Kitten won't eat when I'm gone.

My 18-week old kitten has never eaten when I am not home.

She eats almost all wet food. I leave dry food down at all times to snack on in between 4 feedings per day of wet. I've tried 4 dry brands so far; she won't eat more than a little snack once or twice a day (max less than 2 tbsp/day). I've tried Purina Kitten Chow (1st I bought before I researched foods), Wellness Core Kitten, Blue Wilderness Kitten and Evo. I mix them, because I keep buying new brands and they're expensive; she'll pick out all the Purina.

When I'm gone at work, a couple times per week, 8:30-3, I leave a frozen puck of wet food on an ice pack. It thaws in 5 hrs. She never touches it, and usually won't eat it when I get home, either. I have to give her new food. She won't eat the dry food when I'm gone, either.

Today we were gone from 9:30 am to 6 pm. She didn't eat the whole time. When I got home, and pointed out her wet food to her, she ate maybe half.

It's like she associates me with her food, and won't look for it when I'm not there. Either that, or she realizes the food is frozen, then never goes back to check and see that it's thawed?

What to do? Will she figure this out eventually? We've had her since 9 weeks old. In April, I start working 5 days/week, and don't want her skipping a feeding every day. [emoji]128533[/emoji]

Any ideas for a good dry food she might *like*? I know wet food is the best; I don't plan for dry to be anything other than a supplement and for her to eat when I'm not home, but I need her to be willing to eat it those times.

Has she been checked by the vet? It's not normal for her not to want to eat.

Lol- she's been to the vet a bazillion times in her little life she's a survivor of panleukopenia, calicivirus and coccidia at 9 weeks old.
She eats just fine when I'm home. It's only the 1-2 days per week that I work that she doesn't eat while I'm gone

My cat does that too.  I give him 1/2 can of food when I leave in the morning, when I get home it often is barely touched.  As soon as I get home and go in the bathroom where his food is kept, he immediately eats.  My only guess is he is happier when I am home, and eats when he is happy.  I have never been overly concerned about it.  I figure he won't starve himself, if he was hungry enough he would eat.  

I've battled my kitten to eat dry food ever since I've had her at 6 weeks old (sister rescued her and siblings) she has always eaten her wet food but is so tiny and never would eat enough to take in enough calories and has always been so skinny. Well she's 10 months old now and I've been through countless dry foods trying to find one she liked enough to eat for one of her 3 meals a day, and finally discovered Purina Muse (the chicken one). It is obviously not the best food out there but I've tried so many and it isn't terrible and its probably better than not eating enough. Before this I had tried Acana, Natures Variety, Nutro, Nulo, Wellness, Blue Buffalo, and Taste of the Wild, different flavors of each brand and all were snuffed. Could get her to try some if it was in my hand but I obviously couldn't feed her that way all of the time. Anyways this one is worth a try for you I think if you exhaust what seems like all other options. My kitties still get their two wet feedings a day and I'm much less stressed trying to force her to take in calories.

Well, I finally found Simply Nourish Source grain-free kitten dry food at Petsmart. The ingredients seem good, and the kibble is the flatter, star-type shape that Purina Kitten Chow has, not the chunky kibble that the others have that I've tried.
She will eat it willingly between wet meals, definitely much better than anything else I've tried. So I've left it down twice now while I'm at work. She doesn't eat tons, but she eats it, as opposed to not touching the frozen-thawed wet food, so it's good enough, so far.

I hope to get her to where she will eat it well enough to leave it down for a weekend sometime...baby steps I suppose.

Also: PetSmart will take back opened dry food even without a receipt (if you have the petsmart card) within 60 days, FYI! I got back $35 in food i'd bought and wasted because she wouldn't eat it. Yay!

I'm so jealous of people who have petsmarts and petcos that they can return food to, lol. I am not close to any pet stores at all and my only option to get cat food that doesn't suck is offline, which causes things to get annoying if you need to return anything. Luckily my 2 year old male cat will eat literally any food I put in front of him so nothing does go to waste at least.

I'm glad you found a food that she will eat!

My cat's attraction to Purina products tells me that the company knows a thing or two about creating flavors that cats enjoy.  Therefore I include some higher end (no corn, no wheat, no soy) Purina products in her diet.  Try these dry flavors from Purina;

Purina Beyond Chicken & Oat Meal

Purina Beyond SuperFood Blend (Herring)

Purina Pro Plan True Nature Chicken and Egg Recipe

My cat loved all three of these kibbles, starting when she was 7 months old.  She was particularly bonkers about the Herring flavor.  Before we went CWS-free she eagerly gobbled up PurinaOne Kitten (chicken), Purina One Indoor Advantage (Turkey), as well as the Chicken & Brown Rice recipe from Rachael Ray Nutrish.