can you really force a cat to eat wet?

well cynder is once again turning his nose up a the wet i put down in the morning and night just don't know what to do anymore .. he is a 5 month old kitten and addicted to dry... can you really force a cat to eat wet or what?.. i am going to keep trying by putting some down everyday in hopes that one day he will magically find its really yummy and start eating it... who knows maybe a few months from now i can post an over excited thread about how he loves it...

This is a great article that has been helping me with the dry-to-wet transition. http://www.veterinarypartner.com/Content.plx?P=A&A=3041

Thankfully, McGee is taking to it like a champ. Cosette, however, is one of the finicky kitties. Hope the article will help and your babies start accepting wet food as actual food soon!

Hello Cyndersmom,

You can not force a cat to eat: wet food, dry food, raw food, or whole prey, in my humble opinion.

If you really want your cat to eat wet food, I would recommend that you mix some dry food in with the wet food. Momma Cat, Shadow, and Panda all get one or two meals of commercial wet food and dry food mixed together daily. Plus dry food as well.

Loki the Savannah, is feed dry food and a whole mouse daily.

As I always say, the best diet is one your cat WILL eat !

I have a die hard kibble head, Toby. Before I switched to an all raw diet I tried to go 50/50 wet/dry. I could get Toby to eat wet by sprinkling various enticements on top or by mixing a bit of dry with the wet. But I had to go 100% wet because once he figured out that the morning wet meal would be followed by a dry evening meal he would refuse to eat the wet and just hold out for the dry in the evening.

Enticements I have used: brewers yeast, Forti Flora, parmesan cheese, bonito flakes, beef liver powder.

It took a couple of months to get him to an all wet diet w/o enticements but he did get there.

Good luck!

Some of mine who didn't like canned food much starting eating more of it when I started feeding only one meal a day of dry food. At first they just held out for their dry dinner but after a while I guess they decided that a canned-food breakfast isn't so bad after all.

Cats will prefer to eat what tastes the best, its really that simple. Dry or wet is irrelevant.

If you have a cat that is disinterested in the wet you are providing, either pick a tastier wet or switch to a less tasty dry. Just like kids, they will still get hungry, and will pick the "lesser evil".

Blue's wilderness dry is apparently only mediocre palatability, as both of my cats will not touch it if wet is available, and Wesley in particular screams for his wet food when its close to meal time unless of course I present some yucky tasting wet like Blue's Wilderness wet which they refused to touch, heh. Fine w/ me though, as it was too expensive anyway!

Cats will prefer to eat what tastes the best, its really that simple. Dry or wet is irrelevant

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Personally, I wish it really were that simple!

For many cats, dry kibble is the only form of food they recognize - this was the solitary choice after weaning, and its ingestion was learned from their mother.

Is it any wonder that so many are addicted?

One of mine rotated between grain-free dry foods and loved them and would never touch wet food. It was rough, but he's now on all wet and he seems to like his new food. I mixed wet and dry gradually and eventually stopped offering dry food. I was afraid my cat would simply not eat, but by the end of the day he was apathetically eating his wet food. Sometimes I do think much of it is a battle of will! Good luck!!

People have told me to microwave the can food to make it smell for them.(the cat) Not long, 1 sec. Just enough to make it warm.

My cat has always been a dry food addict but I put that down to him being bought up on it. I can leave out food and he won´t jump on the counter and steal food, so that´s a plus. I had to change brands a few years back after a UTI, to Affinity Ultima for cats prone to UTI´s. I have tried to give wet food and he will eat it for a couple of days and no more, or he will lick off the gravy and leave the rest. So I figure he is healthy and happy on the dry so why change. He also won´t eat fresh cooked chicken or fish, just his boring old dry food. Lots of cats are fussy, unlike my dogs who will eat just about anything!!

Originally Posted by MeuzettesMom

People have told me to microwave the can food to make it smell for them.(the cat) Not long, 1 sec. Just enough to make it warm.

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I used to be concerned as well, as there were reports of how microwaving had destroyed taurine in the food and caused malnutrition. So I was being overly cautious and using hot water over seran wrap to reheat the food... turned out to be a pointless waste. Upon further research, I found it has nothing inherent to do with microwaving the food but merely how much it is heated, taking hot spots into account since microwaves don't always heat uniformly.

1 second isn't going to heat much of anything IMO unless its just a spoonfull, but 6-8 seconds for half a 5.5oz can on the average microwave just to bring it to room temperature and then mixed up should be fine.

well this mornig i thought i would try the crumbled up cat treat on top as he was back to only licking the gravy and he ate almost every morsel of food, so i think i will try that for a while and see how it goes. i do microwave it for bout 6 seconds, stir and then test with my finger to see if there are any hot spots..

Originally Posted by cyndersmom

well cynder is once again turning his nose up a the wet i put down in the morning and night

just don't know what to do anymore

.. he is a 5 month old kitten and addicted to dry... can you really force a cat to eat wet or what?.. i am going to keep trying by putting some down everyday in hopes that one day he will magically find its really yummy and start eating it... who knows maybe a few months from now i can post an over excited thread about how he loves it...

Click to expand...

"Slowly persuade" is more like it.
My cat was a Die Hard kibble addict (actually, even now having been wet only for 4+ months, if he even hears a bag that sounds like dry he will go crazy..) and it was a huge pain trying to get him to eat the wet. I never mixed it together, just fed separate meals, and when it was time for his wet meal I would add hot water, put it down till he stopped eating, pick it back up, add more, stir, add water (make him feel like it was special again ) and repeat until he ate as much as I wanted him to have for that meal. I went through a lot of crying (him, not me ), swirling, begging, and pouty faces before I was down to I think 1/8th cup or less a day and then I said Forget it! and stopped giving dry ever again. He used to be picky with what wet he would eat as well, but then I got tough and ignored him when he gave me the 'I know you have better' look, so he'll eat anything.
Now if only I could convince him that 5oz a day is plenty.....

Such handy advice! I am going through the same thing right now with Esme. She turns her nose up to wet and is a dry food addict. Once she hears the bag, she goes running. I think instead of feeding mostly wet with a sprinkle of dry, I am going to try the opposite and feed the dry and mix with wet. Then increase the wet.