Cats Messy Eating Habits

In the grand scheme of things this is really minor and I have a feeling it will be my behavior that needs adjusting... not the cats' ! I am attempting to make the transition from free fed dry food to scheduled meals with wet food, home-cooked, and maybe eventually raw food. The three kitties get their food on the dining room table (rarely used for human dining) to keep it away from the dog. With the dry food it wasn't a big deal that they left some crumbs on the table, but the wet food is just nasty. They take a of bite off the plate, step back and drop it on the table, break it up into a bunch of little pieces, then go back for more. They then walk through the food on the table, roll it around, etc....and rarely lick it all up. I switched to using the largest dinner plates we have, and they still do it! Then I gave them some home cooked last night, they took the tiniest piece of chicken off the table to eat it on the rug and left bits there too. They drop food on the chair cushions too. It is driving me nuts. The dog thinks this is great of course...food falling from above. The thought of them doing this with raw meat scares me.

My one thought was to make a large place-mat to cover the whole table out of  a vinyl or oil cloth tablecloth with some non-slip rug gripper stuff on the back. That way I can wipe it down with some disinfectant without hurting the wood tabletop. It won't prevent them from taking the food "to-go" though. Are my kitties particularly messy or is this normal? What do you all do?

One of mine does the 'out the bowl and on the floor thing' but as it's on the tiled floor it doesn't bother me much as I just wipe the floor over when they have finished.
Could you not put the dog in another room and feed them on the floor? He/she could then come in and clean it up afterwards for you. If not then I think a plastic tablecloth would be a good option for you.

KittyWhiskers said:

One of mine does the 'out the bowl and on the floor thing' but as it's on the tiled floor it doesn't bother me much as I just wipe the floor over when they have finished.
Could you not put the dog in another room and feed them on the floor? He/she could then come in and clean it up afterwards for you.

If not then I think a plastic tablecloth would be a good option for you.

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They like moving their kill around before eating it. Mine all do it to one extent or another. Dry food they just eat over the bowl.

Try pureeing the food in the blender with some water. They will lap it up and can't run around with it.

I've a cat that never learned the art of eating. He picks up a morsel of food with his front teeth and then tosses it in the air to try and get it further into his mouth. He misses. You'd figure that by age 14, he would have learned that this method doesn't work. Human food treats are whisked into the dining room and dropped on the carpet. I've had no luck and have little to offer other than the above watering down. A huge, wide bowl helps with the kibble misses but doesn't catch them all. Wet food is served in pasta bowls.

Sinbad does this too. He 'kills' his meat before eating it by shaking it in his jaws, then he drops it on the floor near the bowl, bites it into pieces and only then eats it. I ended up moving his eating place to the hall because the floor there is easy to mop. He also seems to enjoy eating there more because it's open to the living room where my husband and I sit, so he can eat in company. Win win, really. 

I'm not sure it's a habit that can be broken, it seems to be instinctual.

My cat is always found this too. You might want to try feeding them on paper towels. Seriously. The only time my cat doesn't drag his food off the plate is if I use paper towels. (I use viva)

We use fairly shallow glass 10-ounce compote/dessert dishes instead of bowls or plates for that reason. So does the local animal shelter, except for litters of very young kittens. It cuts down on the mess because there's an edge, but also plenty of "whisker clearance". They're something you can usually pick up cheaply at the Salvation Army or flea markets or garage sales. One of the other mods recommends wide, flat Corel for food bowls.

Our cat made a habit of destroying (chewing) oilcloth, cloth or plastic tablecloths. In desperation we had a piece of safety glass cut to fit our oak table. It was a lot cheaper than expected (we shopped online), looks great and is easy to keep clean. That might be an option for you.

Mine does this, and I use an extremely large food mat (the ones they sell for big dogs) and put his relatively tiny bowl in the middle of it. He drops most of his food on the mat, so it's just a matter of picking up the mat and wiping it clean with warm water. I rotate out the mat with another identical mat once in a while when I need to clean the previous one with mild soap.

You can also try putting paper diwn. Your local newspaper should be able to supply you with "end rolls" of plain newsprint paper. It'll be clean--no ink. One will last you a long time. Just put down, use, and throw away.

Thanks for the ideas everyone. At least it is not just my kitties being particularly messy I wish I had somewhere to easily separate them from the dog at meal time. Unfortunately the only room on the first floor with a door is the small bathroom where their litter box is. ...not a nice place for them to eat.  If they ate faster I could put the dog in there while they eat, but they are so slow, and the dog will just paw at the door the entire time. The dog does eat his meals in there, but he is finished within 15 seconds of me setting it down for him! If only the cats were that enthusiastic about their food.

Jcat just reminded me of why I no longer have a tablecloth on the kitchen table. We had a fitted vinyl one on there that the kits started shredding the edges of, and we had to throw out. Don't know why I didn't remember that when thinking about making one for the other table!

The plates I am using now are 11" square corelle that are a bit raised on the edge. It looks ridiculous with a just tablespoon of wet food on it, but that is the most they will eat so far. I think they are less likely to take the food off the table if it is pate or ground texture I guess, but they still seem intent on taking it off the plate and leaving it on the table, no matter how big the plate is. It is not a matter of accidentally nudging it off while eating either. They take mouthful, step back, and drop it on the table.

I know some people feed whole pieces of bone in raw meat. How do they manage that? I can just picture Tubby taking a raw chicken wing onto the couch to eat it at his leisure. Yuck