You can tuna piano, but you can't tuna fish (Canned Tuna in Margo's Diet?)

Sorry for the lame joke, I hate trying to think of thread titles... 

ANYWAY.

So I like spoiling my kitty, and today she had her first taste (at least, first taste with me!) of canned tuna. She LOVED it. Vacuumed it down, meowed like crazy, and did the cute-kitty-eyes to try to get more. I gave her about a teaspoon of tuna, not wanting to upset her stomach. And then I got curious.

Is it okay to feed canned tuna? How much or how little or how sparingly?

A lot of cats love tuna, and some cats (like ferals who live near the sea) subsist on it.

I personally would recommend feeding tuna only as a treat.  Tuna especially can have some heavy metals, which aren't good for cats.  I think it has to do with 'bottom feeders' and pollution.

Ritz is prone to UTIs, so I feed her NO fish, except Krill Oil as a supplement.

As an alternative to tuna, see if she will eat sardines, in water, no salt added.  Sardines tend to have less of a metal problem.  Bonus points if you can find FRESH sardines; extra bonus points if you can find them in Nebraska!

Out of my 7 cats only 3 eat the human tuna fish. I will pick up a half dozen cans every 6 months but strictly as a super special treat. Luckily it's my 3 girls that eat the tuna, the boys could care less about it. I have raised them strictly on a meat diet, no fish due to the possible UTI's they can cause in my boys. But as a super special treat, sure. Why not. I happen to be very fortunate with my 6 1/2 cats. 6 adults and 1 4 month old kitten. They all love water. I keep 4 jumbo water bowls around the house that get changed daily and I you would think they were bathing in them for the amount of water they drink. And good plumbing. Each year for their yearly visit to the vet for shots I always do a blood panel just to make sure all inners are working properly. Last check up on Momma Pooch 20 yo she had high cholesterol, I laughed. God bless this little one, I got her when she was 17 her and her daughter Missy 14 yo and they weren't fixed. They moved into our house with a friend of ours who had to move out of his place for a 18 month stretch. Well I had cats for over 30 years, they all came from the same shelter, and of course they were all neutered before I could take them home. So when Momma Pooch and Missy moved in I had never seem a female cat in heat. All that screaming and crying plus them trying to get out the door. The girls were going after my boys who of course have no equipment but harassing my babies. So I told their owner that house rules all cats are neutered. So off to my vet for first blood work to make sure their liver and kidneys were well enough to go under which they were out 2 days later they were both neutered. Once the owner moved out, by then he also had brought his boy cat over, who was also a son of Momma Pooch and brother to Missy. He only left Momma Pooch behind, well sort of, I really wanted Momma and Momma seemed to be really enjoying her life with me. I fussed over her and still do, she's all of 5 1/2 lbs. loves to be touched but not picked up. She sleeps with me every night on her blanket right next to my pillows where I fall asleep, with my hand in her belly, touching her every night. My poor Momma Pooch came to me with no teeth and unfixed. In March she will be 21 yo. We have enjoyed life together for these past 4 years and she now cries once in a while to announce she is coming up into the bed via a step stool, night stand then mattress but if I open a can of tuna fish she is on the floor next to my feet screaming her guts out. The can opener hasn't even stopped rotating around the can of tuna but Momma Pooch has smelled it and can't wait to eat it. Although Momma Pooch has no teeth she eats everything including hard food and her favorite treat "temptations". Oh she also likes the green grass I buy for my cats, she will sit there an gum on a long strain of grass for 15 minutes until she has sucked all the flavor out of the blade. But tuna for Momma Pooch is her absolute favorite. And her high cholesterol well let's just say it's something she will die with and not die of. Oh also when I had her fixed one if her teets were swollen so the vet removed it and did a biopsy of it and it came out as a cancerous growth but again that's 3 1/2 years ago and Momma is still around. I think the most important things as a geriatric pussy cat is that she has no arthritis to prohibit her from going up and down steps, her eyes are still good, her ears are fine and that nose is cute as a button.

Canned tuna has several issues, 1) the high heavy metals as Rit mentioned above, especially mercury 2) high sodium content which is not good for cats 3) the highly addictive nature of fish for many cats 4) fish can be highly allergenic for some cats. I would keep tuna for very occasional treats and reserve it for times when she's sick and you really need something to tempt her to eat.

About 5 of our 7 love tuna but I only use it very occasionally for a treat (they got some at Christmas!)     I've also used it occasionally to get them to take meds if I have a hard time pilling them or something.  I'll dissolve the pill in tuna water and then add just a couple of bites of tuna to make sure they eat it all.