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Should I feed my Maine Coon a raw diet?

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The idea of feeding a raw diet, often homemade, to a domestic cat became a trend about 12 years ago. The raw diet has been touted as a good cure for sensitive feline stomachs and digestive problems leading to 'smelly poop'. Of the purebred cats, the Bengal probably topped the list of the best 'patients' for the change in diet. Although I am sure that many Bengal cats benefited as their stool improved, we don't hear about the potential issues. Premix and raw meat cat food diet. This is taking raw meat and adding in the nutrients needed to make it a balanced diet. It is a good option. Photo of mince by BobPetUK Risk and reward Despite the fact that I am a supporter of the raw diet for cats, I am also fully aware of the potential hazards. The decision to feed a raw diet is a personal one based on risk and reward . It will be a balanced decision. And if you want to feed your Maine Coon a raw diet, I think the safest way forward is to buy a commercially prepared food to...
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Can Maine Coons eat raw meat?

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The question is actually asking if Maine Coons SHOULD be given a raw meat diet and the answer is NO. The video of me explains. Yes, I know I look old and ridiculous but I got tired of typing stuff. The point is that of course Maine Coons can eat raw meat. But eating meat alone is not enough as it will not be complete and balanced. You need to add supplements. You can buy them so you could buy some raw meat, mince it up and add the supplements to make it complete and balanced (see link below) but that's not enough either really if you ask veterinarians and 'experts'.  RELATED:  Good Cat Diet: Premix and Fresh Meat ? There is a chance that raw meat contains pathogens (nasty germs) which the Maine Coon will ingest and make them sick such as toxoplasmosis. And if you prepare it carelessly and store it incorrectly you may add some bacteria to the prepared product such as Salmonella . You might store it at a temperature that is too high. It may go off slightly and so on. READ A ...
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How much will it cost to feed my Maine Coon for ONE YEAR?

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As the Maine Coon (MC) is the largest domestic cat breed and as they CAN weigh around 20 pounds, I'll attempt to work out an answer on the basis that the owner has a large MC at 20 pounds in weight. That's convenient for me because I have prepared an infographic which sets out the minimum and maximum cost for ONE YEAR for dry, wet and raw cat foods in the United States to feed a 10 POUND cat. Here it is: So, if we rather crudely double the cost for a MC we arrive at the following. Note: doubling the food intake for a cat double the weight is a bit simplistic but I believe a good starting point. In feeding a Maine Coon, the cheapest dry food for one year, the cost would be twice the $86 (the cost for a 10-pound cat) which makes $172 and for the most expensive dry food it would be $704. Feeding the same MC with the cheapest wet food would using the same double cost produces $892 per year for the cheapest wet food and the most expensive would be $4214. Feeding a raw diet, the cos...
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Location: United States
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Reasons Maine Coon breeder switched from raw to commercially manufactured wet and dry

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I have just read an interesting blog article written by a Maine Coon breeder in the UK about feeding Maine Coon cats and indeed any domestic cat. Her experiences, of course, relate to Maine Coon cats. Her breeding cattery is called Rudycats Maine Coons Ltd . One kitten from Rudycats Maine Coons Ltd. Image by them. I believe that it can be very useful to listen to cat breeders because they have more direct first-hand experience than most people in raising cats. And it is strongly in their interest to raise healthy cats. Their business is dependent upon it. UPDATE : This breeder has been accused of being cruel and callous in her breeding. That is the allegation. It does not directly affect what she says about cat food, but you should know. Click this link to read about this allegation . Therefore, they should be trying very hard and using their best efforts to create healthy and strong kittens. Nutrition is a major way to meet that goal. I don't know the name of the breeder but perha...
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Do Maine Coons need a special diet?

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A Maine Coon (MC) owner on the mumsnet.com website says: "Cat food confusion! Maine Coon (year old)". She believes that her cat needs a MC diet, but in general they don't. Some individual MCs might need a special diet to meet their individual health needs but that applies to all domestic cats. Please read on. Update: Obese MCs are more prone to developing HCM and therefore a diet to control weight would be useful . She has a young Maine Coon (MC) who's bigger than the adult cat next door and wants advice on the mumsnet.com website about buying cat food for her MC. Her cat likes dry cat food as most domestic cats do because the manufacturers add tasty fats to it. It can become slightly addictive. But just because cats like it does not mean that it is good.  Do Maine Coons need a special diet? Image in the public domain. Like most cat owners who've studied cat food I believe that the less convenient high quality wet cat food should be the default food because it c...
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Omar, celebrity Aussie Maine Coon, eats raw kangaroo meat

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Omar is Australia's celebrity Maine Coon. He's enormous as you can see in the photographs. I think he's the biggest domestic cat in Australia and in 2017 there was talk about him being the world's longest domestic cat at 3'11"! But I don't really care too much about these records because they are a bit artificial. He has a successful Instagram account - as he would - because people love big Maine Coons. I have a full page on him which is linked to below. Omar, Australia's celebrity Maine Coon cat (info and pics) Omar carried by Stephy Hirst. Photo: Omar's Instagram account. But the interesting aspect of this story is that his co-owner, Stephy Hirst, told the BBC that he eats raw kangaroo meat. She said: "It's the only meat we could find that he actually wants to eat". It's an interesting snippet of information about this celebrated cat. Sadly, we don't have more information about why Stephy put him on raw meat. It's unus...
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Location: Australia
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Piles of raw cat food for a Maine Coon breeder in Russia

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This is an interesting video and still image. For people interested in domestic cats and perhaps the cat fancy, the video and still image are interesting because it tells me that in Russia, where this video comes from, they sometimes feed their cats raw cat food which means they make their own cat food from raw materials. It is tricky so please do it carefully after research. And secondly, this breeder is obviously committed to the idea of feeding her cats home-made cat food.  Piles of raw cat food for a Maine Coon breeder in Russia. Screenshot. She is one of those interesting Maine Coon breeders in Russia because they do create some very interesting-looking cats. I have argued that the Russians breed the best Maine Coons. They have outmanoeuvred the Americans which is sad for them because this is an American cat.  CLICK FOR PAGES ON RAW CAT FOOD SUPPLEMENTS This is America's purebred cat which they call their own. Okay, it was imported from Europe in the 1600s but tha...
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Location: Russia
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The extreme Maine Coon face

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This is an example of extreme breeding. This is a Maine Coon but this cat is an extreme and rare example of this breed. This is not the way they look normally. This face is almost like an aggressive robot with the piercing eyes and the huge muzzle.  Or like a lion's head. The head looks enormous and very heavy. It looks unreal. But it also looks very impressive.  And purchasers like impressive-looking domestic cats. But this not the face of a Maine Coon that wins cat show competitions as it does not fit the breed standard as accurately as the more moderate winners (see below).  In fact, the CFA standard is clear in that the cat should have a balanced appearance although this cat was not bred under the CFA breed standard as I understand it (see below).  Click here for more on the kind of MC which wins at shows . Maine Coon selectively breed to have an extreme face. Image in the public domain. And the Maine Coon is meant to be a large cat, the largest domestic cat b...
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Maine Coon Size - this is a huge one!

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  Enormous Maine Coon with a head bigger than the person holding him. Pic: in public domain. Maine Coon size is very important to both breeders of this cat and the public. I sometimes think that the public is more obsessed with Maine Coon size than the breeders are. The bigger the Maine Coon the better. There is a fascination about it and I confess that there is nothing much more impressive than a huge Maine Coon. They've been bred like this through selective breeding but please remember that they weren't always like this. The original Maine Coons were regular farm cats in the state of Maine in 19th-century and before. They were robust, rugged, medium-longhaired moggy cats but impressive nonetheless. Their impressiveness led to breeders deciding to breed them which in turn led to the breed being accepted by the cat associations and then to win cat shows and become perhaps one of the most famous breeds in the world. The breed standard for the Maine Coon as provided by e.g. Cat F...
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Comparison of a black smoke Maine Coon at 6 weeks and 6-years-of-age

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This is a cross-post as the image is so damned good. It is amazing because the cat is amazing. To put the same cat at different stages of their life in the same photograph is a nice idea especially with this Maine Coon (MC) who has an amazingly heavy face. It is so mightily masculine to be almost unbelievable. He has a priceless expression on his face too. Very serious compared to the innocence of his face when he was 6 weeks old. He looks a bit coy when 6 weeks old and a slightly grumpy middle-aged man when 6 years old. Comparison of a black smoke Maine Coon at 6-weeks and 6-years-of-age. Image in pubic domain. No doubt he is huge too. You get a clear sense of that in the image. There is a serious and less impressive side to this image. It's the backstory that people don't really want to read about and discuss or in fact do anything about: heart ( HCM ) and joint disease. The bigger and heavier the MCs are the more predisposed to heart disease they are. Here is the posts on...
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Average lifespan of Maine Coon cat

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How long do Maine Coon cats live for? What's the average lifespan? Do they live shorter lives than the average random-bred family cat? These are difficult questions to answer accurately. In fact, I don't think we can answer them accurately because nobody has been counting. Nobody has a database or carried out a full-blown survey and therefore you will read anecdotal evidence i.e. statements by breeders or people who think they know the answer and these answers get repeated on the Internet. I am not sure that they are accurate. Picture of a Maine Coon who looks like a middle-aged man. Photo: Pinterest. My research indicates that people believe that Maine Coon cats live between about 10 and 15 years old. Some may live longer than that and some may live shorter lives. One well-known Maine Coon, Rubble, lived for 31 years and was at one time the oldest domestic cat in the world. But there will always be exceptions and this article is about the mean or the average although these ...
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Eerie picture of a Maine Coon sitting like a human on a chest of drawers

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This is a slightly scary picture according to those who've seen it. One social media user said it was the devil and "If I walked into a room and saw that, I would assume some shit is about to go down". There is a ghostly stillness and sinister feeling about the image. 'Eerie' is a better description. This attractive cat appears to be completely at ease and comfortable sitting on top of a chest of bedroom drawers. The lighting from below (deliberate?) enhances the eerie effect. It seems possible that this is a photo-edited image but if so, it has been done with great skill. However, I don't think this is Photoshopped. Rethink: to be honest, the more I look at the picture, the more I feel that this is a photo-edited image. It is just too unnatural to be real. Although some domestic cats get themselves into some very strange positions. Maine Coon calmly sitting just like a human on a chest of drawers. Picture source unclear. Image deemed to be in the public d...
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Tortoiseshell Maine Coon with split-face

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Maine Coon with "split face". Photo: Screenshot. This is a very impressive Maine Coon. As you can see she is a tortoiseshell and as you probably know almost all tortoiseshell and calico cats are female. There are a few male tortoiseshell cats (and this might be one of them). Their sex is caused by a genetic aberration because the genetics of tortoiseshell cats dictates that they are almost always female. About one in 3000 are male as I recall. Also, it is not that unusual to see this extreme pattern on the face which creates the appearance of a "split-face". This is not what is called a "chimera" but a normal variation of the tortoiseshell pattern. Sometimes you do see what some people call "two-faced" cats with this sort of face due to a sharply defined pattern down the middle of the face. But the genetics behind that is different to this normal tortoiseshell variation. This is a particularly extraordinary looking Maine Coon cat. Not all Maine C...
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Are Maine Coons illegal in some countries, states or territories?

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One Maine Coon website asks if Maine Coons are legal? My initial response was that it is a bizarre question (second thoughts below), but I'll answer it in my way. I say that it is a bizarre question because the Maine Coon is an entirely domestic cat by which I mean NOT a wild cat hybrid and therefore there is no reason whatsoever to declare it illegal in any jurisdiction unless that there is some other fanciful reason to ban the cat (there might be - see below). Are Maine Coons illegal in some countries, states or territories? No, to the best of my knowledge. Image: MikeB I know of no jurisdiction anywhere in the world that bans Maine Coons which makes sense. Conversely a similar sized domestic cat, the F1-F2 Savannah, is illegal in many jurisdictions (states, territories and countries) because it is a wildcat hybrid. The cat has some wild cat DNA which some legislatures consider to be detrimental to human health and welfare and to the conservation of wildlife (if the cat escapes t...
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Difference between Maine Coon and domestic long hair

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The difference between a Maine Coon cat and a domestic longhaired cat comes down to the fact that the former has been artificially bred (selective breeding) whereas the latter has usually procreated according to natural selection. Natural selection is random breeding and therefore the domestic longhair is a random-bred cat whereas, selective breeding produces a purebred, pedigree cat registered with a cat association.  Difference between Maine Coon and domestic long hair. Infographic by MikeB. And because each individual Maine Coon cat is registered with a cat association, if they are in genuine Maine Coon, their appearance should comply with the association's breed standard . The breed standard tells breeders what their Maine Coon cats should look like in order that they can win cat show competitions if they want to enter their cat into these competitions. And so, as the appearance of Maine Coon cats is moulded to the guidance of a breed standard (see a section below from the...
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2 top Russian Maine Coon cat breeders which ship internationally

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I am writing this from the West; specifically, near London, UK. There will be quite a few people living in the West who'd like to adopt a Maine Coon cat and they would like to adopt one from a Russian breeder because they do have a certain style.  I sense, although I don't have hard evidence to support this feeling, that the top Russian breeders of Maine Coon cats might be superior to breeders from other countries.  I am putting aside Putin's invasion of Ukraine when writing this article. Some people might object to dealing in anyway with a Russian business on account of that barbaric and illegal invasion. We should remember that Russia has quite a strong cat fancy. They like their cats and they love their purebred cats particularly the Maine Coon. It is in fact a cat breed which is quite naturally suited to the Russian way of life and climate. There's lots of space in Russia with a relatively low population and therefore there are going to be houses with large grounds ...
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No part of a Maine Coon cat should be exaggerated

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It is interesting to read that the premier cat association, the CFA (Cat Fanciers' Association) - the cat association which really dictates (with TICA) how Maine Coons should look - makes it clear that no part of the cat should be exaggerated, and the cat should be "well-proportioned and balanced".  In other words, any form of extreme appearance such as a particularly heavy muzzle or particularly large ears with extra-long lynx tips are not going to be seen as advantageous in terms of winning cat shows or in terms of having an ideal appearance. As soon as I read that no part of a Maine Coon should be exaggerated, I immediately thought of the extremely large, extreme-bred Maine Coon cats that often come from Russia. These cats have very heavy muzzles.  Lion-faced Maine Coon with exaggerated features. Image in public domain now. In fact, their heads look like the heads of lions. I get the impression that breeders have selectively bred their cats over years to look like male...
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