WildCat Nutrition Pty Ltd

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Carnivore nutrition - a complex science

I’ve been studying cheetah nutrition and metabolism for several years now. These amazing animals were the subject of my PhD research and I feel like I have just scratched the tip of the iceberg in my understanding of their complex physiology. On the one hand their diet seems so simple - in the wild they mostly eat small to medium size antelope. In captivity, however, this favoured dish is for many reasons rarely on the menu. Captive facilities generally have access to meat from a variety of domestic species including horses, donkeys, cattle, chicken and rabbits. Very often, certain carcass components such as the skin, internal organs, blood and bones are removed soon after slaughter, leaving only the muscle meat and a few large bones. Although this provides a source of high quality protein, the muscle meat is horribly deficient in several vitamins, minerals and amino acids. Young fast growing big cats frequently develop metabolic bone disease due to calcium and vitamin D3 deficiencies. Often they have concurrent vitamin A, thiamine and copper deficiencies. Muscle meat diets are also deficient in certain amino acids such as glycine and proline. In my research I discovered just how important glycine is in cheetah metabolism. I also discovered that the standard captive diets do not contain sufficient salt (sodium chloride), folic acid, vitamin E or magnesium. The dietary supplements that are currently available for big cats do not contain an adequate range of nutrients to prevent all these deficiencies and for this reason, I decided to create a range of products that could be customized to meet the needs of several different carnivore species, fed on a variety of diets