My fat cat

I recently asked my vet how to reduce my cat's weight. She told me to put her on a "Senior Diet." Does anyone have experience feeding a senior food that successfully caused weight loss. What brand did you use? Please include any other suggestions that have worked for you.

I believe it would help if you told us what you were currently feeding. What types of food and brands?

Kibble is higher carb and calorie, and usually leads to weight gain. Especially when cats get older and aren't as active. Wet food is higher protein, with less carbs. Switching to a good grain-free canned food should help with weight, just make sure to read the ingredients and avoid the "gravy" flavors, as they are usually higher carb. 

Does your cat have any underlying health issues, like IBD, diabetes, kidney disease, or a heart condition?  If so, this will influence how you design a diet for your cat.  Generally, however, switching from kibble to wet food and adding exercise sessions help cats lose weight.  It also helps to feed your cat several small meals a day rather than letting her graze.

You might find the following helpful:

http://www.thecatsite.com/a/obesity-in-cats

http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?c=1+2140&aid=697

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/313448/senior-diets  (This discusses what "senior diets" are.)

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/308596/...-lose-weight-we-almost-tried-everthing-we-can

The following thread is long but tells the story of bringing a 27 pound cat down to a healthier weight and everything involved in doing so:

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/245236/mickey-my-27-lbs-foster-and-his-journey-back-to-a-healthy-weight

Good luck!   I have an overweight cat myself and need to start the diet process as well.  Not looking forward to it!  

Paiger8 said:

 
I believe it would help if you told us what you were currently feeding. What types of food and brands?

Kibble is higher carb and calorie, and usually leads to weight gain. Especially when cats get older and aren't as active. Wet food is higher protein, with less carbs. Switching to a good grain-free canned food should help with weight, just make sure to read the ingredients and avoid the "gravy" flavors, as they are usually higher carb. 

Click to expand...

I agree about the recommendation for low-carb, grain-free canned foods rather than a "special diet" dry food, which would still have high carbs that aren't conducive to weight loss. As for the canned foods, some of the carby non-grain thickeners that are used to make those alleged gravies are potato starch and tapioca.

The story of the 27-pound cat that @Margd linked to is a good one! He got fed Fancy Feast Classics (pates) which are low-carb. I also think the idea of several meals a day is a good one.

Good luck!

This is also helpful: http://catinfo.org/?link=felineobesity

Typically you would feed enough calories daiy. This is generally 20 to 25 calories per pound of ideal body weight daily. If your cat needs to lose a lot of weight, doing a more conservative 30 or 35 calories or so initially would be better to prevent fatty liver disease. If your cat has medical conditions like diabetes, heart condition, IBD, etc this slightly complicates how you can do a weight loss diet. You may have to balance certain other things like carbs or phosphorus plus calories to prevent the medical condition from being affected.

Can you give us more info about your cat and what you are currently feeding?

I am feeding Wellness wet food.

Thanks for the many links. I will read them all. Health issues? I will be taking her to the vet to answer that question.
She does not graze. I feed her about 3/4 of a can two times once in the morning and once in the evening. That is 3/4 of a can total for the entire day. THANKS!