Skinny Kitty

[Aelia Jusa]

I recently took my cat to the vet and apparently she is too skinny. Tuppy has never been terribly interested in food - she usually doesn't eat everything I give her and doesn't eat table scraps or anything. I wouldn't even bother giving her a bone or chicken wing which is recommended for teeth-care because I know that would just end in me cleaning chicken-grease off the carpet from where she left it and then trying to think of how to serve the remaining wings for my own dinner... So she's always been lean although she has lost about half a kilo from last time she was at the vet. They didn't think there was anything wrong with her that might cause her to be so lean but she could still do with beefing up.

So I have bought some more expensive vet food (Science Diet) that has more calories and protein and she is eating that okay as well as her normal wet food. But does anyone have any suggestions as to what else to give her that she will enjoy and is high in calories? Or even how to give her her food so she is more interested in it? She is really fussy too - I have a long list of wet food flavours that she refuses to eat , so she's not easy. It is annoying because she always makes a big fuss at breakfast and dinner time like she's just about to keel over in starvation but then if it's something she doesn't like she just gives me a disdainful look and stalks off.

[robertthebard]

Figure out the stuff she really likes, and base other choices around that. I have quite the opposite problem with my cat, as she will eat most anything I give her, and a lot of stuff that she figures out how to steal...Not sure what else to suggest, except maybe go a few days, and only feed her once a day, so that she's particularly hungry?

[Ladyzekke]

Fancy Feast brand certainly fattened my cat up LOL! But she'll only eat either the flaked tuna or her favorite, Salmon and Tuna Pate.

Have you tried a lot of different fish wet foods Aelia? Fish of some sort is usually a favorite, even stinky Mackerel.

Also is your kitty fixed? Neutering also seems to make them gain weight for some odd reason.

Science Diet is a good food, so is Iams and Eukenuba. [img]smile.gif[/img] Oh, NEVER buy this brand Nutro. I was talked into it a few weeks ago by this guy working in the pet store. He told me how healthy it was, and it even had yucca root or something in it to make the catbox smell not so stinky. WRONG! I'm not going to go into details, but let's just say I've renamed the catfood brand NutroBLAST. [img]graemlins/uhoh1.gif[/img]

[ 01-23-2006, 05:35 PM: Message edited by: ladyzekke ]

[Melcheor]

I think we need a picture, in order to make a proper diagnosis here...

[Mack_Attack]

LMAO Ladyzekke. That had me rollin around on the floor here at work. I will pass on the pics. I have a 1 year old boy in nappies. I have seen it all. [img]graemlins/hehe.gif[/img]

Good luck with the weight gain. I hope it works out for ya. I never knew cats had favorites for food. I mean the eat mice. Or do they just kill for fun?

[ 01-23-2006, 06:29 PM: Message edited by: Mack_Attack ]

[VulcanRider]

Does she drink milk? Give her a dish of whole milk every day or 2.

[Cloudbringer]

I'll echo LadyZ on the Fancy Feast, as my vet says it's high cal food. Most of those premium foods are.

Vulcan Rider, contrary to popular belief, milk is not good for cats. Many can't handle the lactose and it will...err... be similar to LadyZ's 'nutroblast!' in results... There are some special cat friendly 'milks' that have the lactose removed and some vitamins/minerals added, but regular milk isn't all that great for them, although some can tolerate it.

[Ladyzekke]

Yeah milk is OK for kittens, but not for young or adult cats. Gives em diahreah (sp?) bad LOL.

LOL MackAttack, I bet you have seen it all LOL. I just never have ever with my FatCat, and I've had her a good 11-12 years now I reckon. It happened when I was at work, I can't imagine the sight of it, don't want to LOL. When I got home from work, put can of her favorite Fancy Feast down, and she sat in the living room and looked at me like "Nah man, I'm good, just..frikken..no thanks". So unlike her usual hogfest LOL. I'd so like to go back to that PetSmart and fling the bag at that guy LOL. He was nice and all, but claimed to not work for Petsmart, just some independent "advisor" who fosters cats in his own home, and studies in detail every frikken ingredient in cat food. And he wasn't kidding. Was a 30 minute conversation I had with this guy LOL. Who, btw, was wearing a Nutro smock. Oh but he's not selling anyting or making any money, just an advisor! Man and I was a sucker too. Went there to get more Eukenuba, instead walked out with NutroBlast. I've never smelled anything quite like it, was almost human smelling LOL. Filled up 70% of the house too, a pungent stench that clinged to anything it came in close contact with.

Again cat food buyers, stay away..stay far far way, from Nutro brand cat foods, at least the dry food which is what I bought. Otherwise, get ready to clean some floors... and WALLS. [img]graemlins/crying.gif[/img]

[ 01-23-2006, 08:09 PM: Message edited by: ladyzekke ]

[True_Moose]

My cat, fully grown male, is 6 1/2 lbs, and I don't think I've ever seen him finish a meal. He's very small, but he's pretty healthy. I find that leaving out the food all day, he actually eats more of it over time - just like some humans, some cats eat over time instead of all at once. I believe we have him on Eukanuba dry food.

Don't worry, LZ, my other cat will eat anything. When she does eat, at least once a week, someone gets a sock coated in...unpleasantness.

[Aelia Jusa]

Yeah I have always fed her Fancy Feast and Dine. She has one of the small tins a day, half at breakfast and half at dinner, as well as dry food. LOL Tuppy hates the pates, except Salmon, Cod and Shrimp. She's more a fish chunks in gravy kind of girl.

LOLOL re Nutroblast - once Tuppy ate some butter that had been left on the bench - I woke up in the middle of the night to the most foul smell...

It's annoying, because I have always bought the premium brand food for her, and I always buy the dry food in the resealable packs, and only put a bit in the jar and freeze the rest so that it keeps as fresh as possible so she is most likely to eat them, given that in the cardboard boxes go stale so quickly, yet the vet was like 'what are you feeding her? Stuff from the supermarket? You should get vet stuff' like everything you buy at the supermarket is all the same and all poor quality. Yet Cloudy's vet says Fancy Feast is the good stuff.

I do think the vet was a tad overvigilant because I took her for the first time to the uni vet school where you're seen by vet students and a consultant so I think the consultants like to pick every tiny thing up for teaching purposes. LOL the vet trip was awful - Tuppy peed in her carry again on the way so one of the vet students had to go clean it out before the consultant would let Tuppy get back in it to go home; not only was she really skinny but one of the students said she found a lump in her abdomen which was later discovered to be a stool [img]graemlins/heee.gif[/img] , the consultant said she has small kidneys and when the student was giving her her vaccination she was pronounced to have tough skin that made the needle hard to put in. And she shed all over the place because she was so petrified.