My first kitty - got a problem

Hello all, im pretty new to this site so please be gentle LOL Holly is my very first cat so im new to all of this.

We have recently bought home a female british shorthair from a breeder and she is 13 weeks old. She has settled in LOVELY and really seems happy. Shes a beauty and I honestly cant fault her!

The thing is, since we bought her home on monday, shes not drank hardly any water. I'm getting worried now. We are feeding her wet food (whiskers kitten mixed with a bit of adult felix cat food...its what the breeders were feeding her) and i have read online that the wet food can also give them a source of fluids. But I'm still really worried and really unsure what to do.

Any help would be great!

Oh and here is a photo of her




Ohhhh ok i'll let you see one more LOL!!!

Oh my! Holly is soooo cute! Love her name too - sure fits the season!

It may take a little bit to get her to drink water...you could try putting ice in her water bowl. We had a cat that didn't drink much water till we tried that. She started to paw at the ice, then she felt how cold the water is, & then she finally drank

Hopefully you can get Holly to drink more water!

My cats (even the renal failure ones) don't tend to drink much water either. All of my cats eat exclusively canned food, so they get most of their fluid requirements from their food. I even asked my vet about it. She told me not to worry because cats are desert animals, and they do get most of their fluids from the food they eat. If you are particularly concerned, you might want to try getting her a pet fountain. I've heard that cats often tend to drink more from a running water source.

She certainly is a beauty!!!

She might be one of those cats that only views water as drinkable if it is in a human glass (my cat does this ... he REFUSES to drink from a bowl, ONLY a cup, so we dedicated a huge cafe mug for his water dish and that works for him), or as someone else said, some cats need ice cubes to show them there is water ... one of the other things my cat has to do is have the water ripple ... sometimes if he or the dog drinks all the water and he knows the last time he saw it, it was dry, he will REFUSE to believe there is now water unless we can get him to watch us flick the water ... which then leads me to the other possibility, which is some cats INSIST on the water being MOVING.

In which case a water fountain would be ideal (we have considered that for ours, but the mug fixed his main issue), or many owners will leave a sink on a little, like a trickle, and the cat(s) will just drink the water from the tap. Just make sure it's not hot water!

And other cats just don't seem to drink that much!

Yeah, I'd try the ice cube thing.. snow and audrey love that.. I've heard kitties like cool-cold water, and yes, wet food will give moisture as well..

If she is mainly eating wet food, I wouldnt worry about her water intake, cats dont have a thirst drive, and wet food is 80% moisture, so they normally get all they need from that. She is gorgeous though.

Wow she's really nice. Surprisingly has more of a "male" look to her. Did you buy her as pet or show????

Canned foods do have more water, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't have fresh water available at all times. We feed dry and canned and the cats will still drink water. As long as she's using the pan ok in peeing/pooping, she's probably getting enough water.

She is so gorgeous ! Has she taken a drink yet?

Oh my, she is adorable!

If you are feeding exclusively canned, I wouldn't worry about her not drinking. I fed mine nothing but canned for several years, kept the water bowl fresh, but if they ever drank from it, I never knew it. I only started to notice them drinking from the water bowl after I added dry food back into their diet. My vet wasn't worried about it, so I didn't either.

Everyone had given you wonderful tips. My Daphne prefers her water ice cold from the tap so her bowl sets on the bathroom counter by the sink so I can refresh it twice a day. I know, just a tad spoiled Seb likes water too, but not nearly as much as Daph. Seb does eat wet food and Daph eats only dry, so am sure there is a correlation there.

Please post more photos when you can. She is just beautiful

I leave the plug in my bathroom sink and let the water trinkle in to it! If it overfills it just goes down the two whole thingys! Thats the only way that BooBoo will drink it! He gets canned food also! Good luck and let us know!

Have you checked her for dehydration? (pulling up the skin at the shoulder blades...if it snaps back she's ok, if not, she needs more water)

I agree that usually an all wet diet should give her enough water. Have you called the breeder to check on her previous water consumption?

Oh - something else I've heard...sometimes cats will refuse to drink from anything but porcelain (i.e. toilet bowl) so if you have a plastic or steel water dish, you might try a china or glass dish. Also, some cats have depth perception issues...put some colored stones at the bottom of her dish.

Thanks everyone!

I was about to try the ice cube trick this morning, as it was feeding time at the zoo so to speak (we also have 2 dogs, 2 hamsters and 5 kids LOL) I was putting some fresh water down for the dogs and Holly started drinking out of it!!