The Available Studies of the Vegan Diet on Cats
The Available Studies of the Vegan Diet on Cats
There is limited research on the impact of the vegan diet on the feline companions in comparison to canines. As it is not as well known in the general public that cats can be healthy on a plant-based diet provided with taurine, B12, vitamin A.
Vegan diet:
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https://www.magonlinelibrary.com/doi/abs/10.12968/vetn.2022.13.6.252
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https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0253292
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https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0284132
Vegetarian diet:
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I'm inheriting a cat (long story) and did some basic research into the possibility of a vegan diet. It seems that while it is possible, like your links suggest, there is no easy way to do it. I looked in thr local stores and while I have found vegan food for my dog, they don't have anything for cats. A few online specialty places but the food is so expensive it is off the table.
I've switched to trying to find the lowest impact food but even that information is hard to find. I hope that it gets better and this small market gains traction, but it's not really at a level right now where thr average person can make a switch.
The main thing I've read (not a cat owner) is that unlike a dog, you're walking a fine line when providing a vegan diet to a cat. It can be done, and this is reflected in robust scientific literature, but you need to seriously know what you're doing. As a critical part of that, I think consulting a vet about getting them on a specific, well-planned diet is something any vegan cat owner ought to be doing. Mainly because while you can probably get away with feeding your cat a suboptimal meat-based diet and have them still be healthy, the risks with a suboptimal plant-based one mean that I don't think DIY research cuts it.
Nonetheless, I think the best thing for a vegan if possible (not your case) is simply not to own a cat, not because it's impossible to accomplish this but moreso because statistically it's much, much harder to accomplish, and normalizing it among vegans is liable to create situations where well-meaning but incompetent owners simply cannot meet the challenge and either give up partway through and go with meat-based food or slowly destroy the cat's health.