Chicken necks and prey model

Feeding just chicken necks is still debated. BARF and raw meaty bones generally say feeding just necks is fine. While people who stick to the prey model diet say that necks have too much bone.

If we compare necks to the prey model diet we see that necks have three times the recommended amount. Necks are about 36% bone. Some common prey and amounts are: rodents and small birds have about 5% bones, rabbits are 9%, chicken 32%, and quail 10% and so on. So its easy to see why the rough guideline of 10%(prey model) is a good range. While feeding cats is not an exact science we do have to look at the bones we feed.

A mouse consisting of 5% bones has a calcium and phosphorous ratio of 1.73:1 (published data on whole prey). Whole chicken at 32% bone has a ratio of 1.6:1. A Pipit (small bird)of 5% bone is 1.2:1. Rabbit at 9% bone is 1.72:1. Chicken necks at 36% bone has 1.1:1

This shows that feeding a variety of things is beneficial.Trying to achieve a mouse type of diet, i feel, won't be met by just feeding 10% of bones that we normally have available to us (calcium is also found in meat and organs but a majority of it comes from bones). I am pretty sure chicken bones are used more than any other bone. They are easy to grind, easy to find, and the smaller parts can be eaten by cats. So i think its safe to say that chicken bones may not be as nutritious as mouse bones, or maybe there is something else that plays a part.

I am all for a prey model diet but at 10% bone with common chicken bones I don't feel you will be truly achieving a prey model diet. Sure the recommended bone amount is right on but nutritionally it doesn't seem to compare to prey. I don't know the specifics of the other diets listed above but there may be a reason why they chose more bone. Again not sure why just speculating using the info I found.

Any thoughts?

This is a wonderful post, chris, I hope others chime in!

My thoughts:

While the "technical talk" kind of confuses me (blonde! LOL), I feel that a mixture of prey items is best. Just chicken necks is likely to cause long term issues, IMO. A cat wouldn't just eat ONE meat/bone source. Just like feeding only mice would cause issues. We feed chicken/mice/bunnies/beef (no bone)/pork (no bone)/venison (no bone).. obviously the mice/chicken and rabbit they eat the bones for those guys. I personally feel as though we should try and make their diet as varied as possible for their sakes.

As for bone content, we feed more than 10% bone on a regular basis, and we have noticed no negative effects or constipation because we balance it with the organ meals and muscle meats. I think 10% is easy to START with, and therefore most recommended.. I don't feel that more bone will harm them, though.

A majority of my diet is chicken mainly because I can't get other things without giving an arm and a leg. I do try to mix it up with turkey, beef, and fish through out the week. So chicken bones are pretty much the staple.

I haven't heard of the rough guidelines of 80 10 10 until the other day. I started thinking about what I knew about chicken and those numbers weren't making sense. The only thing I am questioning is the nutritional value of chicken bones. To me, after a long discussion on another board, they may be lower in calcium. Being that it takes 30% or so of bones just to achieve the 1.6:1 ratio in a whole chicken. In mice or other animals listed above its not too much more than 5% bones to achieve that ratio. So there is a possibility if someone fed mainly chicken bones that they would need to feed more than 10% to achieve the calcium levels closer to prey.

BTW - The catnutrition.org site states that a mouse has a Ca:P of 1.1:1.

It's close to the bottom:

http://www.catnutrition.org/nutrients.php

Sigh.

I'm going to see if I can't find a source of definitive information on the nutrient content of various animals. I wonder if the local zoo might be able to help? Or the public library?

You are making this more complicated than it needs to be, really. Ca:Ph does not matter. It is what the early BARFers were gung-ho about because their diet plan is mostly bone. In their eyes, you can never feed too much bone. The Ca:Ph ratio should not at all be what dictates the menu, it is what mocks a whole prey item and that is where the estimated 80/10/10 comes in. Truly, I feed about 70/20/10 but you can feed up to 30% bone without any major health issues. What a prey model diet should be is actual whole prey or making up one with various body parts, organs.

If you did feed wild or pastured whole animals and nothing else, that would be 100% acceptable. Kelly, you are right on because the mice we all feed our cats are raised on a pelleted diet, not a natural one and therefore would not have the proper balance of O3's and O6's. However, wolves in certain areas dine almost exclusively on one prey animal, depending what it is. Deer is most common. Wolves that eat deer 99.99999% of the time will not perish. A cat that eats exclusively wild mice or rats will not perish. The only reason a carnivore's diet is varied in the wild is because the environment allows it. The environment also controls when there is no variety and only one prey animal. What a terrible evolutionary disadvantage if a carnivore had evolved to need a variety of prey. We would almost certainly have no wild cats or canines left. What Mother Nature HAS evolved a carnivore to eat is WHOLE PREY and that gives them everything they need, no matter what the prey is they eat. A GSD breeder on the rawfeeding list hunts whole deer for her dogs. They are gorgeous and extremely healthy. Variety is important only if you are feeding domestic prey raised on a species inappropriate diet.

mschauer wrote:BTW - The catnutrition.org site states that a mouse has a Ca:P of 1.1:1.

It's close to the bottom:

http://www.catnutrition.org/nutrients.php

Sigh.

I'm going to see if I can't find a source of definitive information on the nutrient content of various animals. I wonder if the local zoo might be able to help? Or the public library?

I don't know how catnutrition got a 1.1:1 ratio. If I remember right they got that info from this paper http://www.nal.usda.gov/awic/zoo/WholePreyFinal02May29.pdf But after looking at both results, one publish the other not, I can't seem to figure out how they came up with that number.

You are right heather I am making this very complicated. I am always preaching to people that feeding cats is not rocket science. Both you and I and everyone else that feeds cats an unconventional diet knows that its not hard at all. I have been interested in feline nutrition for awhile now. And am fine with most aspects of feeding a cat a raw diet. There are times though that I feel I need to question some of the info or things that I feel to be true. The questioning will hopefully spark discussion with my peers and encourage the finding of data (if any). Then people can express there opinion on the matter and hopefully something will be solved and or something is learned. I don't want it to seem like I did this just because I wanted to complicate things. I mainly made the statement/question because I knew there really wasn't a definitive answer but I was hoping through discussion that we could possibly come up with an accepted answer.

There obviously are many more factors with feeding prey. I was just looking at the main parts: 80% which is where a majority of the phosphorus is located and 10% where the majority of calcium it. Taking that info and trying to apply it to an item that many raw feeders feed and seeing if it truly fits the bill. If it didn't then are we truly doing the best thing possible for our kitties. I will never dispute that variety isn't a good thing. And I believe that the 10% bones is a good number considering the percentages I listed in the beginning. But not sure if 10% is a good number for someone feeding mainly chicken bones. Again I know the importance of variety.

So the question I will have for awhile, unless good info and or argument comes my way, are chicken bones nutritious enough to just feed 10% of diet? For people who feed a variety of bones this is not an issue for them. But for people who feed mainly chicken bones they may want to think about this.

Just to let you guys know this is probably not the last of these somewhat complicated questions for me. Learning for me is questioning. I hope everyone will take part in them. There is a good chance that it will try to complicate the simplest thing of feeding cats raw food. But I think it gets myself and others thinking of other possibilities or ways of feeding cats if any. Most of us got to the point of feeding raw food through research and thought.

If you think these types of questions are pointless or too much let me know and I will stop. I understand the effect these can have on new people to raw. They are overwhelmed with new info and that fact they now have to somewhat be a cat nutritionist. Then they come to a post like this one and start to panic.

I may want to discuss a topic on fatty acids sometime soon. Still trying to tie up most of my loose ends.

Anyway take care

Hi Chris! I do enjoy in depth raw topics, believe me, but some things just don't need a long explanation. In my experience, edible bone is edible bone is edible bone. It doesn't matter what animal it comes from. You are basing your question on Ca:Ph ratios? Why? Where do you get the suspicion that the levels you have found are either acceptable or unacceptable?

The only thing that I am focusing on are chicken bones. Like yourself, I feel a variety of prey is the ultimate diet.

This is my thought on why there may be a small issue. My question is based on ca:ph ratios and how they relate to bone percentages. Rodents at about 5% bones have a ratio of 1.7:1, some small birds at 5% bone have a ratio of 1.2-1.5:1, rabbits at 9% bone are about 1.7:1, and chicken at 32%(according to the usda) is about 1.6:1. Chicken has 6 times more bone than rodents/small birds and 3 times more than rabbits. But it takes all 32% of the chicken bones to reach the common ca:ph ratios in other prey.

So if chicken bones only comprised 10% of the diet would they be nutritious enough? As I mentioned before if you feed other bones there, imo, will be no problems but if they (chicken bones) are a large source of your calcium you may have to take this into consideration. Looking at these %'s and ratio's makes me think that chicken bones are lower in calcium when compared to other prey bones. Maybe because they are mass produced and a majority are fed poorly. Possibly a better guideline for a prey model diet consisting of mainly chicken bones would be yours at 70 20 10 but with an emphasis of feeding a variety.

I think you should post this question on the rawfeeding group. I can't say I know the answer other than what I've already posted. I'd be curious to know other's feedback that are more into the technical side of things.

Is that a yahoo group? If not then where is it?
Thanks for the suggestion. I posted on another forum but after a fair amount of discussion we couldn't nail it down either.

chris10 wrote:Is that a yahoo group? If not then where is it?
Thanks for the suggestion. I posted on another forum but after a fair amount of discussion we couldn't nail it down either.

I'd be interested in knowing what they have to say.

BTW - As far as I'm concerned you should feel free to discuss any topic you like here. There won't always be people who have the answers but I think there is some value in just knowing what kinds of questions others are coming up with in regards to raw feeding.

So glad you guys chimed in!

Yes, guys, please feel free to discuss ANYTHING. It will help others learn.

Also, (snickers) I should beat Heather with a wet noodle for posting another forum, eh? The more links, the more we learn!

When we have 14,000 members here I won't need to refer the tough cases to the list.

Oh, hun, I WANT you to post links! The more resources people have, the better off their pets will be. I joke because everyone gets so mad when you post an unrelated forum on THEIR forum.. I was almost beat with a wet noodle.