- Joined
- Aug 13, 2014
- Messages
- 32
- Purraise
- 8
Our cats appear to be drinking far too little (we haven't had any health problems yet, but I'd rather prevent than cure) and have been looking for ways to get them to drink more.
We first had 2 plastic bowls that they barely used (barely drank twice a day, for 5-10 second max), possibly because the bowls got dirty/slimy super fast, even if we cleaned it every day.
We then switched to gravity-based dispensers, but that didn't get them to drink more.
We recently had my parents' dog over for a weekend and we noticed that both cats went straight for the steel bowl and drank a fair bit more, so we decided to swap the plastic ones with steel ones, but turns out that was nothing more than the novelty-effect, because the dog is back with my parents now and the cats still barely drink.
However! They both like to go to the kitchen sink whenever we're not looking though (they rarely try to jump onto the counter when we're around). I swear, I can leave the room with both cats napping on their trees, realise that I forgot something a second later, head back into the living room and both of them are on the kitchen counter sucking on the tap as if they just spent a week in a desert. So this makes me think that they do want to drink, but are just hating the bowls
So upon checking out some books and websites, it turns out that some cats just prefer running/moving water (that's possible why the youngest of our cats always splashes the water in the bowls a little bit when he wants to drink). So we should get one of those fancy electric drinking fountains.
But here's the kicker.. Those things are electric, so they have a cable coming from it.. And our youngest is a passionate cable-chewer. We have spent a lot of time, effort and money to make the rooms they can get into nearly 100% cable-free, so to put a cable right next to their drinking areas simply will not end well.
So what can we do now? They dislike static bowls (unless they really have no other option), but we can't put a bowl with running water because it wouldn't last 2 days.
We first had 2 plastic bowls that they barely used (barely drank twice a day, for 5-10 second max), possibly because the bowls got dirty/slimy super fast, even if we cleaned it every day.
We then switched to gravity-based dispensers, but that didn't get them to drink more.
We recently had my parents' dog over for a weekend and we noticed that both cats went straight for the steel bowl and drank a fair bit more, so we decided to swap the plastic ones with steel ones, but turns out that was nothing more than the novelty-effect, because the dog is back with my parents now and the cats still barely drink.
However! They both like to go to the kitchen sink whenever we're not looking though (they rarely try to jump onto the counter when we're around). I swear, I can leave the room with both cats napping on their trees, realise that I forgot something a second later, head back into the living room and both of them are on the kitchen counter sucking on the tap as if they just spent a week in a desert. So this makes me think that they do want to drink, but are just hating the bowls
So upon checking out some books and websites, it turns out that some cats just prefer running/moving water (that's possible why the youngest of our cats always splashes the water in the bowls a little bit when he wants to drink). So we should get one of those fancy electric drinking fountains.
But here's the kicker.. Those things are electric, so they have a cable coming from it.. And our youngest is a passionate cable-chewer. We have spent a lot of time, effort and money to make the rooms they can get into nearly 100% cable-free, so to put a cable right next to their drinking areas simply will not end well.
So what can we do now? They dislike static bowls (unless they really have no other option), but we can't put a bowl with running water because it wouldn't last 2 days.