I have trained my cat to wear a harness to take her outside safely

>>2363468
I think it comes with the same sentiment that anti-vax parents have but with pet owners. As in they think it's toxic but then their kid gets measles or their puppy gets parvo and they regret it immensely.

I don't know much about this, and I am generally for vaccinating your animals, but iirc there's a vaccine (I think for feline leukemia) that has a high chance of causing complications, so sometimes vets advise against it if your cat is strictly indoor and doesn't risk coming into contact with other infected cats.

>>2363472
I know the feline leukemia vaccine isn't considered a "core" vaccine and if a vet pushes for that with an indoor cat I generally think it's just for the money.

Does a vaccine ever stop working? Anyone know if they actually need done once a year or is that just a precaution?

>>2363468
If you get an inexperienced vet tech doing a vaccine, they may do the procedure poorly which could lead to infection. At the absolute worst case scenario, the left leg would need to be amputated at the shoulder (they inject in the left shoulder) assuming you left it to fester. I have never heard of this actually happening outside of the internet.

Some vaccines are unnecessary and sort of go against their purpose. The FeLV vaccine for instance I got mainly so if my cats ever got loose, they at least wouldn't be immediately euthanized for having FeLV ( that's the standard procedure here). However I didn't learn until afterwards that the FeLV vaccine can actually gives the cats a slight positive in tests, so the whole point was null.

As for the injecting illness thing, rabies vaccines are always a killed version in the US meaning there is no virus left alive that could get you sick. Just about everything else you can get is called 'modified live' meaning they were Tampered with so they can't survive long in the body.

>>2363468
Honestly anon, you should do your own research.

If you are really concerned, then ask for a list of the vaccines that the vets want to give your cat, and then look up studies done on these vaccines, what exactly the vaccines do, why they are necessary, and then from the research and information you find, come to your own decision.

Rabies is obviously an important one, but if it is the kitty version of the flu shot, and you feel as if your cats immune system should be able to handle that, then just decline that particular vaccine.

Vaccines are only made to help people and animals out from getting sick. If you have a sickly cat that is having immune system problems, and can't handle the regular diseases, then ya, it might be a good idea to get that yearly vaccine.

So basically just do your own research, and make sure that research is from good sources who actually put the time and work in to do their own research and actually test the effects of the medicines.

And do the same thing for your kitties food please. Salmonella is carried in raw food, and if you wouldn't be willing to eat if yourself, please don't feed it to your cat.

Cooked may not be as high quality as raw, but it definitely cuts down the changes of your cat getting sick.

>>2363494
Technically the 1 year rabies vaccine would probably be sufficient for an animal's lifetime. I believe I read that theoretically it wouldn't drop below a 95% protection. I'm not sure about the distemper combo. However, the US is very paranoid about rabies. I honestly think it would do wonders for keeping pets in the home if owners only had to worry about a single rabies shot

>>2363525
>Cooked may not be as high quality as raw
Genuinely curious, is this true and why is it the case?
The protein, fat and mineral content should stay the same when cooked and become more easily digestible. The only reason I can think of is because the chewy consistency might be better for their teeth and it might help their gut flora to keep a little bit of the bacteria on their food.

>>2363515>>2363531
Thank you for your thoughts on the subject!

>>2363525
Well I have been doing research, but none of the sources I have found seemed particularly credible which is why I posted here to get some discussion on the subject. Not that I couldn't always do more research, for sure.

Are you against raw feeding? It was hard to find reasons NOT to raw feed, aside from the cost. All she's had so far is raw chicken breast. I couldn't find any sources that it was common in raw fed cats or dogs to get sick, as they are carnivores and evolved to eat raw meat. But if you think there are reasons it's detrimental, I'm curious.

>>2363743
Not that poster but the reason I started feeding my cat raw is because of all the other crap in canned cat food. By products, soy, etc. I never intended to switch her to 100% raw, but I thought it would be good for her to have a little in her diet.

I feed her roughly 90% canned and 10% dry as it is right now. Trying to make it maybe 70% canned, 20% raw and 10% dry. Dry is mostly for her teeth and for enrichment, since I use dry for puzzle toys to occupy her.

>>2363747
Would there be a significant difference in feeding your cat raw chicken breast and cooked chicken breast though?

>>2363746
I would presume it would be unsafe for the same reason it's unsafe for people to eat raw chicken.
They might have a stronger acid in their guts and be able to handle contaminated meat but natural prey also isn't cooped up in mass farms and pumped full of antibiotics and thus breeding ground for hyperresistant bacteria so if anything does go wrong it would be awful. Cheap commercial chicken meat just isn't good.

>>2363752
The first thing that comes to mind is that cooking it would cook a lot of the moisture out of it, but as long as your cat isn't fed only dry I dont think that's a huge risk anyway. A lot of people say it cooks the vitamins out, and since by raw feeding you're trying to recreate a cats natural diet there wouldn't be much point in cooking it would there?

>>2363755
Here is one of the sources I have. http://rawfed.com/myths/cats.html

This isn't the only page I read, but it is one of them. Again, not any of these sources say it's a risk and of course the people who write these pages all feed raw and they have not experienced any illness in their pets because of it.

What kind of food do you guys feed your cats? My day is on canned fancy feast primarily, but perhaps there's a very high quality canned food I could substitute her raw meat for I'd I decide to stop the raw diet. For now I am still for it though. I can't afford to feed raw or a very high quality commercial 100% of the time, unfortunetly.

>pumped full of antibiotics and thus breeding ground for hyperresistant bacteria

I'm sorry, but you really think commercial cat food doesn't have these problems? That shit is the lowest of the low, all the dead, decaying animals that aren't fit for humans. Sure it's cooked but there's hardly any nutritional value left in it.

>>2363761
Well, canned food is still cooked so it should not be contaminated with any bacteria while raw chicken is pretty dangerous for humans at least.
I'd think the primary advantage of feeding raw is simply knowing what you've fed your pet instead of hoping your brand of canned food doesn't have too much rotten garbage inside. I don't think it being raw is what makes the difference.

Vet tech here. I like the schedule my current clinic uses:
PRC: 3-4 boosters as kitten -> booster at 1 year -> every 3 years beyond that
Rabies: 1 shot at 16 weeks -> 1 year booster -> every 3 years
FeLV unneccessary for undoor cats, but once a year for outdoor ones.

Yearly core vaccinations are unneccary imo.

>>2363767
I see your point. Maybe I'll buy some commercial raw food and feed it to her a few times a week instead of just getting the meat from the store. If you guys think that's any safer?

>>2363773
Thanks for the input! So do you think most vets say once a year for money reasons or because that's what's so widely taught? Or both?

>>2363773
I got the FeLV vac because I foster kittens that are sometimes too young to be tested. I only got the vaccine on the off chance that my cats end up at a shelter (my concern was them getting outside) and the local shelters euthanize FeLV cats. However I learned later that the vaccine can make healthy cats come up as a slight positive. Is that true? How prevalent is that? Does it just happen to all cats that get the vaccine?

>>2363773
Mostly the same feeling here. At a shelter that I volunteer at, they only do yearly rabies and distemper as a way to encourage stupid poor people to have their pet seen by someone once every year.
At my vet's office, boosters while young, and that's necessary, then a yearly shot at one year old, then a three year shot. We do recommend FeLv for indoor cats because we are pretty rural, stray cats are everywhere, and if you bring a sad sick stray in, Bam, your kitty could end up a Luke case as well.

>>2363468
>"did you know it's injecting a virus into your cat"
how else is the thing supposed to work
fucking Americans i swear

>>2363468
The one reason you wouldn't vaccinate your animal is if they're an adult that has never been vaccinated - meaning they probably already encountered whatever they were going to, and developed/have an immunity against it. Animals' immune systems are way more powerful than ours 99% of the time because they live in a lot more filth and don't religiously protect themselves against illness and uncleanliness the way we do.

>>2363525
I agree with most of your post but animals eat raw meat all the time - they develop an immunity. It's not as if eating cooked food has changed them the way it has changed us. Many pet owners of dogs and cats feed raw with zero issues.

just get a dog

One thing to worry about when it comes to feeding raw is making sure it is nutritionally balanced. Cats can't survive on chicken breasts, they need to eat the organs as well to stay healthy. It can be difficult to get those organs but you might be able to talk to your local butcher

>>2363468
Never not vaccining my cats again, had a pretty sad experience with my tonkinese cat afew years back :c

>>2363468
My cat got a tumor from the three year rabies vaccine. It's widely known that it can cause tumors and the vet admitted that it was the vaccine that caused it. Had his right rear leg amputated, but it came back 6 months later and he died. Demand the 1 year rabies vaccine

The reason why you can't find credible sources is that there are no credible anti vaccine sources. It's a movement based on conspiracy theories and a complete lack of scientific knowledge (OMG big pharma pushing vaccines that cause autism! It's in the chem trails!)

>>2364603
A fair enough point, but I was never intending to go 100% raw, just giving her some occasionally. She'll still mostly be eating commercial foods.

Been reading everyone else's posts, thanks for the respones! This >>2364714 is something I didn't know, so thanks for bringing it up.

>>2363531
We're paranoid for good reason. In places with poor rabies control the death rates are much higher, whereas most Western nations see one every couple of years.

>>2364531
If only it were just Americans. The French are notorious anti vaxxers, in fact they rate above the US in terms of percentage of people that believe vaccines are generally unsafe.

File: [Inarticulate Yelling].jpg (54KB, 333x200px) Image search: [Google]

54KB, 333x200px

>>2363468
>"did you know it's injecting a virus into your cat"
Some people, I swear.

That's what a vaccine essentially is. They're injecting dead virus/parts of a virus in your/your pet's body so that it can start producing effective counter measures. This is why sometimes you still get the symptoms.

This is all done so that your body can react in a timely and effective manner to the next time it is actually attacked by the virus.

They teach this shit in highschool. How are people so dumb.

>>2363468
Ah I see you're a fucking idiot with too much access to internet, not enough critical thinking skills and who shouldn't be having a cat.

Have you tried coconut oil?