Cats & Kittens

My female cat is 3 years old and weighs 9 pounds. I cannot see her ribs obviously and cannot feel them under her fur at all. She doesn't look hugely obese like other cats I have had when I was younger, but she certainly is on the heavy side. I feed her what I was told to feed her by my vet which is 1/4 cup of dry food in the morning. and 1/5 a can of wet cat food in the late afternoon, and then another 1/5 can of wet catfood in the evening before I go to bed. I also feed her those little cat treats throughout the day that are good for her teeth and only 2 calories. I make her chase them and she loves this little game. It gives her a bit of exercise. She's a very playful cat and at least once a day I play with her or she will even just start pushing a toy around and play with it.

The problem is that she asks for food constantly. I'm feeling like I should feed her more. She's practically camped out by the pantry where her food is, and everytime I open the drawer where the can opener happens to be, she will come running. Everything I feed her she gobbles up within minutes, so her dish is always empty. I feel guilty and don't know if I should feed her more because she wants it so much and I thought it would be better for a cat to always have food in her bowl that she can graze on all day, but if I did that, she would gobble it all and want more 2 hours later.

any advice? (I'm very concerned about overfeeding because the cat I had as a child died of diabetes complications and was very overweight)

Welcome to Cats and Kittens. I'm glad you're so conscious of your cats weight and health! Good for you! She doesn't sound like you are starving her - a way to tell if she is too skinny is if you could see all her ribs and backbone - you should be able to feel the ribs but not see them and you really shouldn't feel the backbone at all. Now if you want her to be more "satisfied" you could try decreasing (or even eliminating) the dry food which is full of fillers and empty calories and bump up her canned food to 1/4-1/2 can twice daily. The protein in canned food will make her feel more satisfied and hopefully she will stop the begging. It doesn't always work because some cats will just beg and beg until we give in but it may be worth a try!

Good luck!

I have one of these too.  My girl Ivy is a butter ball.  I tell her that if her circumference is greater than her height, we have a problem.  Of course, she is one of six, so that doesn't help.

You didn't say how long ago you cut back on her food.  If it has been pretty recent, she just needs a little time to adjust.

Are you using 6oz cans? If so and you're making one last 5 meals, that is a pretty tiny amount of food.

What brand of food are you giving her?

Switching to something very low carb should be able to give you the weight loss results without having to be quite so restrictive on the amount. Plus as was mentioned, higher protein food will help her feel full longer.

Our female cat was pushing 13lbs after steroid therapy for a skin condition. Since switching to a quality almost all canned diet about 18 months ago, she's now under 11 and continuing to loose.

I feed Innova Cat and Kitten food (this one is not quite as low carb, but they really like it so I rotate it in), Evo Cat and Kitten, Evo 95% Chicken and Turkey and sometimes Wellness Chicken or Turkey. On the rare occasion they get dry food, I use Innova.

HTH!

Thanks all for responding.

I'v been feeding her like this since I adopted her last year. She's a shelter cat who was a good weight when I got her (she was 2) and I wanted to keep her that way. I took her to the vet immediately and got the advice as to what I should feed her. For dry food I feed her different brands, but usually the more expensive brands the vetrecommends like ONE and nutriscience (?) but for the wet cans I always feed her friskies only. I have tried the vet brands and she doesn't like them and will leave them dry in her bowl. I'm not sure if they arethe 6 oz cans. They say 156 g. I don't know how many oz that would be?

I'll look for a high protein food next time I go to the pet store, and see if that fills her up better.

Thanks for the advice! I'm glad toknow that I'm not underfeeding her and that other cats are like this too. I do remember one of my other very heavy cats being like this, just obsessedwith food and everything related to food. She lives for it!