Cats are weird... wet food edition
June 22, 2013 3:13 PM Subscribe
Why do my cats keep losing interest in wet food they've happily eaten for weeks?
Ok, so I've read all about why wet food diets are better for cats, so a year or so ago I transitioned my two from the unlimited kibble they were used to, to a twice-a-day feeding schedule of wet food. Didn't have any trouble with the transition, they happily ate the wet food and were always ready for more at the next mealtime. Until a few weeks later...
They'd still come running when they heard the can pop open, then when I'd put it down for them they'd sniff it and look up at me like "what else ya got?" To be clear, this is the same brand they'd been eating happily for weeks, in the same flavors they had previously enjoyed.
So I'd leave it there, and in the morning you could see they'd eaten a little bit of it but most of it was still there. And you could tell they were hungry, because they'd start begging for food as soon as I came out of the bedroom and would dance around with excitement as I opened a fresh can and put it in their bowl. And they'd sniff it, and look up at me, like, "yeah, I thought we were clear ... we don't want this no more."
So after a few days of this I tried a different brand. And initially they took to it, and then after a few weeks the same thing: "we don't want this no more, either."
Lather, rinse, repeat with different brands & flavors over the course of a few months. Eventually I gave in and put them back on kibble because I was worried they'd make themselves sick not eating. (My "old man" cat got very sick from liver disease a few years ago brought on by not eating, so I worry.)
Thing is, my girl cat has been very obese for years. We kept them on the wet-food-only for several months, and she slimmed down nicely. Both cats' coats became very sleek, and less prone to matting and dandruff. Within weeks of putting them back on the dry food she regained all the weight she lost, and her coat is showing the effects as well.
I think it would be good for both of them to get them back on the wet food only, but how do I keep them from going off it? Is there a particular food that they would find really appealing long-term?
We've gone through Friskies, 9 Lives and Fancy Feast, and currently give them a bit of the Fancy Feast a couple of times a week as a treat as they seemed to enjoy on an occasional basis.
They only like pate style wet food, if you give them shreds or chunks they just lick off the gravy and leave the meat. I tried EVO once and they acted like I was trying to feed them poison.
I'm willing to try a better brand of food (more expensive, within reason) but I am not willing to make homemade food for them. I can barely manage to make homemade food for me and my hubby.
Any tips, tricks, ideas, thoughts?
Ok, so I've read all about why wet food diets are better for cats, so a year or so ago I transitioned my two from the unlimited kibble they were used to, to a twice-a-day feeding schedule of wet food. Didn't have any trouble with the transition, they happily ate the wet food and were always ready for more at the next mealtime. Until a few weeks later...
They'd still come running when they heard the can pop open, then when I'd put it down for them they'd sniff it and look up at me like "what else ya got?" To be clear, this is the same brand they'd been eating happily for weeks, in the same flavors they had previously enjoyed.
So I'd leave it there, and in the morning you could see they'd eaten a little bit of it but most of it was still there. And you could tell they were hungry, because they'd start begging for food as soon as I came out of the bedroom and would dance around with excitement as I opened a fresh can and put it in their bowl. And they'd sniff it, and look up at me, like, "yeah, I thought we were clear ... we don't want this no more."
So after a few days of this I tried a different brand. And initially they took to it, and then after a few weeks the same thing: "we don't want this no more, either."
Lather, rinse, repeat with different brands & flavors over the course of a few months. Eventually I gave in and put them back on kibble because I was worried they'd make themselves sick not eating. (My "old man" cat got very sick from liver disease a few years ago brought on by not eating, so I worry.)
Thing is, my girl cat has been very obese for years. We kept them on the wet-food-only for several months, and she slimmed down nicely. Both cats' coats became very sleek, and less prone to matting and dandruff. Within weeks of putting them back on the dry food she regained all the weight she lost, and her coat is showing the effects as well.
I think it would be good for both of them to get them back on the wet food only, but how do I keep them from going off it? Is there a particular food that they would find really appealing long-term?
We've gone through Friskies, 9 Lives and Fancy Feast, and currently give them a bit of the Fancy Feast a couple of times a week as a treat as they seemed to enjoy on an occasional basis.
They only like pate style wet food, if you give them shreds or chunks they just lick off the gravy and leave the meat. I tried EVO once and they acted like I was trying to feed them poison.
I'm willing to try a better brand of food (more expensive, within reason) but I am not willing to make homemade food for them. I can barely manage to make homemade food for me and my hubby.
Any tips, tricks, ideas, thoughts?
The Nature's Variety Instinct food is nice because you can rotate among the different flavors, and it's all pate-style. It's available at PetCo and on Amazon, among other places.
It sounds like restless_nomad and I are both recommending grain-free. It's probably worth trying to see if something with fewer carbs than you've tried works better for your kitties.
posted by jaguar at 3:43 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
It sounds like restless_nomad and I are both recommending grain-free. It's probably worth trying to see if something with fewer carbs than you've tried works better for your kitties.
posted by jaguar at 3:43 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
Mine do the same thing. I keep a few different brands/flavors in stock and rotate and that seems to work out well. It seems like they don't get too bored of any one thing if there's some variety.
I've read that's better anyway - if you've got cats who only ever eat one kind of food, then you can be really screwed if that flavor stops getting made and they go on a hunger strike, or if they develop allergies to something in that one brand/formulation.
Right now my beasties are obsessed with Avoderm and Wysong, moderately interested in Merrick, and turning up their nose at Wellness, so I guess I've been leaning too hard on the Wellness lately and need to mix it up more.
All of that said, you wouldn't think all three of them would go off the same food at once but that seems to be how it happens.
In conclusion: Cats are weird.
posted by Stacey at 3:43 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
I've read that's better anyway - if you've got cats who only ever eat one kind of food, then you can be really screwed if that flavor stops getting made and they go on a hunger strike, or if they develop allergies to something in that one brand/formulation.
Right now my beasties are obsessed with Avoderm and Wysong, moderately interested in Merrick, and turning up their nose at Wellness, so I guess I've been leaning too hard on the Wellness lately and need to mix it up more.
All of that said, you wouldn't think all three of them would go off the same food at once but that seems to be how it happens.
In conclusion: Cats are weird.
posted by Stacey at 3:43 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
Best answer: From Terry Pratchett's The Unadulterated Cat (fantastic book, btw):
Get a few different flavours/brands and rotate them, to head off boredom. But don't exhaust yourself trying to find the one perfect food that they'll eat every time, because alas for most cats I don't think it exists.
posted by Catseye at 3:43 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
Feeding Real cats follows a pattern as changeless as the seasons:Every cat I've had has done this with food, switching what they'll consider edible about every couple of weeks or so. Which I suppose makes sense - if you were eating out at a restaurant every night, you wouldn't want the same thing every single time, right?
1. Real cat turns up its nose at gold-plated tinned stuff recommended by woman on television.
2. Out of spite, you buy some down-market own-brand stuff whose contents you really wouldn't want to know about (after all, considering what can be put in beef burgers and sausages... no, you really wouldn't want to know about it...) Cat wolfs it down, licks empty plate across floor.
3. Out of relief, next shopping trip you buy a dozen tins of the humming stuff.
4. Cat turns up nose at it after one meal. This is a cat, you understand, that will eat dragonflies and frogs.
Get a few different flavours/brands and rotate them, to head off boredom. But don't exhaust yourself trying to find the one perfect food that they'll eat every time, because alas for most cats I don't think it exists.
posted by Catseye at 3:43 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
Sammy Katz is similarly picky. I really wanted him on Merrick but he eventually turned his nose up at it. He consistently likes both Natural Life canned and Newman's Own, both of which are available in local supermarkets. Neither is grain-free (Natural Life has rice; Newman's Own does have a grain free variety but it's hard to find where I am) but the cat reliably eats it. So.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 3:46 PM on June 22, 2013
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 3:46 PM on June 22, 2013
Best answer: In my experience rotating does the trick. It's fine to feed different brands, one meal brand a, next meal brand b, following meal kibble, next meal meat. If I notice cat(s) don't eat a certain brand/flavor I drop it from the menu.
The positive that comes with feeding different brands is that it provides a better overall nutrition (not all cat foods are made the same, some have more of ingredient x, some more of y, some more of z etc).
Also re: homemade food.
As long as cats eat a minimum of 50% of industrial cat food it is not necessary to add vitamin and mineral supplements to a homemade meal. A meal consisting of pure raw meat in chunks is fine. Cats are carnivores, all grains and veggies are only there for the bulk and not necessary to add.
Such a raw meat meal is super simple to prepare, it's not much work to cut up a bit of beef, chicken, turkey, lamb, rabbit or venison etc.
I personally don't feed pork because of Trichinosis and the different fat. All the meat and organs I feed are fit for human consumption, so if you're preparing meat for cooking maybe try set some aside for the cats. Your cats might not like it or only certain kinds of meat. For organs: liver should be given in very small quantities only.
Obviously, if this sounds interesting at all, I want to encourage you to read up on raw feeding yourself and do some research first. This is just what I researched and works for me. Other people might have other approaches.
Re: wet vs. dry.
Wet food is way better for sure, but that does not mean that kibble is never to be given. If you find that it works for your cats I think it is fine to give it in smaller quantities.
It's just important to make sure that cats are sufficiently hydrated.
I add a spoonful or two of water to a meal of meat for that purpose, cats seem to think it's gravy and "eat" it first!
posted by travelwithcats at 4:04 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
The positive that comes with feeding different brands is that it provides a better overall nutrition (not all cat foods are made the same, some have more of ingredient x, some more of y, some more of z etc).
Also re: homemade food.
As long as cats eat a minimum of 50% of industrial cat food it is not necessary to add vitamin and mineral supplements to a homemade meal. A meal consisting of pure raw meat in chunks is fine. Cats are carnivores, all grains and veggies are only there for the bulk and not necessary to add.
Such a raw meat meal is super simple to prepare, it's not much work to cut up a bit of beef, chicken, turkey, lamb, rabbit or venison etc.
I personally don't feed pork because of Trichinosis and the different fat. All the meat and organs I feed are fit for human consumption, so if you're preparing meat for cooking maybe try set some aside for the cats. Your cats might not like it or only certain kinds of meat. For organs: liver should be given in very small quantities only.
Obviously, if this sounds interesting at all, I want to encourage you to read up on raw feeding yourself and do some research first. This is just what I researched and works for me. Other people might have other approaches.
Re: wet vs. dry.
Wet food is way better for sure, but that does not mean that kibble is never to be given. If you find that it works for your cats I think it is fine to give it in smaller quantities.
It's just important to make sure that cats are sufficiently hydrated.
I add a spoonful or two of water to a meal of meat for that purpose, cats seem to think it's gravy and "eat" it first!
posted by travelwithcats at 4:04 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
It's just important to make sure that cats are sufficiently hydrated.
When I got my first cat I read that they will drink more water if there food and water are in different places. I moved the water dish across the room he started drinking noticibly more water. The same goes for new cat.
Torgo is also completely fickle when it comes to wet food (and really only cares about the gravy) so I buy whatever is on sale. If he doesn't eat it at least I know he's drinking.
posted by Room 641-A at 4:17 PM on June 22, 2013
When I got my first cat I read that they will drink more water if there food and water are in different places. I moved the water dish across the room he started drinking noticibly more water. The same goes for new cat.
Torgo is also completely fickle when it comes to wet food (and really only cares about the gravy) so I buy whatever is on sale. If he doesn't eat it at least I know he's drinking.
posted by Room 641-A at 4:17 PM on June 22, 2013
"food and water are in different places"
Oh, yes. There is no mention of drinking behavior in the original post but maybe it is helpful to someone else who happens to read it. Multiple drinking spots are nice, cats kind of stumble upon a water bowl and drink a bit. Changing the water frequently helps as well.
For the dandruff and fur issues I'd try a grain free food. I have had good luck with the Rocky Mountain formula by Taste of the Wild.
posted by travelwithcats at 4:37 PM on June 22, 2013
Oh, yes. There is no mention of drinking behavior in the original post but maybe it is helpful to someone else who happens to read it. Multiple drinking spots are nice, cats kind of stumble upon a water bowl and drink a bit. Changing the water frequently helps as well.
For the dandruff and fur issues I'd try a grain free food. I have had good luck with the Rocky Mountain formula by Taste of the Wild.
posted by travelwithcats at 4:37 PM on June 22, 2013
Best answer: trader joe's and the whole foods store brand (360) both have multiple flavors and are pate style, and i'm pretty sure are grain free. my family's cats are fans, and so were my own when we lived in the States. (wouldn't eat the 'healthy' kibble if their life depended on it though!) good luck!
posted by jrobin276 at 5:04 PM on June 22, 2013 [2 favorites]
posted by jrobin276 at 5:04 PM on June 22, 2013 [2 favorites]
Best answer: Being on a dry food diet increases your cats' risk of kidney, bladder, and urinary problems. Cats get 70 percent of their daily water intake from their food -- which doesn't happen if they're eating dry food.
My cats eat Weruva and Tiki Cat canned foods (mostly chicken varieties), and they love love love meal time. But I do vary their meals. When I go to the pet supply store, I tend to buy two of everything they've shown they like. I go by the logic that you might LOVE pizza, but you don't want it for every meal every day. So I change the flavors from meal to meal. If you can't do that, you can also buy some freeze-dried meat or fish treats, and sprinkle them on top of the food to change it up. Sometimes, when I'm making tuna salad for myself, I'll add a little bit of the tuna water to the cats' food.
Note: the Weruva and Tiki Cat come in shreds. You would need to mix it in with your pate formula to transition your cats if you decided to try it, but there are other foods like Best Feline Friend and Wellness that are more gooey. If you could move to a brand that has real chunks of meat in it, you would get the cats accustomed to using their teeth the way nature intended: to tear things up a bit. This is important in maintaining good dental health. There's really good advice that the rescue I volunteer with cites from extensively here.
Basically, in addition to wet food being better than dry, some wet food is better than other wet food. You want a food where the first ingredient is muscle meat; with a high water content; and with few "extras." You want as few carbs as possible (which often come from grain-based fillers), because cats don't need grains in their diets. (Also, many cats have grain allergies and people don't even know it -- my cat Althea, for instance, used to develop bald patches before we got her on the good stuff. Her former caretakers took her to the vet and he was all, "Grain-free diet! Cats are carnivores!")
If you feel like you have a lot of time and a ton of patience, you could try raw food. The downside is that you need to be religious in taking it away after thirty minutes, because it will grow bacteria faster than canned food does. And if your cats don't like shredded meat, I imagine they won't even know what to do with a hunk of uncooked meat. My vet was totally against raw food, so I've stuck with the canned stuff. But really, my cats eat better than I do.
(PS: I'm training to present seminars on cat care, which is how I'm learning all this stuff! It's very exciting! My apologies if I came off like I was lecturing! I'm just very excited!)
posted by brina at 5:13 PM on June 22, 2013 [3 favorites]
My cats eat Weruva and Tiki Cat canned foods (mostly chicken varieties), and they love love love meal time. But I do vary their meals. When I go to the pet supply store, I tend to buy two of everything they've shown they like. I go by the logic that you might LOVE pizza, but you don't want it for every meal every day. So I change the flavors from meal to meal. If you can't do that, you can also buy some freeze-dried meat or fish treats, and sprinkle them on top of the food to change it up. Sometimes, when I'm making tuna salad for myself, I'll add a little bit of the tuna water to the cats' food.
Note: the Weruva and Tiki Cat come in shreds. You would need to mix it in with your pate formula to transition your cats if you decided to try it, but there are other foods like Best Feline Friend and Wellness that are more gooey. If you could move to a brand that has real chunks of meat in it, you would get the cats accustomed to using their teeth the way nature intended: to tear things up a bit. This is important in maintaining good dental health. There's really good advice that the rescue I volunteer with cites from extensively here.
Basically, in addition to wet food being better than dry, some wet food is better than other wet food. You want a food where the first ingredient is muscle meat; with a high water content; and with few "extras." You want as few carbs as possible (which often come from grain-based fillers), because cats don't need grains in their diets. (Also, many cats have grain allergies and people don't even know it -- my cat Althea, for instance, used to develop bald patches before we got her on the good stuff. Her former caretakers took her to the vet and he was all, "Grain-free diet! Cats are carnivores!")
If you feel like you have a lot of time and a ton of patience, you could try raw food. The downside is that you need to be religious in taking it away after thirty minutes, because it will grow bacteria faster than canned food does. And if your cats don't like shredded meat, I imagine they won't even know what to do with a hunk of uncooked meat. My vet was totally against raw food, so I've stuck with the canned stuff. But really, my cats eat better than I do.
(PS: I'm training to present seminars on cat care, which is how I'm learning all this stuff! It's very exciting! My apologies if I came off like I was lecturing! I'm just very excited!)
posted by brina at 5:13 PM on June 22, 2013 [3 favorites]
Best answer: Mine does this too. I find I can go back to one she has gone off after rotating through two others. So we do the chicken flavour for a month or so until she won't eat it, then lamb & kidney, then after a few weeks of that she won't eat it, so we switch to sardine flavour, which she loves for about a month, and then we can go back to chicken again. Rinse and repeat.
Brain of a goldfish, I swear.
(Also, I tend NOT to rotate meal by meal, because she gets excited when she gets a new flavour and eats more than she usually would. It takes about a week for her to get bored enough to only eat when she is actually hungry, which is the desirable situation. We also feed raw chicken bones (necks and wings) every second day as a treat, which is good for her teeth.)
posted by lollusc at 6:46 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
Brain of a goldfish, I swear.
(Also, I tend NOT to rotate meal by meal, because she gets excited when she gets a new flavour and eats more than she usually would. It takes about a week for her to get bored enough to only eat when she is actually hungry, which is the desirable situation. We also feed raw chicken bones (necks and wings) every second day as a treat, which is good for her teeth.)
posted by lollusc at 6:46 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
We feed our two a frozen raw diet (generally either Primal or Nature's Variety), and wind up changing what they get depending on what the pet supply store has in stock. When we don't, like when the pet supply store has their preferred flavor in stock and so we don't have to rotate, they do seem to go into a "nah, don't want that after all" phase after a while.
In general, they want nothing to do with the chicken, like the beef, and LOVE the bison — I think they're harkening back to ancestral memories of the ancient Saber-Toothed Tabbies and Saber-Toothed Calicoes swarming and killing aurochs…
posted by Lexica at 7:38 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
In general, they want nothing to do with the chicken, like the beef, and LOVE the bison — I think they're harkening back to ancestral memories of the ancient Saber-Toothed Tabbies and Saber-Toothed Calicoes swarming and killing aurochs…
posted by Lexica at 7:38 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
Best answer: Could it be that some time in the two week period of grace that the wet food hangs around in the dish long enough to go off or spoil a little bit?
Then they eat it and it tastes bad or even makes them a little sick, and after that they won't touch it?
A residue of the previous meal left in their dish after they've eaten as much as they ever do and which goes bad might be enough to trigger such a thing, I'd think.
With a new food, try tossing anything they leave within an hour or two, and give them a clean plate for every meal and see what happens.
posted by jamjam at 7:44 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
Then they eat it and it tastes bad or even makes them a little sick, and after that they won't touch it?
A residue of the previous meal left in their dish after they've eaten as much as they ever do and which goes bad might be enough to trigger such a thing, I'd think.
With a new food, try tossing anything they leave within an hour or two, and give them a clean plate for every meal and see what happens.
posted by jamjam at 7:44 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
I had a cat once who would rather starve than eat anything other than the very cheapest dry cat food. If it wasn't at least 40% Mysterious Additives, she just wasn't interested. She was a bit of a roamer and we lived on a reserve at the time, so I suspect that canned food just wasn't anything as good as the lizards and mice she'd frequently try to share with me. I guess the kibble was a favourite mostly because of how different it would have tasted to that.
Pet mince and fresh meat offcuts may be a better way for you to go for a while. You can always puree them in a food processor the way you do for an infant. You can always rotate the kibble in and out to make sure they're at least getting some calories.
posted by Jilder at 12:52 AM on June 23, 2013 [1 favorite]
Pet mince and fresh meat offcuts may be a better way for you to go for a while. You can always puree them in a food processor the way you do for an infant. You can always rotate the kibble in and out to make sure they're at least getting some calories.
posted by Jilder at 12:52 AM on June 23, 2013 [1 favorite]
As a note, your options aren't just 'limited wet' and 'unlimited dry' - you can also put out a limited amount of dry food. Might help with the obesity, and especially if you wanted to integrate it into your rotation.
posted by Lady Li at 1:08 AM on June 23, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by Lady Li at 1:08 AM on June 23, 2013 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: This is so helpful. For one thing it is good to know that my cats are not unique in their weirdness and that other people have found workarounds.
I think I'm going to pick up a few different kinds of grain-free food and experiment with the different rotation recommendations to see if one of them will do the trick. And yeah, I guess I never thought about supplementing the wet diet with a small amount of kibble to make sure they don't starve.
I appreciate all the answers, I learned a little something from each one. Hopefully my kitties will soon be happily eating a healthy diet once again! I miss watching my girl cat chase her tail. I don't think she can see it when she's fat!
posted by Serene Empress Dork at 6:20 AM on June 23, 2013
I think I'm going to pick up a few different kinds of grain-free food and experiment with the different rotation recommendations to see if one of them will do the trick. And yeah, I guess I never thought about supplementing the wet diet with a small amount of kibble to make sure they don't starve.
I appreciate all the answers, I learned a little something from each one. Hopefully my kitties will soon be happily eating a healthy diet once again! I miss watching my girl cat chase her tail. I don't think she can see it when she's fat!
posted by Serene Empress Dork at 6:20 AM on June 23, 2013
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But then, I also let them free-feed off of BG dry food, and my tiny skinny non-food-motivated cat seems to prefer it, and my furry hog ignores it. So in conclusion, cats are weird, and I have no idea if this is any help.
posted by restless_nomad at 3:31 PM on June 22, 2013 [1 favorite]