine can be bought at your local health food store"

And regarding cats: "Cats are often more finicky than dogs, and their nutritional requirements are more complicated. Cats need a considerable amount of vitamin A, which they cannot biosynthesize from carotene, as dogs and humans do. Insufficient amounts may cause loss of hearing, as well as problems with skin, bones, and intestinal and reproductive systems. Cats also need taurine. A feline lacking taurine can lose eyesight and could develop cardiomyopathy. Commercial pet food companies often add taurine obtained from mollusks. James Peden found vegetarian sources of both taurine and vitamin A, plus arachidonic acid, another essential feline nutrient. He then developed veterinarian-approved supplements Vegecat™ and Vegekit™ to add to his recipes. These recipes are probably the healthiest way to feed cats a vegan diet at this time."

PETA also lists companies that provide vegan/vegetarian food for companion animals, but they caution you not to rely on this fact sheet alone. There is a book dedicated to the subject, Vegetarian Cats & Dogs, which can be ordered through (broken link removed)..

Whether or not you choose to persue a vegetarian diet for your companion animals, I think it's important to buy "pet" food from animal-friendly companies, companies that don't test their products on animals (like IAMS does). PETA has a list of companies that don't test their products on animals: https://www.iamscruelty.com/notTested.asp.

Unfortunately, this debate will go on for some time. It was brought up that whatever you feed should be quality, but diets like Nutro or Nature's Recipe are not quality foods. They can't compare to Solid Gold, some Wysong, Wellness, NDF, not to mention the high-quality raw diets out there. Usually, people only do a lot of the cooked or raw homemade diets partway and screw up ratios of nutrients. It is better if the education is done and the full effort is made. It isn't usually that complicated, but the effort certainly needs to be there.

As per the vegetarian taurine and l-cartinine, I don't have any good research on the bioavailability of the stuff. I don't know how absorbable that stuff is. I have only seen the negative. If anyone has some scientific insight and studies on this, I would love to see the links. As far as PETA's info sheet, I did read it and it has some good info, but then some poor info. Pretty much a wading game. I would never feed my dogs or cats soy. It's not very well utilized. It's a cheap ingredient that is a filler in lower-quality foods. I can't go there.

As much as I would love to not be able to feed my cat meat, I think for her (and I would imagine, a lot of cats) even if their was a nutritionally suitable alternative available, she wouldn't eat it. I don't believe in the 'cr*p in a can', and she gets fresh fish daily instead. She doesn't like chicken or any other seafood.
Picky cat!

I'm not sure if I can advocate applying human ideals onto animals. Dogs and cats essentially evolved to be carnivores over omnivores. A bear is far more omnivorous then either dogs or cats. They are documented to eat things other then meat, they spend quite a lot of their time actually searching for non carnivorous material.
I know that there are diets that can work, but one has to be quite exacting, and frankly, my vet has given my dogs specific diets already, so a non meat alternative was never even mentioned. And I suppose when looking at it that way, it should be something discussed with ones vet before even being attempted. I would never want to put any of my animals in danger, and I wouldn't agree with switching my dogs over to a vegetarian diet without the backing of my vet.

We have choosen to domesticate and keep carnivorous and nearly carnivorous animals. I believe it is unethical to deprive them of their natural diets when they rely on us to feed them. Obviously better treatment for livestock raised to feed our animals is important.

Wolves and wild dogs do not restrain themselves to bones and the prime cuts of their prey. They eat toungues, organs, skin, hair and other things that we call offal to get all the nutrition they need. To be honest the crap way our livestock is raised (opposed to wild and free) it might not be that safe to feed raw. I don't think the BARF diet is any more sensible than a vegetarian one for dogs.

Spirited

Wolves and wild dogs do not cook thier food. Cooking does change the nature of food a lot. I think if one were to seek out a healthy and compassionate source for thieir raw meat (like a local farmer who raises and butchers the cows him/herself and feeds thier cows grains and grass not animal byproducts on a small scale farm) then it would be better then a comercial diet.