My cat is now ten or eleven years old (the shelter didn’t know her exact age when they got her). She has never been a cat who eats for pleasure. She’ll eat dry cat food and some crunchy cat treats, and nothing else. She has such a low appetite that free-feeding has never been a problem; even when I give her a pile of treats, she’ll eat one or two and save the rest for later. It’s no surprise that she’s always been slender.
Recently, she’s getting thinner and thinner. Probably it’s just that she’s losing muscle mass because she’s not as active as she used to be, but she really feels like just fur and bone.
Seems like it’s time to switch her food from the standard formula to something specialized. My question is, since she doesn’t have a weight problem, is a “senior formula” cat food the right thing for her?
After a vet check where everything came back normal on our aging boy kitty we have added kitten chow to his daily rations. He’s a Siamese (or a Siamese mix… found him wandering and skeletal about 11 years ago) so has always been on the thin side. Now he is still thin but not so bony.
The hard part is keeping the other 3 cats from getting at the kitten chow. The 20 pound brown tabby does not need it, for sure.
We have a senior citizen of our own (16 years) who has recently had a return of appetite - for years and years and years she had refused to eat ocean-based jellimeat so we’d given up and just brought the meat packs. Then a few months ago we tried her with some fish flavours and she has been devouring them ever since and put on a decent amount of weight.
So perhaps try a new food or a different brand? And yes, she can absolutely go to senior food.
I’ll also second the suggestions to pop her to the vets, just to check there isn’t anything else going on.
Yes, please have kitty checked out at the vets. It may be exactly what you think and kitty is slowing down on eating due to a slowing metabolism. But if there is an issue, since kitty is skinny to start with, kitty will go downhill fast without some vet assistance - no reserves to call on. The Kitten Chow idea mentioned above is a good one. The pieces of kibble are smaller and easier to digest, which might be helpful for a senior kittizen, plus are more heavily packed with nutrients. Your vet office would also have something similar to the human product Ensure (I’m sorry, I have no idea of the product’s name, but the reasoning behind it is the same as that of Ensure).
Take the kitty to the vet. She may have thyroid problem or renal/liver problems. Thyroid problems can be treated and/or cured, renal/liver problems can be managed long term.
Based on the short description, I wouldn’t think diabetes, but that’s another common middle-aged cat disease.
Also, 10-11 years is no longer “senior” for cats, but it IS around the age where they start getting their disease triad (hyperthyroidism, diabetes, and/or renal/liver issues). With treatment or management, these cats can then continue on living for years.
Yes, I’ll add to the chorus. Something is likely wrong. Please have a vet check her. What leaped to mind is actually kidney, but it could be anything from bad teeth to something really serious to nothing at all. Only a vet can tell you.
I can tell you, from my experience, when an animal stops eating, that’s usually a real sign that there’s something wrong.
Interesting on the no kitten food…I was told the exact opposite with my elderly dog - give him a high protein food so that what little he eats, counts.
We checked with our vet about kitten food for our adult cats (because they haaaaaaaaaate the adult food but love the kitten food) and his advice was that as long as they’re not getting fat, the kitten food is fine. His primary concern was that since kitten food was higher in fat, our furballs would pork up if they stayed on it once they were adults.
Since they’re not getting porky, we’ve let them keep eating it. The older two are almost 11 now and both in apparently excellent health.
Hmm. Checking in with my long-defunct animal physiology degree … probably worth confirming that kitty’s kidneys are okay before switching to higher-protein kitten food.
This is kinda anecdotal, but whenever I had a kitty who decided they didn’t want to eat their current food I would switch them to** Iams dry** (the regular, orange-bag chicken flavor). They coat it with something appetizing as I’ve never not had a cat who didn’t love it. Only problem is it would make a normal healthy cat fat. That, and it’s a little pricey.
Yes, kitten food will have more protein, so it would be good to check out that the kidneys are OK before starting to feed that to the cat. It may be that the vet will say it is fine to feed the cat kitten food, if only for a moment.
With baby food, you have to be careful that the ingredients present are not harmful to cats. Some brands/types may have garlic or onion powder, and those are a big no-no for cats. They are sensitive to it and may make them anemic.