What is wrong with feeding your cat tuna?

What is wrong with feeding your cat tuna? Answer: canned tuna is not a complete cat food. Cats need certain nutrients and canned tuna does not contain all the required nutrients. That alone is reason enough to limit tuna as a cat treat.

What is wrong with feeding cats tuna? Ans: it is not a complete cat food.

Also there are different varieties of canned tuna. For example it can be supplied in oil with added salt. It sounds obvious but tuna in water must be the choice if feeding your cat a treat.

Another factor is that some cats are allergic to fish, we are told. I have not tested that idea but it could be true.

Foods high in unsaturated fats are unhealthy for a cat and tuna is high in unsaturated fats.

Tuna contains more mercury than other fish. This is because tuna is high up on the food chain and so the fish accumulate more mercury. Apparently canned white tuna can contain three times the amount of mercury than skipjack tuna.

Some cat owners might consider feeding their cat raw tuna. Veterinarians consider it unwise to feed raw foods to cats because they believe cat owners are unable to ensure that no cross-contamination of bacteria occurs due to poor storage. I think this underestimates cat owners but I can see the dangers. Small amounts of raw tuna should be okay in my opinion provided correct storage procedures are adhered to. Of course your cat might dislike it being conditioned to eating commercially prepared foods.

There are many advocates of homemade raw cat food. They say it has improved their cat’s health. I’d recommend it provided it is done with caution, care and expertise.

Tuna should never be a cat’s exclusive diet as it is not a complete cat food. If cooked it should be plain with no added seasoning. Once again this is common sense.

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The main problem with feeding cats raw fish is that it contains an enzyme which destroys the essential B vitamin thiamine. Cooking removes that enzyme as well as parasite eggs (heart worm) and bacteria while retaining all the nutrients. Meat should also be cooked to eliminate any bacterial and parasite contamination. Cooking also improves it’s bio-availability by 20-30%. That advantage is certainly worthwhile. One of my Turkish Vans was sent to a breeder in Germany who feeds all his cats raw meat. She died of an incurable infection despite the vet’s best efforts. I place the blame firmly on the raw meat diet. Her sister and mother who are still with me never get anything raw and enjoy perfect health. I regard the raw meat diet as a fad based on the observation that cats in the wild eat freshly caught prey which is inaccurately extrapolated to mean that raw meat is natural and better. This is not the case since wild cats have a much shorter lifespan than domestic cats partly due to their often parasite and disease infested prey. It doesn’t make any sense to feed your cat raw food. Note how your cat may bring prey back home but they don’t eat it. Maybe they know better than we do. Another bit of inexpert advice from the experts is that you should not feed your cat liver. But they don’t stipulate which liver. There is an enormous difference between the vitamin A content of chicken liver and beef liver but they only vaguely refer to “liver” as if they were all the same. One average serving of beef liver provides 431% of the minimum daily requirement of vitamin A which is a dangerous overdose for a cat whereas chicken liver only has 75% of the MDR. A daily serving of chicken liver would pose no danger at all to your cat’s health. On the contrary it would supply a wide variety of essential vitamins and high quality protein. But it is black-listed by nutritional experts. Sad. Instead of tuna I would suggest sardines which are just as nutritious without the high mercury content. You can compare the nutritional values of sardines and tuna by accessing nutriondata. https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/poultry-products/667/2

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Comments

What is wrong with feeding your cat tuna? — 3 Comments

M E King on August 30, 2018 at 2:50 am said:
My cats get the occasional small can of albacore to share. Other than that I try to limit or eliminate any fish from their diet.
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- Michael Broad on August 30, 2018 at 6:28 am said:
  Me too.
  Reply ↓
Harvey Harrison on August 29, 2018 at 6:25 pm said:
The main problem with feeding cats raw fish is that it contains an enzyme which destroys the essential B vitamin thiamine. Cooking removes that enzyme as well as parasite eggs (heart worm) and bacteria while retaining all the nutrients. Meat should also be cooked to eliminate any bacterial and parasite contamination. Cooking also improves it’s bio-availability by 20-30%. That advantage is certainly worthwhile. One of my Turkish Vans was sent to a breeder in Germany who feeds all his cats raw meat. She died of an incurable infection despite the vet’s best efforts. I place the blame firmly on the raw meat diet. Her sister and mother who are still with me never get anything raw and enjoy perfect health. I regard the raw meat diet as a fad based on the observation that cats in the wild eat freshly caught prey which is inaccurately extrapolated to mean that raw meat is natural and better. This is not the case since wild cats have a much shorter lifespan than domestic cats partly due to their often parasite and disease infested prey. It doesn’t make any sense to feed your cat raw food. Note how your cat may bring prey back home but they don’t eat it. Maybe they know better than we do. Another bit of inexpert advice from the experts is that you should not feed your cat liver. But they don’t stipulate which liver. There is an enormous difference between the vitamin A content of chicken liver and beef liver but they only vaguely refer to “liver” as if they were all the same. One average serving of beef liver provides 431% of the minimum daily requirement of vitamin A which is a dangerous overdose for a cat whereas chicken liver only has 75% of the MDR. A daily serving of chicken liver would pose no danger at all to your cat’s health. On the contrary it would supply a wide variety of essential vitamins and high quality protein. But it is black-listed by nutritional experts. Sad. Instead of tuna I would suggest sardines which are just as nutritious without the high mercury content. You can compare the nutritional values of sardines and tuna by accessing nutriondata. https://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/poultry-products/667/2
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