Need help making food choices on budget

Not sure where to go for help so thought I would start here. We have 2 cats, brother and sister that are 2 1/2 years old. We have had them since they were 3 months old. They are free feed  taste of the wild and Kirkland maintenance dry, we rotate these foods, plus they are given about 2-3 oz friskies 2 x daily and they sometimes don't eat all of it.I try to feed 3-4 cans of friskies then rotate a better quality canned food such as soulistic, natural balance, wellness, etc Turbo the male is 14 1/2 lbs and really needs to lose some weight, Shiloh weighs about 9 lbs and seems to be about the right weight for her smaller structure. Turbo is bigger in stature than Shiloh but definitely too chunky to be healthy.

Turbo loves wet food, he usually eats about half of what I put down in the kitchen right away and then I move the dish to the laundry room where the dogs can't get it, the dry food is down there, and Shiloh usually doesn't like to eat in the busy kitchen. Shiloh tends to eat more of the dry food as she prefers that to wet. 

I know that I need Turbo to lose a bit of weight but not even sure how to go about doing that without Shiloh losing weight. Also I have a very tight cat food budget but want the best that I can do for these cats. Turbo is my son's best friend, son has ADHD and some other issues and Turbo has been the best thing for him and we need to keep him healthy! Any suggestions or ideas are very appreciated.

Could you feed the cats in different rooms? So Shiloh gets enough? I think it will be difficult for Turbo to lose weight with free feeding, but maybe you could  just put down a smaller measured amount. More wet food and less dry could help him too.(less carbs and more meat for weight loss).In my opinion 2 of the best foods for weight loss are Tiki Cat chicken and Merricks cowboy cookout. Unfortunately these aren't cheap. For the bargain foods:  If there is a Trader Joe's near you they sell 5.5 oz. cans for .69 cents. It has decent ingredients, especially for that price. You could try looking for good prices  online at places like doggiefoodirect.com. If you order $49 worth you get free shipping and they always have something on sale.

I meant petfooddirect.com. Sorry.

smitten4kittens said:

I meant petfooddirect.com. Sorry.

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LOL, there is also www.doggiefood.com so I think you got the 2 combined there!

First thing to help kitties lose weight is not to free-feed. Measure his food and give him 3 meals a day. . .it's the constant snacking that really puts on the pounds. Switching to all canned food would help too, but can be expensive, so if you gave him 1 meal of dry and 2 of canned that should also work, as long as the dry food is carefully measured.

mhsconrad said:

Not sure where to go for help so thought I would start here. We have 2 cats, brother and sister that are 2 1/2 years old. We have had them since they were 3 months old. They are free feed  taste of the wild and Kirkland maintenance dry, we rotate these foods, plus they are given about 2-3 oz friskies 2 x daily and they sometimes don't eat all of it.I try to feed 3-4 cans of friskies then rotate a better quality canned food such as soulistic, natural balance, wellness, etc Turbo the male is 14 1/2 lbs and really needs to lose some weight, Shiloh weighs about 9 lbs and seems to be about the right weight for her smaller structure. Turbo is bigger in stature than Shiloh but definitely too chunky to be healthy.

Turbo loves wet food, he usually eats about half of what I put down in the kitchen right away and then I move the dish to the laundry room where the dogs can't get it, the dry food is down there, and Shiloh usually doesn't like to eat in the busy kitchen. Shiloh tends to eat more of the dry food as she prefers that to wet. 

I know that I need Turbo to lose a bit of weight but not even sure how to go about doing that without Shiloh losing weight. Also I have a very tight cat food budget but want the best that I can do for these cats. Turbo is my son's best friend, son has ADHD and some other issues and Turbo has been the best thing for him and we need to keep him healthy! Any suggestions or ideas are very appreciated.

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Hmmm... I think I would immediately eliminate the free feeding of the kibble.  I'll just tell you how I do it.  I'm not saying this is right or wrong, it just works in my household.  I have 4 cats.  Mine are on a 90% wet to 10% dry.  I used to free feed kibble but stopped doing that about a year ago.  I measure out their daily kibble "ration" LOL  into automatic timed feeders.  I feed 2 wet meals a day and don't leave it down after they have finished.  Generally there isn't a speck left anyway.  The kibble is timed to come out 3 times a day in between their main meals,  which is the wet.  I use the kibble for grazing now and not really a part of their main diet.  I stopped free feeding the kibble because one of my cats was starting to eat a bit too much of it and ignoring her wet, or just licking the gravy part of the wet.  No gravy licking allowed in this house You indicated budget might be a consideration so the timed feeders may not be an option.  If not, is it possible for you put kibble down between the main meals and then pull it after a period of time?  

I have one shyer kitty that does not like to eat with the others.  So I do feed her in the kitchen on the counter top in a quiet area.  She's fine with that.  I have to sterilize the counter a lot but that's okay with me as long as she's eating and happy.  

Kibble is carb and calorie dense and some kitties love it too much.  If you're going to feed kibble try to find the most nutrient dense kibble your budget will allow.

Best of luck to you!  

Thank you for the suggestions so far. I was thinking that I needed to do  mostly wet food with maybe a bit of dry if measured out. I have no idea how to determine how much food they each need, do I just go off the label of the can for serving size? If I do just a bit of measured out dry ( was thinking to put that out at bed time so they don't wake me up at night looking for food ;-( ). What would be good dry food to feed, how do I figure how much, etc. I had thought about getting a couple of those treat dispensing balls to put the dry food into at night so that they would get a  bit of exercise while getting the food. Right now I feed them wet food at about 5-6am and then at around dinner time 5-6pm. Would I need to adjust those feeding times since they won't have dry to graze on during the day?

Thanks again for all the help!

The serving size on the cans are too much. The average indoor cat would eat about 5-6 oz. of wet a day, if that was all they got. You can try less if you are feeding dry also. EVO chicken and turkey has good ingredients if you are going to stick with some dry. Just feed a little less than you are now and adjust it according to what happens with his weight. You could search threads on here about caloric counts to help with portion size.The calories per cup are listed on dry food bags. You don't want him to lose it too quickly (that is bad for their liver).The treat ball is a great idea. It might help them not wake you up during the night if their  last meal was late night. I feed mine 3 times a day. When I get up, after work, late night right before bed. This keeps them satisfied until morning.