cats eating ice cream have gone viral on the Internet, whose purpose is to record their reaction to the sensation of cold.
Perhaps you should ask yourself if cats can eat ice cream before participating in any “trending topic”. However, you may also have doubts about offering your cat something fresh and delicious on hot summer days. Whatever the reason, in the following article you will find out if cats can eat ice cream so, if you are interested in the subject, keep reading!
Can cats eat ice cream?
Ice creams are frozen foods that are usually made from dairy products in combination with fruits, candies, nuts, etc. Therefore, they are products with a high level of sugar and preserved at a very low temperature. For these reasons, in addition to other ingredients it may contain, it is not recommended to offer ice cream to our cats.
sugar and lactose
The main sugar that ice cream will contain is lactose. Like humans, cats can be lactose intolerant much more often; In addition to being very sensitive to the action of sugars in their digestive tract, since they are not physiologically prepared to digest them.
Most likely, if a cat eats ice cream, it will later suffer from diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain, and general discomfort.
What happens if a cat eats ice cream?
In addition to lactose, ice creams indicated for people may contain ingredients that are toxic to cats, such as chocolate ( harmful due to the presence of theobromine toxin ), eucalyptus (very toxic to cats), nuts, coffee (caffeine is a highly toxic stimulant for cats), xylitol as a sweetener, high amount of citrus, etc.
Therefore, from a health point of view, ice cream is not a beneficial product for cats, on the contrary. Its high level of sugar, in addition to other possible harmful ingredients, means that when cats eat ice cream, an acute and annoying picture of digestive pathology is caused.
How do cats react to cold food?
The other handicap of ice cream is that it is food preserved between 0°C and 4°C. Cats also have a complex nervous system similar to ours. We all know the sensation of when we ingest a cold drink very quickly, or in this case an ice cream, and suddenly we are flooded with a stabbing pain in the forehead and beginning of the nasal septum, quite unpleasant, which we colloquially call “brain freeze” or “ cold headache”.
This occurs because in the face of a cold stimulus, which causes a great contrast in temperature on the palate, the blood vessels that nourish the brain rapidly increase their blood flow. This causes increased pressure in the brain (intracranial) and dilation and contraction in the arteries of the meninges (layers that cover the nervous system). This results in intense pain that lasts a few seconds.
A cat also freezes its brain from eating ice cream, with the difference that, although it is a well-known sensation among people, it generates bewilderment and discomfort in a cat that it should not experience.
cats eating ice cream
If you are thinking of recording your cat feeling something very unpleasant, for the simple fact of uploading a video to social networks, from here we advise you not to do it since it is not necessary. In addition to negatively influencing the gastrointestinal health of the cat, you are going to cause pain and headache or, as it is known in medical terms, neuralgia of the sphenopalatine ganglion.
homemade ice cream for cats
However, if what you want is to give your cat a treat on hot days, you can prepare a homemade recipe that will not be harmful. This option includes homemade ice cream prepared without milk (or lactose-free milk) and no other type of sugar.
Ice cream recipes for cats
Fruit ice cream and vegetable milk for cats
One idea is to make small pieces of fruit (for example apple, pear, or papaya), place the pieces in a container, and add non-dairy cereal milk. Mix everything well and place in ice cream molds. Freeze for a day and voila. You can also use vegetables such as carrots or pumpkin, your kitty will surely love it.
Ice cream with a can of meat
This recipe is even simpler. You can take a can of your cat’s wet food, mix it with a little water and place it in ice cream molds. By freezing it for a day you will have the canned food, but with a different presentation that, on hot summer days, cats can feed on ice cream.
How to avoid “brain freeze”
Previously we have seen cold as a disadvantage since it can happen that a cat freezes its brain from eating ice cream. To prevent this unpleasant situation from occurring, offer the ice cream when it has rested for a while outside the fridge and has gained temperature, more or less, from approximately 8°C. It also prevents it from eating it very quickly and offers it in small times, little by little, so that the drastic temperature contrast in the brain does not occur.
Cats can eat ice cream if we care about the ingredients it contains and the temperature at which we offer it. What for us can be a simple game, can trigger a digestive health problem and discomfort for our cat. Although it is nothing serious, it is not something necessary either.
