Normally, it is mainly dogs who, as “vacuum cleaners”, inhale everything edible and inedible that comes in front of their noses. But there are also particularly greedy cats that will lick or nibble on anything that looks or smells interesting. But unfortunately not all foods that we humans like are also tolerable for cats.
In order to protect your kitty from poisoning, you should therefore know what she can and cannot eat. Here’s an overview of which foods are toxic to your cat and how you can tell if they’ve eaten something toxic.
Paws off: Many foods and plants are poisonous to cats!
Can my cat eat olives? Or coriander? It’s not always exotic or particularly spicy foods that are toxic to your four-legged family member. Even normal treats such as chocolate or raisins can be dangerous for cats and other animals due to their ingredients.
For some foods, such as B. Onions or coffee, because of their bitter or pungent aroma, there is little risk that your kitty will consume large amounts of them. Nevertheless, caution is the mother of the porcelain box: On the one hand, some four-legged friends have a somewhat special taste. And on the other hand, toxic foods can also appear in “camouflaged” form – for example as part of a tempting meat dish that hardly any fur nose can resist.
You should protect your kitty from the following foods
Onion and leek plants
I don’t know about you, but for me, onions and garlic are one of those things in the kitchen that actually never run out and are in most dishes. Unfortunately, all bulbous plants – including onions, chives, leeks, garlic, shallots, spring onions and wild garlic – are highly toxic to house tigers. They contain sulfur compounds that destroy your furry friend’s red blood cells. These substances do not harm us humans because our red blood cells have other enzymes.
Half a small onion or a few cloves of fresh garlic is enough to cause massive damage to your kitty. Onions, garlic and co. are particularly dangerous in raw form. But even processed, whether cooked or dried, they still contain enough toxic components to cause poisoning – regardless of whether your velvet paw ingests a large single dose or several small amounts.
Onion poisoning in cats usually manifests initially as vomiting and diarrhea. After 1-3 days, your kitty will develop symptoms of anemia. These include loss of appetite, weakness, pale mucous membranes, dark urine and an increase in breathing and heart rate.
Luckily, onion poisoning in cats is relatively rare, as most cats find the pungent smell of fresh onions enough to make them run away.
However, there are a few exceptions:
Processed dishes in which the onion or garlic flavor is masked by something tasty, such as a creamy tsatsiki or a ready meal made with onion powder
Chive plants that your kitty mistakes for cat grass
Supposedly health-promoting garlic preparations for cats such. B. garlic tablets or garlic powder. The animal welfare organization “FOUR PAWS – Foundation for Animal Welfare” expressly advises against these products.
Chocolate and cocoa
As delicious as chocolate tastes – you should definitely hide it from your furry friend, because anything with cocoa in it is absolutely taboo for cats! All chocolate treats contain theobromine and small amounts of caffeine. These so-called methylxanthines have a stimulating effect on the nervous system. These ingredients from the cocoa bean are harmless for two-legged friends. In the case of four-legged friends, poisoning with theobromine and caffeine leads to life-threatening cardiovascular problems, since the animals can only break down the substances very slowly.
The first signs of chocolate poisoning are restlessness, weakness and tremors, followed by diarrhea, vomiting, coordination difficulties, seizures and cardiac arrhythmia, up to and including cardiac arrest. Symptoms appear 2-12 hours after consumption.
Slight symptoms of poisoning can already occur at 20 mg per kg of body weight. For a cat weighing 4 kg, this corresponds to 40 grams of milk chocolate, i.e. almost half a bar. Just a few small pieces (8-16 grams total) of dark chocolate are enough to induce vomiting or other symptoms.
As little as 80 mg of theobromine per kg of body weight can be deadly for your velvet paw. For a cat of average weight, half a bar of dark chocolate is life-threatening.
The higher the cocoa content, the more dangerous the chocolate is for your furry friend.
30 g of whole milk chocolate contain approx. 70 mg theobromine
30 g dark chocolate about 450 mg
30 g baking chocolate or cocoa powder up to 600 mg of the toxin.
Pretty complicated? If your kitty has actually eaten chocolate, you can use the chocolate calculator to determine how much poison she has ingested and what you should do.
Avocado
Whether small amounts of avocado pulp will harm your cat is debatable. What is certain is that avocados contain the poison persin, which can lead to life-threatening damage to the heart muscle in many animals. Symptoms of persine poisoning include coughing, shortness of breath, increased heart rate, and accumulation of fluid in the abdomen and under the skin. The poison is mainly in the skin and in the core of the avocado. Avocado plants are definitely highly toxic for four-legged friends and your kitty should definitely not nibble on them.
Apart from the persin it contains, which can possibly harm your velvet paw, the avocado contains a lot of fat. Many fur noses react to this with digestive problems up to an inflammation of the pancreas.
Unfortunately, it has not been proven what amounts of avocado are dangerous for cats. To be on the safe side, I would make sure that your house cat does not come near an avocado – not even your home-grown avocado plant.
Macadamia nuts, bitter almonds and fruit stones
For most velvet paws, nuts and fruit stones are more interesting as toys than as food because of their round shape and good rolling properties. Nevertheless, it is important to know that there are also species that endanger your kitty and from which she should definitely keep her paws.
Even small amounts of the delicious macadamia nuts are highly toxic for your furry friend, even if it is not yet clear which substance is responsible. Even after eating 1-2 nuts, muscle tremors, lameness, joint stiffness and high fever can occur. Liver damage was also observed.
Bitter almonds are primarily used in baking and are highly toxic to both humans and animals in their raw form due to their amygdalin content. Because a single almond contains up to 3 mg of the toxin, just a few bitter almonds can mean death for an average-weight cat.
The pits of stone fruits such as plums, apricots, peaches and cherries contain the substances amygdalin and prunasin, which can cause prussic acid poisoning in your fur nose if the cat bites them, releasing the toxin inside the pit. Because just 2 mg of hydrocyanic acid per kg of body weight are enough to cause serious term replacement systems such as nausea, vomiting and palpitations up to and including respiratory arrest.
Grapes and Raisins
Most cats are not big fruit lovers. However, your velvet paw should give grapes and raisins a particularly wide berth, because they lead to severe symptoms of poisoning in four-legged friends.
Both fresh and dried grapes can cause symptoms such as vomiting, diarrhea and kidney problems even in small amounts of 10 grams per kg body weight. Elevated levels of calcium were also found after eating grapes and raisins. Which ingredient causes the poisoning has not yet been fully researched.
What is certain is that the harmful substances in the dried fruit have a higher concentration, so that just a few raisins can trigger kidney failure. Not many cats like raisins – but some like to nibble on pastries like stollen or raisin bread, so you’ll want to carefully hide these foods.
Coffee and black tea
You can’t do anything without coffee? Or are you more of a tea drinker? You should keep both away from your fur nose, because the caffeine it contains is metabolized in your cat’s liver to theobromine and then causes the same symptoms as chocolate – i.e. diarrhea and vomiting, tremors, cramps and tachycardia.
As little as 80 mg of caffeine per kilogram of body weight can be deadly for your velvet paw. Depending on the strength of the drink and your pet’s body weight, this equates to 1/2 to 1/2 cup of coffee or 3-8 cups of black tea.
Raw nightshades and raw legumes
Your cat is so well behaved that worktops and kitchen tables are taboo for them? Mine neither ???? It is all the more important to know which types of vegetables you should not steal under any circumstances:
Potatoes, aubergines, peppers and tomatoes belong to the nightshade family and contain the toxin solanine when raw/unripe. The toxin is particularly concentrated in the skin of vegetables and in green areas. Even small amounts of the poison irritate the mucous membranes and cause gastrointestinal problems. Disorientation and confusion can also occur. If your kitty has ingested a large amount of the poison, solanine poisoning can lead to fatal cardiac arrest.
That’s why furry friends should never eat these vegetables raw – especially not the potato skins. When cooking, most of the solanine goes into the cooking water. Therefore, you should throw away the hot potato water immediately after preparation, before it cools down and the cat drinks from it. Potatoes, peppers, aubergines and tomatoes are better tolerated when cooked, but they still don’t belong in your kitty’s food bowl.
Uncooked legumes such as beans, peas and lentils contain lectins such as the toxin phasin, which can cause abdominal cramps, vomiting, bloody diarrhea and severe circulatory collapse in cats. The toxin is only broken down by heating, so that cooked legumes are better tolerated. But even then, beans & Co – just like cabbage vegetables – can cause flatulence in your velvet paw. Once you’ve smelled cat farts, you won’t want to do it again anytime soon!
Alcohol and intoxicants
Let’s face it, even if the last party was really nice, alcohol is a powerful neurotoxin. For cats, which have a lower body weight and are therefore more sensitive, there is a risk of alcohol poisoning even with small amounts. The symptoms are coordination disorders, stomach problems and liver damage. Ingestion of the lethal dose of 6.0 g of pure alcohol per kg of body weight paralyzes the heart and respiratory functions. Depending on the constitution of your kitty, even small amounts can cause major damage.
Normally, the pungent smell keeps your fur nose from drinking alcohol. An exception are sweet, creamy drinks such as eggnog or Baileys. People like to lick the glass here. A particular danger emanates from schnapps pralines: because the theobromine contained in chocolate increases the toxic effect of alcohol and also causes dangerous chocolate poisoning.
Incidentally, even after eating raw yeast dough, your kitty can get alcohol poisoning in addition to digestive problems and flatulence if the dough continues to ferment in the cat’s stomach and releases alcohol.
And while we’re on the subject: not only alcohol, but also other stimulants and intoxicants such as nicotine and hashish can cause severe poisoning in your furry friend. As little as half a cigarette (or the equivalent amount of loose tobacco) can have a lethal effect on your kitty.
If your velvet paw has eaten your weed (or your biscuits), it can lead to symptoms of intoxication and cravings, but above all to massive symptoms of poisoning and even coma. Even half a gram of hashish can cause death due to the THC it contains.
Also inedible: food packaging
A few years ago, a friend’s cat had to go to the vet with his flashing blue light because he had eaten something wrong, which is extremely tempting for cats and can be found in many kitchens: a piece of liver sausage – complete with the small metal clip at the end. Luckily, my girlfriend knew straight away that it’s all about the sausage in the truest sense of the word. A few hours later the tomcat had a successful operation and is completely fine again today. Unnoticed, however, this could have ended badly, because such a small pointed object can cause great damage in the sensitive cat’s intestine.
Incidentally, this also applies to plastic packaging or foils, which smell temptingly of sausage, bacon or other delicacies and are therefore eaten. These objects do not dissolve in the animals’ digestive tract and can, in the worst case, cause a life-threatening intestinal blockage, which requires absolutely quick action – with blue lights flashing.
Not poisonous, but unhealthy: What cats shouldn’t eat either
Even if the following foods do not lead directly to poisoning, they have no place in your kitty’s food bowl – because they can cause illness, have unnecessary or unhealthy ingredients or simply are not part of a cat’s natural diet.
Cow milk
Spoiling your beloved furry friend with milk or cream is almost a classic. However, although most cats like to lick up milk and milk products, they do not tolerate them well because they lack the enzyme to break down lactose. Adult velvet paws have a natural lactose intolerance and get stomach pains and other digestive problems from milk and milk products – even if the milk is diluted with water.
Salty foods
There are house tigers who are conditioned to the sound of the sausage slicer because they know: I’m about to have something delicious! Sausage, ham or smoked foods do not really belong in cat bowls, as these processed meat products contain a lot of salt. This also applies to chips, pretzel sticks or other snacks, which you should also not share with your animal roommate. Although your furry friend’s organism needs small amounts of salt, too much of it can cause stomach problems and damage the kidneys in the long term.
Raw Pork
Raw pork and wild boar can be tainted with viruses that are completely harmless to humans but can infect your cat with a deadly disease: Aujeszky’s virus. This disease is also called pseudo-rage because the first symptoms – restlessness and aggressive behavior – are similar to those of rabies. Dogs infected with the Aujeszky virus die within a few days because there is no treatment for the disease. Only temperatures above 60 degrees render the pathogens harmless. Therefore, only feed pork and wild boar meat that is well cooked – or just leave it out completely.
Tuna
Only a few velvet paws can resist the scent of an open can of tuna. Nevertheless, the fish should only remain a rare delicacy, as tuna is contaminated with mercury, which can harm your cat from a portion of around 100 grams of fish. If your kitty regularly eats a lot of tuna, it can cause kidney problems, fatty liver, heart and eye diseases. If you want to treat your pet to some tuna every now and then, serve them a product from the pet store that – unlike canned tuna for humans – does not require a lot of salt, spices and oil.
Cooked Bones
“No chicken bones for the cat!” I’ve known that sentence since I was a child. The temptation is great to give the begging kitty bones from the table to gnaw on. But be careful: heating the bones makes them brittle and makes them easy to splinter. Due to the risk of injury, your furry friend should never eat cooked bones.
Sugar
It is not 100% proven that small amounts of sugar cause tooth decay or diabetes in cats. Nevertheless, it is superfluous in cat nutrition. Our velvet paws can’t even taste the sweet taste because, as pure carnivores, they lack the receptors. You should therefore enjoy your sweets supply alone, because sugar, sweeteners and too much carbohydrates have nothing to do with a species-appropriate diet for four-legged friends. If you want to be on the safe side, when it comes to cat food, look for sugar-free and carbohydrate-free varieties from specialist retailers.
Beware of toxic drugs!
What heals us humans can make pets sick. Many human medicines are metabolized differently by your cat’s body and can therefore cause major health damage. While the active ingredients of most medicines are excreted in humans via the liver and kidneys, cats are often unable to break down these substances and therefore develop severe symptoms of poisoning.
Therefore, under no circumstances leave your medicine lying around in the open – not even supposedly harmless tablets such as e.g. B. your birth control pill.
More importantly, never give a sick cat medicines for humans, even in an emergency, always consult a veterinarian so that they can prescribe a suitable preparation for you. Painkillers in particular pose a great danger for cats and do not bring any improvement if your house cat is unwell.
The following medicines are pure poison for your furry friend and should never be eaten by them:
Pain relievers such as paracetamol, diclofenac and ibuprofen
tranquilizers and antidepressants
ADHD medications, such as B. Ritalin
sleeping pills
birth control pills
Beta blockers (heart medication), thyroid preparations, antiallergics, mineral tablets with iron, vitamin D3 preparations and antibiotics for humans can also make your kitty sick.
This list is not exhaustive and does not mean that other medicines are harmless to four-legged friends. Without exception, every medicine belongs in the medicine cabinet, where it is out of reach for the cat!
Better safe than sorry!
It is not always known exactly how much of a food is toxic for your animal roommates – also because not all cats react to the toxins in the same way. That’s why I strongly recommend that you protect your kitty from the foods mentioned here in general. This can be life-saving if the worst comes to the worst! It’s safest if you don’t leave anything “dangerous” lying around and only feed your pet cat food or feed it species-appropriate. Human food generally does not belong in the feeding bowl and should not be given as a treat.
What to do if the cat ate poisonous food
You should never take poisoning lightly, because in addition to typical acute symptoms such as vomiting, diarrhea, salivation, exhaustion, cramps, states of excitement, cardiovascular problems and breathing difficulties, serious long-term effects such as organ damage can always occur, depending on the poison and the amount of poison. Your kitty can also die from untreated poisoning.
If you suspect that your furry friend has eaten something poisonous, or you have even seen it doing so, you should act quickly:
Immediately move the poisonous food out of reach and remove any remaining poison from the cat’s mouth.
And then: Off to the vet – but with blue lights!
The sooner your kitty gets treatment, the better her chances!
Don’t forget to take anything with you that can provide information about the toxin – e.g. E.g. vomit, medicines with package inserts, or any remains of the toxic food.
The vet will then initiate the necessary treatment. They may want to make the cat vomit, do a gastric lavage to stop the toxin from doing further damage or give the cat charcoal tablets to bind the toxin in the gut. Some toxins can also be “defused” with a suitable antidote.
If your velvet paw is in poor condition, it can be hospitalized for observation or further treatment of the symptoms.
I read again and again on the internet that you should make your fur nose vomit yourself, e.g. B. by giving saline solution or milk. Please refrain from this self-treatment! Forced vomiting can cause your kitty to choke and get the poison into her lungs. Please do not give her milk either, as this can increase the effect of certain poisons. If your cat throws up on its own, you shouldn’t stop it – but treatment should be in the hands of a good veterinarian.
Conclusion: This is how you prevent food poisoning
Many of the foods that humans enjoy are toxic to cats and should not be eaten by your velvet paw. It’s best to put these out of your kitty’s reach, especially if she’s very curious or greedy.
Food for human consumption does not belong in the cat’s food bowl, not even as a treat or reward. Rather ensure a balanced, species-appropriate diet and spoil your darling with healthy cat snacks.
If your fur nose has eaten something poisonous, take it to the vet as soon as possible. When it comes to poisoning, every minute counts. Refrain from improper self-treatment and rather get in the car or taxi with the cat.
