Sid - a girl cat with struvite crystals

[Ari Moore]

We've had our first (and I hope last...) health problem possibly related to our cats' vegan diet - one of our cat friends, Sid, has had some trouble peeing recently, and the vet says she's got a pH of 8.5 (normal for a cat is 5.9-6.4 so this is really alkaline!), and struvite crystals. She's diagnosed the problem as FLUTD (feline lower urinary tract disease). It could be unrelated to her diet (it's also related to stress and viral infections) but the diet is the most likely culprit. However, it's probably the dryness and the alkaline nature of her food that's the issue here, not the specific proteins.

The vet has prescribed DL-Methionine, which is what Jed Gillen gave to Jude, his cat friend whose health issues are outlined in Jed's book, "Obligate Carnivore." It's supposed to make her system more acidic so she can dissolve those crystals and stop making new ones. She's also got a (non-vegan) supplement here called Dasuquin, which promotes bladder health and will supposedly make her more comfortable. Fortunately it's not a bad case - she's still peeing all right, she's not blocked, and doesn't appear to be in pain or depressed or anything; the vet said her bladder felt okay, and she checked out all right on all other fronts.

We're shocked about this development because we've been feeding Sid carefully balanced vegan cat foods, and she has a kitty fountain and loves drinking water (which helps cats avoid urinary tract issues), and, well, she's a girl! This is supposed to be an extremely rare condition, and usually is only an issue for boy cats. Well, here it is in a girl cat. If anyone out there has a vegan girl cat, take note...

Lessons learned: we need to test all three cats' urine regularly - this is no joke! It might be hard to do but it's really, really important - we could have caught this problem much sooner and Sid wouldn't have had to deal with having to pee and not being able to, which must really suck for her. We've got to get our other two cat friends' urine tested too to make sure they too aren't developing this problem. And, we also now know that we really do need to feed them more wet food and less kibble. They do love kibble, but they love wet food too and it's much better for them.

We have a follow-up urine test scheduled for three weeks from now and I'll post an update so we can see if this treatment works. The alternative is to feed her a prescription diet full of animal by-products and chemicals, and I'd really love to avoid that. So, fingers crossed for Sid, I'll be able to post a happy update three weeks from now. Stay tuned...

[Ari Moore]

I'm back with a follow-up! We brought in Sid's urine for another test and her pH is still way too high (8!), but it did go down. There are fewer crystals too, and she's no longer having any difficulty peeing. Yay. But we still have work to do.

Over the past few weeks, we've slowly weaned them off of AmiCat - they love kibble but it's too dry, and we want to make sure they eat Vegecat pH, to help bring their acidity back to where it should be. (At this point we're assuming the other cats also have a high pH since they're all eating the same food.) We've made sure they have more fresh water available to encourage them to drink even more. After a few weeks we intend to get all three of them tested... and then we'll decide what to do at that point, depending on the results.

Also, our vet supplied us with an article from a few years ago that says that AmiCat and Evolution aren't nutritionally complete. We've heard about this and had thought that the companies had changed their formulas, so we're sending the article to the companies for a response. I'll post more details when we get to the bottom of it.

[Ari Moore]

Thanks so much for this insight! I use the instructions that came with my Vegecat pH, where there's no mention of quinoa - and I'd love to try it but I'm afraid to wing it since the protein / supplement / oil measurements all seem to be very exact. Would you mind posting your recipe? Where'd you get it?

[Ari Moore]

A correction: the article the vet gave us actually referred to Vegecat KibbleMix by Harbingers of a New Age, and Evolution Diet vegan gourmet vegetable stew entree.

And an update: The article is called "Nutritional adequacy of two vegan diets for cats", authored by Christina M. Gray, DVM, et al. It was published in JAVMA, Vol 225, No. 11, December 1, 2004. I wrote to both companies to ask for a response, and this is what I heard back.

James Peden at Harbingers of a New Age is a very personable, responsive guy. I've always had great email interactions with him. His response came within hours and read:

We were aware of the study that was submitted to JAVMA by Tina Gray and others. The study took a flawed sample from our company. We wrote both to JAVMA and Tina Gray in February, 2004 stating that fact with an explanation. Unfortunately the letter received no response from Tina, and the letter to JAVMA had no effect on their subsequent publication of the study. In 2003 (the year the data was collected for the study) we produced 770 pounds of Vegecat KibbleMix. At that time we were making very small batches of just 14 pounds each. Each batch was made separately, starting with a "micro-mix" as well as a "macro-mix" that we make up. From our analysis of the study it is obvious that one was substituted for the other in that one batch purchased by Tina Gray.

We are a very small company. My wife, Kathi does sales and I do research and development. Jon is our sole employee who does the mixing of the formulations. He brought to my attention what must have happened. He had mistakenly picked up the Vegecat Micro-Mix container instead of the Vegecat KibbleMix Macro. That substitution would have resulted in grossly elevated selenium levels as well as a complete lack of taurine, since only the MACRO contains the taurine, and not the Vegecat Micro-Mix.

We immediately took steps (color coding and separation of mixes) to ensure that would never happen again as well as stressing the importance of proper procedure in making our products.

We have many clients with their cats having been fed Vegecat products for many years with success. Some of our earliest customers (from 1986) are still buying our products and submitting positive feedback. If the product analyzed was typical we would have been out of business long ago. It is important for us to maintain high standards and quality control for not only our success but of those who purchase our products in good faith.

Unfortunately, due to our limited resources, we've never had the substantial money required to have an independent laboratory analysis as we had hoped for. We try to be as responsible and accurate as possible, knowing that the continued good health of perhaps thousands of companion animals using our products are at stake.

The response from Lynn Crandall-Weisman, president of Evolution Diet Pet Foods, also came within hours. It read, "Yes this happened 4 years ago. I can tell you there are no problems now with nutritional inadequacy with our food. We will get back to you shortly with a proper response that you can put up on your web-site." I haven't yet gotten a follow-up response but when I do, I'll post it here.

[Ari Moore]

Sid hasn't had peeing problems for ages but we're still getting follow-up tests and continuing to bring down the accumulated crystals and her pH. We've stopped feeding her dry food and are making them mostly Vegecat pH, with Evolution and Evangers canned food as a back-up.

Also, I got a response from Evolution! Here it is:

Dear Ari:
Thank you for taking the time out of your busy day to get in touch with us. Each year the State of Minnesota tests our pet food for completeness. We have only had one batch in the last 19 years that did not meet state and federal requirements. The state checks our pet foods every year for both state and federal standards of protein, fatty acids, moisture and fiber. I am not sure whether the vet student study was done on one single can from that batch or not. (Referred to in the critique by the vet student you are referring to). Please send me a copy of that paper. I will give you a more complete response as soon as I re-familiarize myself with its content. (We are pretty sure it was one can of food).

Now: going back to that one deficient can of pet food. As soon as we reviewed the ingredients and percentages of protein, and fatty acids from the study we removed what we had left from the canned food we had at our warehouse from sale to the public immediately. We were concerned of course even though we had no complaints from customers about any health problems from their pets and our own pets were doing well on the food. Since the can of food the vet student had, came from a different batch, and we no longer had any cans from that batch to compare it to, we could not test other cans from that same batch. We were ready to go in to production with a new batch at that time, so we took some precautions with the upcoming new batch. (See: Testing of a Single Can for Completeness below).

Our company has also never had one toxicity recall in the almost 20 years we have been designing, producing and packaging and distributing vegan pet foods.
Over the past 20 years or so we have had hundreds of dogs, cats and the occasional ferret, rabbit and bird at our rescue.

Our rescue has used the services of many veterinarians over these past 20 years in addition to the services rendered at the University of Minnesota Diagnostic Laboratory and Veterinary Treatment Center.

Most Veterinarians I have encountered have much expertise in the area of allopathic medicine and diagnosis or what most of us would refer to as drugs and surgery. Veterinarians do not have a substantial background in animal nutrition.

Veterinarians receive about one week of formal nutrition in veterinary college. Much of the additional information they receive is from pet food company sales people both inside and outside their classrooms.

Vets in college are typically given free pet food by major manufacturers so that these companies can win their loyalty and convince the vet to always use their products when treating disease with prescription diets that come form these same companies that gave or gives them free or substantially discounted pet food.

The animal nutrition program at vet schools is one that is related to standard veterinary medical and diagnostic procedures.

Veterinarians are not trained in the area of therapeutic nutrition procedures with the small exception of using the prescription diets that are premade with diseased animal and slaughterhouse waste ingredients.

Veterinarians are also heavily indoctrinated with much propaganda from their teaching staff and pet food companies that meat, poultry and fish ingredients are required for the normal body function of dogs, cats and ferrets.

The study that was conducted in 2004 was by a veterinary student who had no experience with vegetarian or vegan dogs or cats, and much less experience with dogs and cats fed Evolution Diet Pet Foods. She may have the used standard assay techniques for protein analysis and compared our food protein concentrations to that of other meat based pet foods or so called standard amounts of proteins as described in some paper or book developed by some person with a nutrition background.

I do not remember what her comparison source was. I reviewed her paper and then I called the author and asked her how she came to her conclusions and what experience she had with vegan or vegetarian animals using our pet food. She told me that she was basing her paper on industry standards and that she did not know how the requirements were derived for her evaluation. She also told me that she had no experience with dogs or cats living on Evolution Diet.

She also told me her study was based on one or two small samples of our pet food (we think it was one) with no animal testing or any period of time on any of our products. In other words, her study was only based on requirements from a single can.

I suggest that one must not blindly accept her conclusions. Her conclusions were based on the bias that Dogs and Cats must have basic minimum concentrations of specific proteins to thrive and live a normal life expectancy.

The information she was basing her analysis on was based on a bias study coming from the meat, poultry and fish industry that make a lot of money getting rid of their diseased animals and slaughterhouse waste products by selling them to the pet food industry (including the prescription pet food industry).

We have had numerous thousands of animals on Evolution Diet all over the United States and Canada for over almost twenty years. We have many Dogs of all shapes and sizes living to over 17 human years of age in good condition and some that reach over nineteen years in good condition. We have many cats that have been on Evolution Diet since they were kittens living 16 to seventeen human years in good condition and some at over 22 human years in good condition.

Accepting the biased view of a veterinary student, who may have been firmly indoctrinated by perhaps many of the people she came into contact with during her life time, you may want to consider her family, her peers and teaching staff at all levels of education, including her pre-veterinary school training and veterinary college, in how she had come to her conclusion. Yes, she also did test a single can of food that she said did not meet industry standards.

TESTING A SINGLE CAN OF FOOD FOR COMPLETNESS

The testing of a single can of food is not the proper way to test for completeness. Typically when food is to be tested, several cans from different parts of the batch must be tested to assure an accurate test. Mixing problems can occur in which testing of a single can of food from one part of a batch cannot measure accuracy. That is why, when for instance, the State of Minnesota comes in and tests our food, they randomly take several cans from different stores, or they come down to our warehouse and take several cans from different parts of the same batch. The results from each can will be slightly different because of the mixing process at the plant. We do the same when we test our food, we must take several cans from different parts of the batch. You cannot test just one can, not just two cans, but several cans!

We do not have our own pet food plant; we subcontract the making of our canned food at a pet food plant that we trust will make our food according to our specifications. When this happened we contacted the plant that makes our food and relayed what had happened and the results from the testing of this student.

We were ready to go into production with another batch of food when this happened so what we did was add a little more protein content to the new batch we going into production with, to make sure that when the food was tested again, it would not come up deficient. (Testing food is very expensive for us, so we hope the pet food plant we subcontract with is doing their job so we don’t have to constantly test every batch we receive). We also specifically told them not to under mix the food. The plant that makes our food made the new batch went and had the food tested, and it was fine. There have been no problems since.

We try and do our best but there are some problems from time to time when manufacturing pet food. For instance we received a batch of pet food that had an odd odor to it. We didn’t notice it until some of our customers brought it to our attention. We then had the food tested. There was nothing wrong with the food as far as spoilage because it did smell spoiled, but then again a mixing problem occurred and concentrated amounts of the vitamin mix ended up in one part of the batch. That batch could not be sold to the public and a new batch was made. The company that makes our food took responsibility for that and compensated us for it.

WE HAVE STUDIED VEGETARIAN ANIMALS FOR 20 YEARS

Our company and our rescue go much further in our studies of small animals then any average veterinarian. For years, we have asked the University of Minnesota Diagnostic Laboratory if any of the animals that we have brought there for autopsy procedures appear to have any signs of malnutrition. The Dogs and Cats we have taken there after death have received both gross and micro histological procedures with toxicology and bacteriology studies when warranted.

Not one pathologist has ever told me that one of the animals has appeared to be malnourished or malformed as result of inadequate nutrition.

In fact there has not been one report that has suggested this out of perhaps dozens of animals that have died with various standard diseases that kill dogs, cats. Virtually every animal that has died at our rescue, have reached what most veterinarians consider a normal life or beyond normal life expectancy for a dog, cat or ferret. The only exceptions have been accidental trauma and possibly a poisoning.

Some animals that we have taken in have gotten pregnant by accident while on Evolution Diet including both dogs and cats. When I say by accident, I mean that one of the vets we typically use to neuter or spay animals that come into our rescue missed and somehow failed to successfully complete the procedure. In other cases we thought the rescue cat or dog was too young to be fixed and it got pregnant with another unfixed young male. In all cases like these we got normal healthy off springs which is the gold standard for testing a pet foods' completeness.

In all the autopsies that we have had performed, there has never been one diagnosis that suggested a protein or fatty acid deficiency syndrome of any body organ in any animal that we have had tested.

Think of all the time, care and money we spent proving the efficiency of Evolution Diet Pet Food Products. Think of all the thousands of dogs, cats and ferrets that are or have been on Evolution Diet for 15 years or more and still leading healthy, long lives. Compare that information to the one small critique written by a meat eater vet student with her own bias doing a comparison with a document that may have been funded by the very industry that has a vested interest in sustaining itself with the study findings, in a journal regulated to large extent by the meat eating and drug industry.

Aren't these the very industries that influence medical doctors and the government with lobbyist money to tell people that vegetarian and vegan diets are unsafe and incomplete?

Sincerely: Eric Weisman, CEO, Dr. of Health Sciences, former human physician

[Ari Moore]

Another update on this article: We passed the responses to it back to our vet, and she took some time and came back to us with a response. She told us that while there are clearly problems with the way vet folks are taught nutrition, that the situation has improved, and many vet students are now getting better information which is less biased toward particular pet food companies.

She pointed out that the testing that Evolution has done is not the kind of really robust testing that should be done to make sure that the food has the appropriate nutrient levels - and she said, even if testing costs a lot, it's important. Good testing helps consumers know that what they're buying is safe. So we consumers should demand testing - and if we want to make it happen, I think we should step up to the plate and help the companies we depend on to make sure it does!

We've still got to do more urine testing to see how Sid is adapting to her new Vegecat pH-focused diet, but she's clearly much healthier now than when she was eating Evolution and then AmiCat kibble. However, we're starting to see that we would really feel more comfortable feeding our cats these foods if they had been tested to the full satisfaction of vets. We've heard that Vegepet may need to do some testing and are inquiring with James Peden to see if we can help with fundraising to ensure testing happens. I'll keep updating this thread as we go...

[Christina]

Thank you for everything you do!! I will surely support you/all of us to get good tests om the vegan animal food. Is there something I can do now?

/Christina

[Ari Moore]

I second that! Contact the companies you buy food from and tell them you want testing your vet will trust.

I think if we all care about testing we really do need to be proactive to make sure it happens. I offered to help James with an online fundraising campaign to help pay for testing, but haven't heard back from him - but I should follow up! :)

[Elisabeth Westerlund]

What is Vegecat pH?

[Ari Moore]

Vegecat pH is a special supplement you can use to make cat food from vegan ingredients, formulated for cats who have pH issues with their urinary tract. (You can find out more about food options on the Resources page.)

[Ari Moore]

An update: Sid is doing great, and Snow, one of our other cats, just got back a urine test - our vet says her protein and taurine levels and her pH check out perfectly. Snow's been vegan since she moved in with us in February 2008. Yay!