Jakers is Scared of Cattle Anyways

I've decided to finally take the final step into my vegan lifestyle -- vegan pet food. This was a big decision that I've gone back and forth on, but I now feel confident to take the plunge. There was a booth at the animal advocacy conference at the U of M that I attended last year (Their Lives, Our Voices) with vegan dog & cat food. So that got me thinking that if I'm making this change, why not have Jakers & Mabel make this change?

However, I mentioned this to both my veterinarian and the owner of a cute little pet food store near my house and both encouraged me NOT to do this. Their reasoning was that, naturally, cats and dogs are carnivores. Looking back at their ancestors (tigers, lions, wolves, etc) they are inherently meat eaters, so it would not be beneficial to make my cat & dog into vegans. This totally made sense, and so I decided not to make the change. I couldn't risk the health of my own pets in the name of animal advocacy -- it seemed counter intuitive.

However, every time I'm buying them food, I have a twinge of guilt. There are still animals suffering and being slaughtered for their food, just as for human food. So I would buy seafood varieties, trying to feel less guilty (not that it's OK to kill fish!)...but there was still that twinge of guilt in my stomach.

After talking the whole thing over with a friend of mine (Erica Meier...she's the Executive Director of an amazing animal advocacy group called Compassion Over Killing), I am totally on board the vegan train. She pointed out to me that NOTHING about my cat and dogs life is natural. Its not natural to keep them inside of a condo for their whole lives. It's not natural to feed them in little serving dishes. It's not natural to feed them beef and pork and chicken (in the wild, they would be catching rats and mice and little song birds). It's not natural to spay and neuter them. Nothing about domesticated animals is natural, when compared to their ancestors. So why is this any different?
What it comes down to is being sure they are getting the nutrients, carbs and fats that they require out of their food. Cats need taurine -- and just like how humans can get protein elsewhere -- cat food can have taurine supplements.

So while I am already able to see this is going to be an expensive change (keeping in mind, I already give my pets the top-of-the-line, costly food), it's one that is totally worth it. Less animal suffering and my pets continue to be well-fed and healthy!