Diet advice! Help!

[kargie]

Hi there,

We recently got two cats from a rescue. One of whom has had very smelly, sloppy muck since we changed the food to Iams dry and Whiskas wet. The other cats muck appears to be fine. Worried about the first cats muck consistancy and colour I changed the dry food back to James Wellbeloved. Noticed today that there is next to no muck in the litter tray and that the cat who's muck was previosuly ok is now constipated. We have stopped the wet food also due to reading scary things. The cats have been drinking more, which I had expected but I am now very worreid and don't know what to do/feed them!
 

Please help!

Thanks

 

[stephenq]

Hi there and welcome : )

What were they being fed when you got them?  How old are they? 

Generally in situations like this the first thing to do is go back to feeding them exactly what they were eating when you got them.  If this doesn't stabilize them in a couple of days then a vet visit is in order.  And generally its a good idea when getting new animals to take them to your vet soon anyway for a basic exam and baseline measurements. 

Wet food is an important part of a cat's diet, its much closer to what they eat in nature, and cats being obligate carnivores do well with the extra meat in wet food.  There are no kibble bushes in nature!  But they often don't do well if they are switched wet foods too quickly, as you see diarrhea often results, or if they are being introduced to wet food for the first time.  One week+ is the usual amount of time to slowly switch a wet food over.  And if their stool starts getting soft then you stop and back up a step or try switching to a different food.

You may also enjoy this nutrition forum that has lots of great articles on nutrition and helpful threads on the subject.

http://www.thecatsite.com/f/64/cat-nutrition

Stephen

 

[kargie]

Hi. Thank you for the advice.

They were on James wellbeloved dry feed, we have swapped back to that for the dry. the wet food was felix so i am going to get some of that tomorrow. Both are still behaving as normal, but i don't want this to continue or get worse. The cat who had smelly poop is approx 10 abd the older now constipated cat is apprix 2 years but possibly older.

 

[stephenq]

OK well if they both don't stabilize in a couple of days, see a vet ok.  There are some things you can do for the constipated cat, like give Laxatone (flavored petroleum jelly).

Stephen

 

[stephanietx]

When changing dry food, it must be done gradually over about a 2 week period.  Changing too quickly results in diarrhea and tummy upset.  You can change canned food quickly, but not dry food.  I suggest you visit http://catinfo.org/ to read up on feline nutrition and check in the Cat Nutrition forum for more advice on food.  Canned food is an absolute necessity in a kitty's diet, so be sure you feed them some canned food.