her pickyness is driving me NUTS!! please help

So I've started giving Lily & Callie, Friskies,and Fancy Feast, to go along with their diet of fancier brands. I stocked up today at PetSmart, and Petco, with their normal healthy brands, and I picked up a few new things too, Halo Spots Stew Salmon, Merrick surf and turf, and Blue Buffalo beef. I wasted all three cans today. Lily wouldn't even touch it. So I thought "Okay you don't like these" So I gave her her regular Blue Buffalo Salmon, which she always loves. Nope, she snubbed her nose up to that too. She refuses to eat kitten specific food now too, so its been hard finding a good quality adult food suited for her kitten needs. Is she now spoiled to Friskies? She doesn't want the healthy stuff. I am so tired of throwing out perfectly good cans, and returning other ones to switch out. Is there a balance I can find? Whats healthy, with a good fat content, and DHA/Omega that doesn't taste "healthy" I am just at her wits ends now. The only kitten food she & Callie eat now, is their IAMS hard food. I dont even want to think about how mch I've spent, and wasted on, her being so picky. It used to be just Callie that was so picky, now Lily is too. Urghh!

Thanks for listening to my rant, and any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

First , how old are they?  I ask because maybe they are old enough that they no longer need to be on kitten food.  Most kittens can move on to adult food by 8 months or so, and also, there are lots of foods out there that are ok to feed for all ages.

Second, join the club.  No solace in that, but many cats are extremely picky, and it's just a matter of finding out what they like.  Sometimes it's a particular flavor, but most often its the consistency...pate vs slices vs in gel, gravy, etc.  I think most kitten food is probably pate, and some cats just don't really like pate. 

I have also thrown away possibly $100s of food, and since I usually order canned via the internet, given $100s of food to shelters since I can't return those cans.  But I just kept on trying untll I found  something.  And sometimes it was Fancy Feast.  Mine ALL hated Merrick,which I thought smelled good enough that it made ME hungry . 

Obvously the healthiest is going to be low carb, which I am just now learning that just because the can says "grain free" doesn't necessarily mean it's low carb .  As far as high fat, I'm not quite sure, that's why I asked the age of your furkids.  But bottom line, IMHO, if you can get them to eat only Fancy Feast, I and many others feel that is better than feeding  kibble.  And, BTW, you could always add an Omega 3 like Krill Oil to their diet.  My extremely picky kitties actually like Krill Oil.

Oh, here's another thought...have you tried crushing a couple of pieces of their kibble and dusting their "good" canned food with it.  That might get them to eat it.

Thankyou for your reply Lily is five and a half months,and Callie is about 8 months. I went ahead yesterday, and just got stuff I know they will eat. All of it is adult maintenance, but I guess its better than them not eating much at all.I got Natural Balance Platefuls, Friskies Plus, Fancy Feast beef shreds, and fancy feast chicken and cheese, and Soulistic good Karma packets, and Purina One beef braised and Pate. They all have a low fat content, between 1% and 4%, but they like them, hopefully if I give them enough of it, it will make up for being for adults. I also got them a bunch of treats, because I know they love them. Whiskas Temptations has a kitten treat, that has a good amount of fat, also with DHA,so I got a few packets of those, along with Greenies Smart bites,which also contains Omegas. Hopefully I'm feeding them right, they just refuse all kitten brands and textures now, except for Royal Canin 4-12 months, they will eat that every now and then. I will definitely look into Krill Oil, I'm not sure if they would like that, but I'm definitely going to look into it, Lily now is not a big fan of fish/salmon flavors. Thankyou again for your help! It would be nice if they actually liked the healthy stuff, but I don't think that'll happen, I will continue to try the higher end stuff every now and then, to see if we have a winner, but always have on hand,the friskies and fancy Feast.

Stacydc83 said:

Thankyou for your reply Lily is five and a half months,and Callie is about 8 months. I went ahead yesterday, and just got stuff I know they will eat. All of it is adult maintenance, but I guess its better than them not eating much at all.I got Natural Balance Platefuls, Friskies Plus, Fancy Feast beef shreds, and fancy feast chicken and cheese, and Soulistic good Karma packets, and Purina One beef braised and Pate. They all have a low fat content, between 1% and 4%, but they like them, hopefully if I give them enough of it, it will make up for being for adults. I also got them a bunch of treats, because I know they love them. Whiskas Temptations has a kitten treat, that has a good amount of fat, also with DHA,so I got a few packets of those, along with Greenies Smart bites,which also contains Omegas. Hopefully I'm feeding them right, they just refuse all kitten brands and textures now, except for Royal Canin 4-12 months, they will eat that every now and then. I will definitely look into Krill Oil, I'm not sure if they would like that, but I'm definitely going to look into it, Lily now is not a big fan of fish/salmon flavors. Thankyou again for your help! It would be nice if they actually liked the healthy stuff, but I don't think that'll happen, I will continue to try the higher end stuff every now and then, to see if we have a winner, but always have on hand,the friskies and fancy Feast.

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Hi Stacy First off, I will also welcome you to the club of picky eaters Actually mine are not terribly picky but they do have their days. Mine get mostly either Nutro Max Cat or Nutro Natual Choice canned foods. There is plenty of variety between both lines to keep them happy, usually. I buy other premium brands to give them different textures and flavors. I gave them Simply Nourish chicken stew this morning and they all just tore into it, including the feral who usually will only eat the Nutro Max wet. It's a coin toss on whether or not they would do the same tomorrow. All of them may very well turn their noses up at it.

I'll just give you my experience with kitten food vs adult food. You will probably want to check with your vet before doing this. I did this only on the advice of my vet. Swiffer was about 6 months old, Ramsey and 'Bitz were 2-3 and Hoot was 11 at the time. I was feeding 3 (count 'em), THREE different life stages of food, both wet and dry. I was completely losing my mind trying to keep them out of each others food. I had entire cabinets with labels kitten, adult, senior and several kibble containers marked the same. Plus I had 2 dogs at different life stages, puppy and adult.

Finally out of sheer desperation, and exhaustion, I consulted with the vet. He told me to put all of the cats on adult food and they should all be just fine. Scooter was too young to switch him to adult dog food so I still had the 2 lifestages of dog food going. BUT, the cats all on adult was totally awesome and all of them have done well on adult ever since and I'm a happy camper too

by George I think I figured it out!! I just fed Lily & Callie their dinner, and Callie ate her portion, and Lily snubbed her nose at it. I think she now has a preference for shreds, and chunks, opposed to Pate. I gave them Purina One Beef Pate, the SAME flavor as Purina One Beef braised, the braised Lily will happily eat, along with the Friskies Plus which is turkey chunks. And she she also likes Platefuls. Maybe she thinks since shes almost 6 months, she doesn't need pate, and shes a big girl and wants big girl food. Hah, I'm so glad I'm figuring this out!

Stacydc83 said:

by George I think I figured it out!! I just fed Lily & Callie their dinner, and Callie ate her portion, and Lily snubbed her nose at it. I think she now has a preference for shreds, and chunks, opposed to Pate. I gave them Purina One Beef Pate, the SAME flavor as Purina One Beef braised, the braised Lily will happily eat, along with the Friskies Plus which is turkey chunks. And she she also likes Platefuls. Maybe she thinks since shes almost 6 months, she doesn't need pate, and shes a big girl and wants big girl food. Hah, I'm so glad I'm figuring this out!

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Different flavors and textures! Yep, sometimes what one likes, the others do not. Goood for you for figuring that out!

Yay!  (told ya...it's all about finding what they like consistency wise)    Oh yes.  Forgot to mention this very important fact.  What they love today, they may hate tomorrow.