A cat’s digestive juices are similar to those of humans but different in some key ways. As in humans, the cat’s mouth is phase one, with
saliva as the first digestive fluid to start working on the food, but cat saliva contains hardly any ptyalin, the enzyme that breaks down starches. (Cats do not naturally seek out starchy foods, and there is little
point in their owners giving them starchy snacks.)
But what they lack in saliva power, cats make up for in phase two, the stomach, where their stomach acids are much more powerful than those of humans. The cat stomach has no difficulty digesting bits of hard bone and other things that send the human stomach into a tizzy.
