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Post by Sherry on Dec 10, 2012 14:28:15 GMT -5
I have to wonder what he would have made of a client's cat. She had him from the time he was a year old, and when I last cleaned for- he was 32!!!!! And yes- barn cat so whole prey fed until he was almost 28z
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Post by Deleted on Dec 10, 2012 14:47:31 GMT -5
I have to wonder what he would have made of a client's cat. She had him from the time he was a year old, and when I last cleaned for- he was 32!!!!! And yes- barn cat so whole prey fed until he was almost 28z wow!!!
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Post by Deleted on Dec 10, 2012 20:06:57 GMT -5
I've always gone by one human year= 10 ferret years...
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Post by Sherry on Dec 10, 2012 20:29:51 GMT -5
For those with cats older than 20, I found a conversion cats.about.com/library/howto/htage.htmYou do have to figure it out yourself though. Just figured out that client's cat would have been about the equivalent of 154
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Post by katt on Dec 11, 2012 1:48:51 GMT -5
Ha A vet who said cats don't live that long...how awful! They can live to be pretty darn old for a mammal given proper care and diet!
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Post by Heather on Dec 11, 2012 2:28:08 GMT -5
She maintained that cats only lived to be at the very most in their late teens and this was rare. She maintained that cats were seniors at 10 and rarely lived much beyond 13 yrs. When I asked her about people who, years ago claimed that they had cats in their twenties, she said they were mistaken. That we often confuse their ages or exagerate how old they are. I know how old Samurai was, because I bought him from a breeder as a kitten at 12 weeks of age. I bought him and his brother Ninja for my daughter's sixth birthday. It was that type of attitude that made start to look for another vet ciao
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Post by Sherry on Dec 11, 2012 9:35:46 GMT -5
I can't blame you for that one, Heather- that's a bit beyond condescension
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Post by Heather on Dec 11, 2012 12:32:55 GMT -5
I was talking to my present vet about cat ages (curious as to what she'd say). This was quite a while ago and I believe we were discussing Merlyn who was at the time about 13/14. She claims that a lot of kibble fed cats have a hard time getting past the 12 to 13 yr old age...she claims that once they get past that then there doesn't appear to be a problem for them getting into their late teens and early twenties. She did admit though, that most kibble cats by the age of 12 or so are going into renal failure which is why it's difficult for them to get past that age. She has always advocated moist over kibble for cats. Now she advocates raw, preferrably commercial but is much more open about frankenprey and prey diets if done properly and you're willing to talk to her about it. ciao
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Post by crazylady on Dec 11, 2012 16:31:10 GMT -5
Hi My dad always said 1 year human life = 10 years to a ferret and used to say 1 year human life is 7 years for a dog that's just working off the old timers rules I once had a dog lived to be 20 then had to help him to the bridge with senile dementia ( little mixed breed terrier ) but my dads whippet also lived to be 18 she was raw fed with no problems i find it funny how now people ( including vets ) are reverting back to the old ways of feeding barf for dogs cats and ferrets maybe they are realising these so called miracle dried foods are not what they are cracked up to be take care bye for now Bev
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Post by Deleted on Dec 11, 2012 18:03:07 GMT -5
A lot of people here class around 12-14 as "normal" for a cat - I gather again it's kibble that does it like has been mentioned here. UK marketing for dry cat foods shows you only need 1 *small amount* vs this many pouches/tins and that wet is x% moisture. No mention of dehydration and renal failure, conveniently.
I find it odd that with vaccinations, neutering (shown to lengthen life) and all these other medications and special foods... that the quoted lifespan of a labrador hasn't gone up since my dad + his dad had them 30, 40+ years ago and fed them on a lot less processed food.
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Post by Sherry on Dec 11, 2012 19:27:54 GMT -5
In fact, the life expectancy has gone way down since the introduction of kibbles. Diabetes is a major killer of cats now, directly due to diet.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 11, 2012 19:48:51 GMT -5
In fact, the life expectancy has gone way down since the introduction of kibbles. Diabetes is a major killer of cats now, directly due to diet. Doesn't surprise me. I think dogs suffer less due to being onmivores/non-obligate carnivores (depending on your view/which studies you believe!) but I still wonder if a modern dry food diet alone is really that good for them - personal observation is I've seen more dogs with health problems on a pure kibble diet than those on a mixed (with either BARF or healthy scraps, purposefully excluding those constantly fed junk... although, I've known 2 healthy terriers to their late teens with such diets, I still would guess it's not ideal!). Not met many on pure BARF to compare The few I have met have made good ages without such severe arthritis as seems to plague many dogs now. The barf is a few dogs but the rest of my sample is a lot of dogs over many years due to being a countryside area. Many of the farm cats who survive with no/little vets treatment (most get 1st set of vaccs, maybe a booster, but few are kept up), on whole prey and just the odd commercial food topups (or meat scraps) seem to live long lives too - maybe not 32 (that's amazing!) but into their late teens or 20s. Better than the early teens of many pet cats. Of course - feeding your pet on natural/whole foods doesn't make pedigree much money
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Post by Sherry on Dec 11, 2012 19:55:42 GMT -5
To give you an idea of the difference, our 19 yr old cat wasn't expected to make it to 14. Until we got him off the kibble. Granted, he's not on raw, but on a high quality grain free wet food.
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Post by Heather on Dec 12, 2012 1:30:37 GMT -5
Samurai, the kitty that I had that lived to be 23 -- well 22 now that I look at it. He would have been 23 if he had lived another 4 months. He was given the infamous death sentence at 12. According to all his blood work he was going into renal failure. Extreme weight loss, vomiting, anorexia. He was a siamese but one of the old style apple heads, a much heavier cat compared to the slender, tiny framed siamese exotics that you see at the shows. He was weighing about 7 lbs (he should have weighed in at about 13lbs). My vet at the time (she was rather amazing really, retired now) told me to take him home and make him comfortable, he had about 6 months...though she was sure it would be sooner. I asked her at the time why.....I couldn't seem to get a cat to live much past the age of 13. Diet she said....it's all about this stupid kibble stuff. Hoping to get her say raw was better, she shook her head. She wasn't a dietician, her vet schooling hadn't covered that. She just knew that old farm cats lived much longer than our pampered pets and that shouldn't be. She claimed she started to see high rates of renal failure in cats with the whole kibble thing. She still pushed for moist whenever possible. I left, broken hearted. I had switched my dog earlier to raw, but couldn't find any information for cats....finally by piecing information together, I switched the old kitty fool. It took me over 6 months just to convince him that he didn't need kibbles and could eat moist, but he was still puking so much. Another 6 months, he was eating raw. He stopped puking . His coat got so soft, he put on weight....he lived. Samurai passed away from old age. He baffled my vet, who did ask how I did this and when I said raw food, she held up her hand and said don't tell me please. It goes against everything the vet boards were telling the vets, and telling the vets to tell their clients. We agreed at that point never to discuss diet. ciao
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Post by Sherry on Dec 12, 2012 9:31:36 GMT -5
He baffled my vet, who did ask how I did this and when I said raw food, she held up her hand and said don't tell me please. It goes against everything the vet boards were telling the vets, and telling the vets to tell their clients. We agreed at that point never to discuss diet. And that is so sad on so many different levels.
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