PLEASE HELP MY CAT IS ALWAYS HUNGRY

My two roommates adopted a cat a little over a month ago. He is a little over a year old now. For the first couple weeks after we got him, we let him free feed. He would whine and cry for food early in the morning (starting at 530ish) and throughout the day, sometimes right after he ate. We live in a small apartment, so whenever we would stand up and go into the kitchen (which is where is food bowls are), he would jet in front of us into the kitchen and whine for food. At that point, he was eating 2 small cans of fancy feast plus some dry food. I read that stopping free feeding can stop the whining and crying, so me and my two roommates set a feeding schedule for him. He eats at 730 and, 5pm and 11pm. We all have different work schedules, so these are the only 3 times be can be consistently fed every day. He gets about 2 small cans a day plus a little dry food. We have used this schedule for about 2 weeks, and he is still ALWAYS WHINING FOR FOOD. Half the time he doesn't even eat all of the food in his bowl unless it is fed to him out of a spoon. He starts crying around 6am until he is fed at 730. He sometimes will then start whining again at 8. Throughout the day, whenever we walk around he tries to lead us into the kitchen to be fed. Other than that though, he is the sweetest most social cat. I do not know how often or much his previous owner fed him. Is there anyway to get food off his mind or quiet him down at least?!?!

I assume he has had a complete vet check to rule out any medical causes.  If so this is probably behavioral.  I assume that you got him from a shelter or rescue as you don't know his prior circumstances.  He may very well have come from circumstances where he wasn't fed well and probably didn't get enough attention either.  The deprivation may well have made him obsessive about food because he never got enough before.  If so you may just have to wait out the behavior and it could take a while.  It really sounds as though you are giving him enough food he just still isn't sure that he will always have enough food.

This reminds me a bit of our Bertha. When we first brought her home from the shelter, she was obsessed with food. She'd vacuum up a whole bowl of kibble in like 20 seconds. It was awesome to behold. One night, she dragged a package of English muffins off the kitchen counter and was preparing to chow down on her midnight snack in our bedroom!

It took a while to convince her that she would never starve again, but she eventually figured it out. I know free-feeding is not recommended, but I don't think she would have overcome this phobia any other way. Now she leaves food in her bowl all the time and only eats when she's hungry.

If you need to feed your cat more often (which it kind of sounds like you do), you can buy automatic feeders that you set to feed on an appropriate schedule. You could perhaps set it to feed a little bit at 6:00 a.m. (before any of you are up), mid-day, 3:30 and around 8:00 p.m. Along with the three regular feedings, you may be able to convince him that he's not going to starve to death any time soon. Once you get past that hurdle, you could cut back on the feeding regimen, maybe.

Good luck with this - I know how it goes!

Best regards.

How much does he weigh?  How old is he?  How active is he?  WHICH type of Fancy Feast are you feeding?  All of this comes into play when trying to determine whether or not he is really getting enough to eat or not.

It does sound as if 6 oz of food, plus a little dry IS enough, but it isn't always, especially if what you are feeding is lower in calories and your cat is pretty active.  Unless you are feeding the Fancy Feast CLASSICS, those cans have less than 70 calories per can, so that's not that much.  Next is HOW MUCH dry and how calories is it? 

All this said, since he isn't finishing at times, this does sound behavioral.  When he does this, can you take his mind off food by playing with him?  Maybe try to really tire him out with a good round of Da Bird or something? 

In the meantime, see if this article is of any help:  http://www.thecatsite.com/a/how-much-food-should-i-feed-my-cat

My girl Nyx was a feral when I adopted her and she would literally eat anything! Think she was afraid of going without food. She also came to us free feeding on kibble. When I tried to convert her to wet she would eat it without a problem, but still cry for the dry. I personally just kept reducing until she had free feed kibble at night only for awhile and wet meals on scheduled throughout the day. This seemed to calm the issue a lot! She is on can mixed with dry 3x a day now (on schedule) but it took quite a bit of time.