Wet food woes

I am still having a VERY hard time getting my cats to eat their wet food. I tried many brands and the only one Neko would eat (and i bribed like nuts on all of them) was the Felidae cat and kitten. Willie ate all of them but was least impressed with the Felidae Chicken and Rice and the Innova. So I stuck with the Felidae C&K and I seemed to be making progress (feeding every other day) but i skipped it for a few days (on vacation) and when I got back and tried to feed it they refused. I was already being very specific with Neko's food. I had to roll his into bite sized balls and roll them in water so that he would eat it. Both Willie and Neko require I add dry (a small amount) or they won't START to eat it. SO I am really very annoyed. I can't keep trying new wets since it's a big waste of money (my dad was not even going to let us get wet food because he thought it would cost too much, luckily my dad knows I know more about animals than him and my mom supports me) and I can't go to the store a few times a week to get more to try. I'm going to feed it tonight and see if they eat. Last time there may have been a problem since I fed them in a different room than usual which had a noisy AC and the TV was on loud for my Grandpa, plus they were eating from bowls on the floor and they are used to being on something off the ground when they eat.


So do you think I should persist with this food? is there anything i can do to get them to eat it? How long can wet food be left out with dry food in it? How about without dry food in it? Any tips are appreciated!!

Have you tried sprinkling brewer's yeast on their wet food? I swear this stuff is a miracle....

You can also try tuna water from a can of tuna. But you will eventually have to wean them off the tuna water later.

Another thing that can help is letting your cats get hungry prior to feeding them. Cats that have access to a bowl of kibble all day long are not going to develop a strong enough appetite to try something new. There is nothing cruel about giving a cat 8-12 hours of fasting time between meals. It's a lot healthier and you can ignore their begging without feeling guilty as well. You may need to make an exception if your cat has a tendency to eat too fast and vomit as with my Spotty but that generally only happens with kibble although it's happened a couple of times with wet so these cats may need 3 meals a day instead of 2 but there should be some time during the day when they have no food so they can get hungry. Since I started feeding Spotty wet food prior to giving him his kibble he doesn't throw up as often, another bonus for wet.

Here is a link with tips on how to switch from dry to wet.
www.catinfo.org

I have not been able to switch my cat Spotty to 100% wet food but I give him as much as he will eat. He's a slow eater when it comes to wet food and often doesn't finish it so I have to give him some kibble. If he were to eat like my other cat Rosie it would be easy to switch to 100% wet. However having 2 cats Rosie is eating some of Spotty's dry as well. My motto is "Feed the cat what the cat will eat." Even if your cat only eats 25% to 50% wet that's a big improvement over no wet food at all. And I've heard of many cats that have done just fine on dry food only and lived into their 20s, but that's more genetics related than food. I still encourage you to push toward that wet food goal but don't worry or panic if it takes a long time. One should only stress if the cat doesn't eat at all.

I wouldn't leave a bowl of wet food with dry food in it for longer than 30 minutes. Without the dry food in it you can leave it out for an hour or two. In my family people have left wet food out all day and their cats never got sick. Cats tend to know when food is no longer fresh. But to avoid being gross I would say one hour in hot weather and 2 hours in cold weather.