Diet Cat Food

Hello everyone!  I signed up to this site because I have a rather sticky issue; at the moment, my dad and I have four cats.  One is Molly, my sweet baby girl (and the ONLY girl!) that we adopted after my mom died.  Sammy and Jinx, a pair of mid-size male cats.  They're not too big, though they seemed to get heavier when I adopted Molly.  My mind playing tricks, I guess.  We also have one other, Patches, who's just... he's big, he's fat, and he's fluffy. 

He's too fat to clean himself properly, so I use baby wipes to clean his bottom every couple of days, and we get him groomed every few months.  By groomed, I mean his long fur gets cut short and he's soaped up and smells lovely.  ^_^

The problem is that... because we have a lot of cats (at least, my dad would count four as a lot) we feed them all together.  They each have their own bowls, and usually they eat out of them.  I want to put Patches on diet food, however, the last time we tried, ALL the cats (minus Molly, whom we did not have) went and ate it.  Would it be bad for all of them to eat it, INCLUDING baby Molly.  She's about ten pounds, more or less.  I could keep one bowl full of regular food, but I'm afraid she'll go straight for the diet food like the others did before.

That's not really a good option for us.  My dad is not what you would call a "cat person", though he LOVES our cats.  He's just too big and tough to admit it.  -.-  And he's not in favor of buying two types of cat food and making it that complicated to feed them.  I can imagine the face he'd make if I suggested homemade cat food. 

So... sorry, I tend to ramble, I'll just put the question in recognizable form down here:  Would it be safe for my small cat to be fed diet food along with the others?  I'm really, REALLY worried for my Patches.  He's a sweet boy, just... FAT.  He always comes up to me and meows for loves, but most of his day is spent sleeping in my closet.  They all really helped me to heal after my mom's death two years ago, and I don't want to repay them with an early death because I couldn't be bothered to help fix his weight.

Thanks guys!

Hm, I'm not a big fan of "diet food", but it is my opinion.

I don't have an answer to your diet food problem, but you expressed interest in getting his weight down. From what I understand, overweight in cat is basically the same as us humans - calorie intake versus calorie burning. 

How much are you feeding him (and them)? How many times a day? Do you free feed or do you schedule meals? To treat obesity, first you should talk to your vet about putting him on a weight loss program, because if you don't know what you're doing, you can endanger poor kitty's life.

The idea is to determine the amount food to feed him to get to his ideal weight. Divide that into scheduled meals (don't free feed). When he is not eating, he should exercise more, same as us humans. Play with him more and get him moving. My cat is currently overweight and this is the plan that I use (I should follow my own advice and do it for my own overweightness too >.>). 

We feed them all at once, basically in the morning and evening.  No real set time, but a usual time of day.  We feed them 1 cup twice a day, but they usually don't eat it all, so I just fill up their bowl with however much they need.

There's something I wanted to know, though.  When we got Patches, he was a sweet lil guy, fit right in the palms of my hands.  And I have small hands!  And then he just... BALLOONED!  I wish I had an amount of time to tell you, but I don't remember.  It was awhile ago, and my memory is terrible.  Sorry.  Oh, but what I wanted to know... (sorry, I went off ranting again)... Could it possibly be hormonal?  I know it happened quickly, more quickly than I've ever had a cat gain weight before.  My vet refuses to even check.  Is it a rare thing?  But it CAN happen, right?  I thought I'd read about it before, but maybe I'm wrong.

Thanks for responding, Fhi, I really appreciate it!  I also wanted to know if it would hurt my baby cat.  Her picture is my avatar.  That's her on my... I mean HER bed.  -.-  She's lil, but man, is she a bully!


And THAT is Patches.  Lookit the belly... lookit the little belly!!!!  Oh, he LOVES to have his belly tickled.  I'll roll him over (cause he's too lazy to roll over himself) and give him tickles.

my cat is overweight also but with my regimen she has lost 3lbs in 6 months. I feed her a grain free dry food (with no by products or meals of any kind) and I ration her food (1/3cup) into 6 feedings in a 24 hour period ( I have an automatic feeder), that way her blood sugar is stable and doesn't crash and she doesn't scarf down her food and throw up like she always used to do (happened 3 times a week, now down to maybe once a month). and i'd recommend you feeding patches in a different room so he can eat in peace without the others stealing it.

Huh... an automatic feeder?  I'd like to take a look at that.  I should show you a picture of our kitchen floor... cat food, all over the place!!!  They can't get their faces in the bowl.  ^^;  Anyway... automatic feeder.  If possible, could you find me a link to one?  Perhaps the kind you use.  The closest store we have for pet supplies is Petco.  Anything else is on the other side of town,

I got mine off of a site and got it in the mail. I think I was from walmart but the company they got it through was Wayfair.  this link will send you to the one I got and it works pretty well but I have to tell you that with any autofeeder you have to reset it after it cycles out, you can set it to up to 6 feedings a day or once a day for 6 days or anything in between. I have to reset mine after midnight every night since I chose 6 feedings a day. it's really convenient for me though since I work up to 12 hours a day. http://www.wayfair.com/QPets-6-Meal-LCD-Automatic-Pet-Feeder-AF-108-LQE1004.html    oh and a reason why your cat might have ballooned up so fast would be cause the other cats eat his share so he might think he needs to eat as much as he can or he won't get any, just a thought. hope something works for you

Very nice, though it has a doggy bone on it!  Hmph.  Maybe there's a kitty version.  ^_^  Thanks so much!  I'll try to just feed him 1/3 cup, but I don't know how I'll keep him away from the other bowls.  Four of those feeders would be expensive, but... well, we'll see!  Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Diet food doesn't make sense to me - it's usually just filled with more carbs/fiber which aren't really important for a cat. Have you checked out http://catinfo.org/  ? It's a great site that talks about feline nutrition. She also focuses on feline obesity here: http://catinfo.org/?link=felineobesity

Perhaps you can add some wet food to their diets? Maybe one meal can be wet? There are some larger cans available for Friskies that can be cost effective. I personally do think that a lower-quality wet food is superior to a higher quality dry food. Adding some wet into their diet can also keep them more "full".

Even if you stick to dry food you'll need to start portioning their meals and calculate how many calories the bigger cat actually needs versus what she is eating. I also suggest giving three meals a day maybe, instead of two. Smaller, more frequent meals will help the metabolism. You can feed once in the morning, once after school/work/whatever, and before bed time. Also, try playing with the cats before feeding! Make her work for the food.

Lastly, if one needs to be on a diet it may be a good idea to separate her from the other cats while feeding her. She may try to start stealing the other cats' food if she's on a diet. 

Good luck!

Sorry. Someone had to do it.

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Agreeing with Pinkman.

Please read the label of your dry food. lf it consists of mostly carbs  -  corn, wheat gluten, starches, brans, etc. - this is what is causing the obesity. Your (beautiful, btw) kitty would be much better off eating canned food with meats as the main ingredients. He will fee the benefits of better nutrition, and won't need to eat as much to get the nutrients his body is craving.

Hi and welcome to TCS. I'm so glad to hear that you are concerned for the health of all your kitties. Obesity is a huge problem with our pets and can lead to diabetes, osteoarthritis and urinary issues. I agree with other posters that "diet" food may not be the right answer. Most commercial cat foods that are marketed as "diet" or "weight management" are actually lower in protein and fat and higher in carbs. As mentioned, carbs are not species-appropriate for obligate carnivores like cats. What may be a better option is to transition to 3 timed meals a day, controlling the number of calories each cat gets. http://www.thecatsite.com/t/264675/transitioning-free-fed-kibble-kitties-to-timed-meals-and-new-food

If you can add at least one meal of canned food which is much better for them than dry, that would be good as well. If not, then feeding the best dry food you can afford which is high in protein, moderate in fat and low in carbs is a better option than diet foods.

When you have a little time have a look through this article written by a vet on appropriate foods for cats and the main reasons for obesity in our cats.

http://www.catinfo.org/?link=felineobesity