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QUiestion: I'm making a hypoallergic diet for our cat based on venison; for the next couple months wanting to keep diet as simple as poss.
Am using venison, calcium, taurine, probiotics, and interested in adding an omega 3 because Theo's cough may be allergic in origin and a lack of 3's to balance 6's is implicated in inflammatory disease.

I want to know if salmon/fish oil mixed with a bit of canned mackeral is a reasonable risk or if i should delete fish and oil altogether for the time being.
I understand other sources of 3's to include hemp or vegetable, but the salmon is the most bioavailable to cats. Is there a less allergic possibility than fish oil ?

Many thanks, I know this is guessing to a great extent..... but wanting to keep it simple for now.... one suggestion was JUST raw meat and organs and probiotics for a good length of time...

Lynne

From what I've read you really need to keep the diet very simple - venison or duck for the meat. After you've established the fact that your cat can tolerate that, then you might sparingly add some fish oils - perhaps you can just add from capsules rather than use the fish itself - a good holistic vet might be able to advise you further on this one.
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Smile, it will make them wonder what you are up to!

Lynne, if you feed grass fed meat - in this case, venison that was not given any grains - it probably already has the correct ratio of Omega 3 fatty acids. You should inquire of the rancher or supplier how the deer were raised and what they were fed.

If you cannot obtain this information or they were fed grain, then I would agree with MadameAlto. Try to do the elimination diet more strictly and add the fish oil later. And yes, fish oil... salmon body oil, to be precise ... is what you'll want to use if your cat is not allergic to it.

I would hesitate to add even the other ingredients (except taurine) you are adding, as a true allergy elimination diet should contain only one single ingredient and no other foods, including no source of carbs and no supplements. Cats of course can't stay on such a diet long (unlike dogs), so the easiest way to do this effectively is to use a food such as rabbit that can be fed with its bones and organs. This won't work if your cat has had rabbit before, of course. Because otherwise the waters will remain pretty muddied. I like the whole ground rabbit from www.hare-today.com. Primal has also recently come out with a whole ground sardine product that might be a good choice for a cat who has never had sardines.

No matter what, I would add taurine. Even 90 days is too long to risk a taurine deficient diet for a cat.
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Christie Keith
Caber Feidh Scottish Deerhounds
Holistic Husbandry since 1986
Meet the Felines!

Thank you so much, Madame Alto and Christie, for your replies to my query.
It will certainly be possible to reduce his diet to the meat (bones, organs) and taurine. The venison farm uses a totally organic approach but it does include grains with grasses.
His cough did disappear for weeks at a time, during his canned venison sensitivity diet, but he has gotten bits of the other cats' diary probiotics, beef canned food, and i'd introduced two or three new things at once etc. and cough would return, which is why i suspect food allergy more than dust or pollen etc., and wanting to go back to the most basic. I feel this will take another year or so to resolve, but prefer it to just making the cough go away.
I would love to know if an intermittent cough will damage his lungs ? I've heard three in the last week, less than 30 seconds, but it sounds rather entrenched. His heart lungs sounded great at the vet's, hiks energy, breathing all perfect, so I'm not panicking too much.
How long should a cough be gone to introduce salmon oil ?
Would I only introduce vit B6, vit. E, one per month ? It seemed that B6 and E are extremely useful for asthma type inflammation, and did I mention that too much omega 6 or lack of 3 could cause inflammation ? that was my interest to add salmon oil now. But I will heed advice here. Christie, would you be the holisitc chat vet ?

Thank you so much !
Lynne

Addendum !
Whole minced rabbit is available, I will go with that, and add only taurine, but I am very much interested to know how long to wait, what to add, what order. Any speculations on outcome.... thank you !!
I could also add calcium to the venison in the meantime while i wait a week to order it.... ?

Lynne

>>Addendum !
>>Whole minced rabbit is available, I will go with that, and add only taurine, but I am very much interested to know how long to wait, what to add, what order. Any speculations on outcome.... thank you !!

The usual allergy elimination diet is 90 days. Then add ONE THING and ONE THING ONLY, wait one week, if no symptoms, add one more. Anything that causes symptoms eliminate permanently, and wait one week after the symptoms appear to add the next food. Do this until you have enough variety of things to prepare a balanced diet. It's impossible to predict how long that will take, it depends on how the cat reacts to each new food that is added. I would expect it to take at least five months total.

Patience is a virtue. <G>
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Christie Keith
Caber Feidh Scottish Deerhounds
Holistic Husbandry since 1986
Meet the Felines!

>>I would love to know if an intermittent cough will damage his lungs ?

It could, as well as his bronchial passages. But it doesn't sound like the cough is that frequent. I'd be more concerned that it's a SYMPTOM of something underlying and as yet undiagnosed, rather than that the cough itself will damage your kitty.

>>How long should a cough be gone to introduce salmon oil ?

Hmmm, I'm not following this line of questioning.

>>Would I only introduce vit B6, vit. E, one per month ? It seemed that B6 and E are extremely useful for asthma type inflammation, and did I mention that too much omega 6 or lack of 3 could cause inflammation ? that was my interest to add salmon oil now.

If you are doing an allergy elimination diet, you can't use any of these things for the 90 days while you're doing it, and you add each thing one at a time, one per week.

> Christie, would you be the holisitc chat vet ?

I'm the host of the holistic chat but I'm not a vet.

Good luck!
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Christie Keith
Caber Feidh Scottish Deerhounds
Holistic Husbandry since 1986
Meet the Felines!