How do you get a cat to eat MORE wet food?

Hi everyone. I've posted before about how picky my cats are but it's finally starting to turn around. I've got them eating wet food twice a day but they don't eat that much of it. This is what I've tried so far:

- 3oz in the morning per cat and 3oz at night - they couldn't finish it

- 1.5oz in the morning, afternoon and at night - They won't even touch the second feeding, even if it's left down

- 1.5 oz in the morning and at night - this, they can finish! But I don't feel like it's enough food. I've been leaving 1/2 cup of Orijen down just in case they're hungry...

I've looked around here a lot and I've seen that people feed their cats multiple times a day. I'm not home enough to do that and when I tried feeding even 3 times a day, they just completely ignored the second meal and wouldn't touch it.

I know they won't eat more than 1.5oz in a meal. Sometimes they can't even finish that.

Any tips? I want to make sure my guys are getting enough. Ideally, I'd like to take them off dry food but right now I just don't feel comfortable doing that.

Edit - I've got 2 cats. A 2 year old male and a 1.5 year old female. No idea on their weights. I've tried to weigh them but they freak out.

It's possible they don't like the wet food you are feeding so they will eat just enough to stay alive.  They might eat more if they didn't have access to dry all the time but only after they have eaten their wet food.  When I took on the cat with FLUTD from the shelter, she had never eaten anything but dry food, she didn't even recognize wet food as food, yet she should not have dry food with her condition.  She needed grain free wet food, very low carb.  It took quite a bit of work to get her to eat it, including mixing a little baby food meat in with it, and sprinkling crushed treats on top.  At first I even stuck a few treats into the top of the food.  I would give her a few pieces of dry food after the meal, but not unless she ate the meal.  I did have to feed her 4 time a day because large meal tend to make the pH more alkaline and I needed to keep hers acid.  She still likes 4 meals a day but doesn't demand them, but she like her own special wet food and won't bother the other cats regular food or dry food when everyone is eating at the same time. 

At first I fed her EVO 95% chicken  turkey canned, but it's very hard to get consistently now, even from chewy.com where I ordered it, so now she has been transitioned to Kroger's on brand of grain-free wet food ABOUND, the chicken only (there is another that includes whitefish, but I dont give her fish.  It is now her food of choice.  You can probably retrain yours too, but do leave the crunchies until "dessert" for them, although crushed treats do make them eat the wet food too.

They're not going to eat more wet food when you're free feeding dry, so you have to take the dry away and get them on a schedule if you want them to eat more wet food. 

missmimz said:

 
They're not going to eat more wet food when you're free feeding dry, so you have to take the dry away and get them on a schedule if you want them to eat more wet food. 

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This is probably true, unless they are totally and irresistibly in love with their wet food.  You didn't say WHICH wet food you are feeding them.  Is it really high in calories or not?  That could play a part in it.  If it's high caloric, they might get pretty full.  Or if two of the feedings are too close together, it's true that they might not be hungry yet (especially if they've just munched on some kibble)  

Have you seen these articles?

http://www.thecatsite.com/a/transitioning-free-fed-kibble-kitties-to-timed-meals

http://www.thecatsite.com/a/transit...-to-a-new-type-of-food-canned-raw-or-homemade

You might try some other canned foods to see if you get a different response.  Many of of serve a variety of canned foods to our furries.  We don't want them to get bored

They get fancy feast in the morning because they're hooked on it and then at night they get another kind. I don't feed just one kind because they get bored of it. I rotate a bunch like:

Wellness
Merrick
BFF
Natural choice
Natural balance
Blue buffalo
Wruva
Nature's variety instinct

And a few more. I have tried taking their dry food away completely and it still didn't make them eat more wet food.

I have also tried making the wet food more enticing with toppers, adding water, adding treats etc.

They usually get fed wet when I get up in the morning (between 8 and 10am) and again around 8 or 830 pm.