Feeding an adult cat

[Anonymous]

1/4 cup of dry food in the morning and a 3 oz. can of wet food at night should be adequate, right? I usually give the dry food at about 9-10am and the wet food at around 8-9pm. Sometimes she meows when I go into the kitchen and I can't tell if she's just trying to get food for the sake of getting food or if she's actually hungry?

[Anonymous]

Depends! Mainly on the cats weight and how active it is.

On the back of the packages there should be guidelines for how much to give, you calculate based on cat weight. Sometimes trial and error adjustments are needed. Our cats never would have as much suggested being lazy indoor cats.

If you can weigh the cat (weigh yourself, then holding the cat), you can monitor for any weight gain/loss.

[Anonymous]

This is a good question for your vet! Ours actually recommended 2 of the smaller cans of wet food per day with little to no kibble/hard food, because many indoor cats develop kidney issues later in life and there is some evidence(?) or schools of thought (I clearly didn't listen that closely) that proper hydration via wet food will reduce the chance of this happening.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:1/4 cup of dry food in the morning and a 3 oz. can of wet food at night should be adequate, right? I usually give the dry food at about 9-10am and the wet food at around 8-9pm. Sometimes she meows when I go into the kitchen and I can't tell if she's just trying to get food for the sake of getting food or if she's actually hungry? [/quote

The current thinking -based on several vets I've talked to- is more wet food and less dry. This is esp true for male cats who need lots of moisture in their diets to prevent urinary issues.

Cats are not mean to graze on dry food all day and it causes all sorts of issue, obesity being the most obvious (of course, some cats are not obese but allowing the grazing allows more for that to happen). It was recommended to us -after our two male cats started to get tubby- that we cut way back on the dry food.

So we give a small amount of dry food in the am in one of those "you have to work to get it" dishes. This slows them down and they get full faster. They get a dinner of canned food, a couple tablespoons each, at dinner. Then a small bit of dry food overnight. They've lost weight this way.

[Anonymous]

That's plenty. For my two cats, I give 1/4 cup in the morning, 1/4 cup in the evening, and they split a 6oz can of wet food at night. The boy is 16 lbs and eats more than his fair share. He also eats any people food he can get his paws on (lurks under the table when my kids are eating like a dog). He should eat less but he's more annoying when he's hungry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:1/4 cup of dry food in the morning and a 3 oz. can of wet food at night should be adequate, right? I usually give the dry food at about 9-10am and the wet food at around 8-9pm. Sometimes she meows when I go into the kitchen and I can't tell if she's just trying to get food for the sake of getting food or if she's actually hungry? [/quote

The current thinking -based on several vets I've talked to- is more wet food and less dry. This is esp true for male cats who need lots of moisture in their diets to prevent urinary issues.

Cats are not mean to graze on dry food all day and it causes all sorts of issue, obesity being the most obvious (of course, some cats are not obese but allowing the grazing allows more for that to happen). It was recommended to us -after our two male cats started to get tubby- that we cut way back on the dry food.

So we give a small amount of dry food in the am in one of those "you have to work to get it" dishes. This slows them down and they get full faster. They get a dinner of canned food, a couple tablespoons each, at dinner. Then a small bit of dry food overnight. They've lost weight this way.

Thank you! My cat actually does not gobble down her food. She is pretty good about pacing herself throughout the morning/day, but I only put out a quarter cup of food so it's not like she can graze endlessly. She has her first vet visit next week so I will ask then, just don't want her going hungry until then

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That's plenty. For my two cats, I give 1/4 cup in the morning, 1/4 cup in the evening, and they split a 6oz can of wet food at night. The boy is 16 lbs and eats more than his fair share. He also eats any people food he can get his paws on (lurks under the table when my kids are eating like a dog). He should eat less but he's more annoying when he's hungry.

Thank you! I was just curious - she meows a lot and comes into the kitchen looking for food sometimes, so I was anxious that she wasn't getting enough, but she's pretty small (six pounds I think) and not super active, so I just wanted to check!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's plenty. For my two cats, I give 1/4 cup in the morning, 1/4 cup in the evening, and they split a 6oz can of wet food at night. The boy is 16 lbs and eats more than his fair share. He also eats any people food he can get his paws on (lurks under the table when my kids are eating like a dog). He should eat less but he's more annoying when he's hungry.

Thank you! I was just curious - she meows a lot and comes into the kitchen looking for food sometimes, so I was anxious that she wasn't getting enough, but she's pretty small (six pounds I think) and not super active, so I just wanted to check!

I'd ask the vet about daily calories and then check the labels to see how what you're giving measures up--different brands and flavors can vary a lot! Weighing your cat regularly to make sure she's not gaining or losing too much also makes sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is a good question for your vet! Ours actually recommended 2 of the smaller cans of wet food per day with little to no kibble/hard food, because many indoor cats develop kidney issues later in life and there is some evidence(?) or schools of thought (I clearly didn't listen that closely) that proper hydration via wet food will reduce the chance of this happening.

No kibble will ultimately mean - no teeth.
If they have plenty of fresh water, some kibble is not going to damage them.

[Anonymous]

I'm going through the exact same thing with our 2 boy cats now. The vet said they were getting chubby and told us to stop leaving dry food out all day. So we give them a quarter cup each of dry food in the a.m. (around 9 a.m.), a quarter can each of wet food (5.5 ounce cans) and then I give them one quarter cup in total (1/8 cup each) of dry food before bed. We've been doing this for a week now and they seem ok, but I do worry I'm starving them. They're on the smaller side and I think their ideal weight is somewhere around 10 pounds.