Olives bad for him?

Crazy,I know..But I have discovered that Lovey goes CRAZY for plain green olives out of a jar.
He will come running to the smell and then paw at me until I give him one.
He likes to lick them like mad, but hasn't eaten a whole one yet.
He will then lap up the olive juice (salt, water?) if I let him..

Is there anything wrong with giving him this treat once in awhile?

Weird Cat.

It's probably okay once in a while, but not too often because of the salt. A lot of cats seem to love (green) olives. There's an Italian cat food called "Green Fish" that consists of tuna, rice, and green olives, and most cats seem to love it.

From what I understand this is actually not too unusual. Olives seem to have a catnip-like effect on some cats. I have heard that there are entire websites dedicated to this, though I have not looked any of them up. It might be fun to do a Google search on it, though.

I think it would be just fine to give your cat an olive when you are eating them in a salad. If he's mostly just licking the extra juice off the olive then he probably isn't actually getting very much salt so I don't know of any reason why it would be harmful for a healthy cat.

Spock loves green olives also. Whenever we have them he gets one. He likes to chase it all over the kitchen, and then eat it. But he always leaves the pimentoes. I didn't know this was common for cats. It must not be too bad for him, because he never gets sick and he weighs 13 pounds.

Our cat Ebony would roll himself all over the olive trying to rub it all over his fur. It was like catnip to him.

Originally Posted by Yosemite

Our cat Ebony would roll himself all over the olive trying to rub it all over his fur. It was like catnip to him.

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Squirt does same with black olives, especially if it was cooked, like on a pizza.

Thanks guys! Weird! I didn't know this was common either...
I also wonder about the "bleach" addiction that I have heard some cats have.
Lovey has this as well and will roll all over a table just wiped down with bleach...or he goes nuts trying to get into the fridge when I am wiping it down..I rinse it down well just in case but always wondered just what IT was...

I wonder what it is in the olives or in the bleach...???

Sometimes our babies are a little "weird". I had one cat, Troika, who had to have her own plate of spaghetti when we had it for supper, or she would steal ours. She ate the pasta, the onions, green peppers, meat and of course, licked up all the tomato sauce and ate the tomato pieces.

I wouldn't give him a lot of olives, it isn't the olives themeselves that are bad for him, but the stuff they preserve the olives in. Also do not give him olives preserved with any sort of garlic in it-

Hissy-

Why not garlic? Is it bad for kitties?

One of my cats (Rocket) goes insane when you open the olive jar! He loves them! He will snub a can of cat food, and even a can of tuna, but if you break out the olives or ranch dressing he goes crazy!

I know that onions are bad for kitties... maybe garlic is, too.

My cats like to lick the orange stuff off my fingers after I have some cheese popcorn. They actually post themselves beside me when they see me eating it and patiently wait for their treat! :-)

My RB kittty Gaby used to go nuts for olives too. She wouldn't eat them just play with them and rub herself in the salt water they were packed in. I thought she was the only cat to do that. It brings back fond memories to hear that other cats have this addiction too.

Originally Posted by Aries

Hissy-

Why not garlic? Is it bad for kitties?

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I am short on time right now, but if you do a TCS search on garlic you will find a lot of discussion on this topic.

I wondered why my cat suddenly got so frantic. I kind of guessed he wanted an olive but it's good to know he is not the only one into that.

Loveysmummy said:

Crazy,I know..But I have discovered that Lovey goes CRAZY for plain green olives out of a jar.

He will come running to the smell and then paw at me until I give him one.

He likes to lick them like mad, but hasn't eaten a whole one yet.

He will then lap up the olive juice (salt, water?) if I let him..


Is there anything wrong with giving him this treat once in awhile?


Weird Cat.

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Aries said:

Hissy-

Why not garlic? Is it bad for kitties?

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Yes, it is. It is 8 times as toxic to cats as onions. There's not much you would think of feeding you cat that would have garlic in it except table scraps, so don't give your cat table scraps.