Former stray won't stop eating!

I took in a stray several months ago. He is a big framed cat, and wasn't too thin when I took him in. I have always free fed my other cat, and did so with the stray also after I brought him in. At first, I wasn't too alarmed at his eating, since I thought it was only natural for a former stray to scarf down food now that it was easily available. Now, several months later, he is a bit of a tubby kitty. Not horribly bad yet, but heading that way. I have to do something now and wanted to see if anyone had advice. I haven't done this before.

1. Will the former stray ever stop overeating now that food is always available?

2. What is the best way to have one cat on a diet and not the other? The former stray will eat anything in sight, including the dog food bowl if we don't stop him.

3. Should I try less food or diet cat food? I was thinking diet since he loves to eat so much, but didn't know if that would just keep encouraging him to gorge himself as much as possible.

Any ideas?

I have the same problem with my rescue kitty. He looks like he swallowed a bowling ball. I used to leave out big bowls of dry for snacking, but no more. Now I feed mostly canned to all 3, with a half a handful of dry per cat after they have eaten their wet. Any leftover dry food gets picked up because he will just devour it. I have been doing this a few weeks and he doesn't look like he's lost any weight. they get fed 2 to three times a day. I split a 6 ounce can twice a day for three of them. The senior cat eats separately and differently than them. The young cat 6 mo., will get extra dry when Tubby isn't looking.

when kitty realizes the food will always be avail it will slow down,... for Zoey this took about 6 months..

Originally Posted by sharky

when kitty realizes the food will always be avail it will slow down,... for Zoey this took about 6 months..

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It's been about five months, so maybe I'll hold off on any changes a bit longer and see if he adapts. I know it must be tempting to gorge on food after living on the streets, not knowing when you'd be able to eat again. Thanks for letting me know how it went with you.

This is a typical response for strays and ferals. The gorge on food and they will eat every bit of food in sight. or they will bury the food for later. I would feed on a schedule and keep to the schedule. If you work and can't be home to dole out food, invest in an automatic feeder which works well. Once the food appears on a timed routine, the cat will relax and stop wanting food all the time. It is just a programmed response of survival, so you have to reprogram the cat's natural tendencies.

I would have the cat checked for worms too.

Thanks for the responses. I've taken him to the vet already, and he is healthy. Hissy, thanks for the advice. I don't post here much but I do read from time to time and I know you've worked a lot with ferals. It seems logical enough of a reaction for a cat when they've been unsure of food in the past. I'll try a set schedule to see if that helps some. I thought free feeding might work, since he sees food is always available, but it hasn't, at least not yet. Also, since he has had a hard life on the street, I don't mind indulging him and spoiling him a bit with food. I just want to get it under contol before it becomes a health issue for him. I need to put a pic up on here so you can see how beautiful he is.