Calculating Calories

So I've been searching for how many calories a cat should eat, but there seems to be differing opinions on that and some don't seem to take into consideration the size of the cat. How do you actually calculate the proper number of calories?

I have four cats, two male, two female. The two females are short both in height and length. I suspect that 9 pounds is probably the ideal weight for them both. Which would mean they are both overweight. However when I entered one of them into a calculator website, it said Scooter's ideal weight was 11.2 - she's 10.4 right now. I haven't had the chance to weigh Kitty yet.

Furgus is mid range for height and length, but has huge paws, so I expect there is some Maine Coon or Forest Cat in his genetics somewhere, which makes me think that maybe he should be around the 12 - 12.5 range, and he's currently 12.2 - but then, he feels kind of heavy, and I don't know if that is just in the sense that 12 pounds feels heavy, or that he feels overweight or that he just feels "solid".

Jack is 13.5 pounds. He does not feel heavy, he feels almost too skinny to me. He has some weight in his back end, but his shoulder bones are easily felt. I think he could do with gaining some muscle back. In the calculator his ideal weight was listed as 14.4 pounds. He definitely felt healthier to me when I picked him up when he had a little more weight on him.

So...my dilemma. How do I know how many calories to feed each of them? Do I go by a guesstimate that, okay the girls are smaller framed, so should probably be around 9 pounds, or is there somewhere that I could enter like height and length and calculate the ideal weight of a cat that size? Or do I just go with 20 calories per pound, like one website I found says and aim for what I think is an ideal weight for them?

ETA: I don't know if age matters when calculating calories but Jack is almost 13, Scooter is almost 11, Furgus is almost 10, and Kitty is almost 4-5 (unsure since she was a stray that we took in a couple of years ago).

The ideal weight for a cat differs from cat to cat. The best thing to do is go by their appearance. If they don't look too skinny or too fat they are probably OK.

As far as how many calories to feed to maintain a certain weight that also depends on the individual cat. I think the best thing to do is maintain a log of their weight over time and adjust their food if they gain or lose. Monitoring their weight is also a great way to tell if they might be sick. If you think their appetite is off but you aren't sure whether a vet trip is needed knowing whether they have lost weight can help with the decision.

forcryinoutloud said:

So I've been searching for how many calories a cat should eat, but there seems to be differing opinions on that and some don't seem to take into consideration the size of the cat. How do you actually calculate the proper number of calories?

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Hello forcryingoutloud, here are some discussions on calories count:-

Cat not getting enough calories?

Cat Calories?! How many do you Feed?

Am I feeding them right?

Trying to Calorie Count...Help with kcals?!

So in the case of Kitty, for example, who is desperately overweight - I think she still has the stray cat mentality, where she needs to eat all she can when she can because she might not get food for days kind of thing. Even though I only give her a set amount, she acts like we're starving her and still somehow manages to be overweight.

Ideally I THINK she should be about 9 pounds, but am unsure of a starting amount to feed. Should I go with the 20 calories per pound, so 180 calories a day, or should I go 20 calories times the number of pounds she is now, and slowly remove calories from her every week? I know that them losing weight needs to be done slowly, so don't want to make her sick by not giving her enough calories right out of the gate.

ETA: Thank you for the links tabbytom !

forcryinoutloud said:

ETA: Thank you for the links tabbytom !

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You are welcomed

For cat diet, best is to go with low carb wet food. Skip the dry.

Here's another link :-

How Much Food Should I Feed My Cat?

Is Your Cat Overweight?

If the wet wasn't so expensive, I'd definitely just go wet but with four cats I'd be looking at about $16 a day for wet food and that is just too expensive for me right now. The tiny cans that say to feed 3 per 6-8lbs of cat, so I'd need like 20 cans a day, and they're the cheapest at about .80 cents a can - the bigger 5.5 oz cans are $2-$3 a can, and I would need probably six of those a day and the 12.5 oz cans which are, of course, the better buy are still $4-$6 a can and I'd need four. The joys of being in rural Canada! -sigh-

So I want to do a 50/50 diet since the dry is, of course, cheaper obviously, but so that they're at least getting some wet into them. Three would happily just eat wet, but my Jack with the heart murmur is stubborn as stubborn can be and refuses the wet. It's going to be a long road to get him to the 50/50.

I'm wretched at math lol so figuring out the proper balance between dry and wet and calories and all that is going to be headache inducing. So I am starting at the basics, and just trying to figure out how many calories total they should each be getting before I figure out how the calories will be split between wet and dry.

In order to calculate how many calories each cat should have in the future, you need to calculate how many calories they are eating right now. Feed them as you have been, but track how many calories each cat currently eats. That is your baseline.

For overweight cats, cut back calories by 10% for 30 days, then weigh the cat to see if that produced a weight loss. If the cat is not losing weight, cut another 10%.

For underweight cats, increase their calories by however much they will eat for 30 days (if they will eat more). Weigh and readjust calories. If an underweight cat won't eat enough, then you need to look for a different food, or some healthy, balanced extra treats.

Underweight cats should really be able to eat all they want until they reach a healthy weight. You do not want overweight cats to lose too fast as quick weight loss can be dangerous to their health.

forcryinoutloud said:

If the wet wasn't so expensive, I'd definitely just go wet but with four cats I'd be looking at about $16 a day for wet food and that is just too expensive for me right now. The tiny cans that say to feed 3 per 6-8lbs of cat, so I'd need like 20 cans a day, and they're the cheapest at about .80 cents a can - the bigger 5.5 oz cans are $2-$3 a can, and I would need probably six of those a day and the 12.5 oz cans which are, of course, the better buy are still $4-$6 a can and I'd need four. The joys of being in rural Canada! -sigh-

So I want to do a 50/50 diet since the dry is, of course, cheaper obviously, but so that they're at least getting some wet into them. Three would happily just eat wet, but my Jack with the heart murmur is stubborn as stubborn can be and refuses the wet. It's going to be a long road to get him to the 50/50.

I'm wretched at math lol so figuring out the proper balance between dry and wet and calories and all that is going to be headache inducing. So I am starting at the basics, and just trying to figure out how many calories total they should each be getting before I figure out how the calories will be split between wet and dry.

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Make sure you look at how many calories are on the cans, too. Some of them are way off base on how much to feed. I've seen some say I need to feed 3 cans a day per cat, but when I look at the calories my cats only need 1.5 cans a day. That's a big difference!

Thank you for all the info! I'm going to have to start doing some math.

yup ignore what the can says. for example, my cat was extremely overweight when i got her (20.5 lbs) and over 2.5 yrs i knocked her down to 9 lbs, her ideal weight. i did this by putting her on a wet diet, approx. 190-200 calories a day, which is now maintenance calories for her. so i feel that'd work for your smaller cats. this is typically one 3 oz can in the morning, one at night. or a 5.5 oz can split in half. you can find the calorie info for most foods on google.

i've noticed the expensive/premium brands are usually really low in calories so you actually do have to feed several which is waaay over the top. look at midrange brands.

i feed my girl for a buck a day, so youd be looking at $4/day if you shopped smart. check out brands like Authority @ petsmart, fancy feast, etc. shop the sales too, unlike dry food you can (and should) rotate through different wet food regularly. plus your boys will thank you, boys should really not be on dry diets.

one more thing, since your boys are so much bigger, you could supplement to maintain their weight (add some kibble on top of their wet food or something)

Yeah, I definitely plan to try and get some wet food in there. One brand I have tried in the past Jack really liked - it was called Oven Baked Tradition Turkey and Vegetable. It's definitely not premium food by any means, but it's wet, and it's grain free, and more importantly he'd eat it! So I am likely going to look at that. If I can get the 12.5 ounce cans, I think it will work out to be a more doable cost per day for all of them on a 50/50 diet (though depending on the calories, the girls might only need the wet).

Honestly I used my vet to tell me how much my cats should weigh. They took a bunch of measurements and gave me 13.1 lbs for Tommy when he was almost 21. I thought he looked fine but there goes my good judgement. They said Stewart was to be 11.8 when he was 16 something. Personally Stew's daddy would rather have him around 12.5 but I argue with him to keep him under that because of his asthma. The asthma has almost completely cleared up vs the number of attacks he'd had at 16 lbs.
At 13 lb Tommy probably gets 230-250 calories depending on how much food he steals from the girls. He's on raw and they're on kibble with a chip reading feeder but the jerkhole jumps up right next to them when they have it open and then runs them off, holding the mechanical flap open with his fat head and starts snarfing.
They usually get a 5.5 oz can of food if I'm out of raw and about 5 oz of raw per day stretched out into 5 small meals.

I suspect that the vet would want to see them all, and spending $60 per cat to find out their ideal weight is a bit much for me right now since I've spent almost $1400 in the last 5-6 weeks between Daniel and Jack and have to take Jack back this week for a check up after the first week on the heart medication.

I would say that both the girls are "average" sized to slightly small sized cats frame wise so should probably be 8-9 pounds. Jack and Furgus are both on the larger frame size, with Jack a bit longer than Furgus. I suspect that Furgus should probably be about 10-11 pounds, and Jack seems to be a good size at 13.5, though maybe could lose a tiny bit around his back end - though I do wish he had more muscle around his shoulders.

I am going to start them on what they normally get broken into several meals throughout the day, with me attempting to turn it into a game and make them chase the kibble around until I get the wet food and really start them on the road toward better eating.

You can call and ask. My boys went in as part of a weight loss program so they didn't need to see the vet, only a tech and we bought a bag of to get them started. It was a free visit.
If you want to make them work for their kibble there is a system called No Bowl where they hunt down their meals.

forcryinoutloud said:

So in the case of Kitty, for example, who is desperately overweight - I think she still has the stray cat mentality, where she needs to eat all she can when she can because she might not get food for days kind of thing. Even though I only give her a set amount, she acts like we're starving her and still somehow manages to be overweight.

Ideally I THINK she should be about 9 pounds, but am unsure of a starting amount to feed. Should I go with the 20 calories per pound, so 180 calories a day, or should I go 20 calories times the number of pounds she is now, and slowly remove calories from her every week? I know that them losing weight needs to be done slowly, so don't want to make her sick by not giving her enough calories right out of the gate.

ETA: Thank you for the links tabbytom !

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My kitties act like I'm starving them too. I know that dry food is awful for their health and I'm weaning them off it entirely. Grain and carbs always stimulate the appetite. But I still wonder if they aren't getting enough fat. They like people tuna as a treat but I noticed it has ZERO fat. That not balanced. Is olive oil ok for a cat?

For me, I've noticed that I never suffer hunger pangs if I eat low carb/high fat/med protein. But when eating grains/sugar I have gnawing hunger.

Cats, they say, need high protein/med fat/low carb. But what kind of fat? I just wonder if what they're getting is enough to satiate them. Once they are on all canned, I'll be able to notice the difference.

ginny said:

My kitties act like I'm starving them too. I know that dry food is awful for their health and I'm weaning them off it entirely. Grain and carbs always stimulate the appetite. But I still wonder if they aren't getting enough fat. They like people tuna as a treat but I noticed it has ZERO fat. That not balanced. Is olive oil ok for a cat?

For me, I've noticed that I never suffer hunger pangs if I eat low carb/high fat/med protein. But when eating grains/sugar I have gnawing hunger.

Cats, they say, need high protein/med fat/low carb. But what kind of fat? I just wonder if what they're getting is enough to satiate them. Once they are on all canned, I'll be able to notice the difference.

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The majority of canned foods will contain plenty of fat. If you feel like adding a little fat as treats to their diet while transitioning, melt down a little unseasoned animal fat when you're cooking for yourself. Bet they would also love a chicken skin cracklin'. Fat is very high in calories though, so I wouldn't give them too much (and no fat treats if they're overweight).

I'll have to get some chicken fat, that's a good idea! Olive oil doesn't sound appropriate for cats. Overall calories do matter, but I'm hoping that a little fat will satiate them and make them want to eat less. For me I know if I eat more fat, I automatically eat less overall, and it helps me lose weight. But cats aren't humans; they need high protein.

Just a little bit though....

Fats are about 120 calories per tablespoon and a lot of cats only eat 200 calories per day. So only a teeny bit as a treat.

heck yes
"1 teaspoon of bacon fat is 38 calories"
3 teaspoons=1 tbs

orange&white said:

Just a little bit though....

Fats are about 120 calories per tablespoon and a lot of cats only eat 200 calories per day. So only a teeny bit as a treat.

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So, Jack is back on his original grain free dry while I am trying to convince him to eat wet, and I've been trying to figure out the calories but the bag has me confused. It says 500kcal/kg (per cup) - so is it 500kcal per cup, or per kg? Also, that seems like a HUGE number of calories. For Jack's size, even with him not being as active since Daniel died, the bag suggests he eat 7/8-1cup of the food a day. Now, he definitely does not eat that much, I would guesstimate it is closer to the amount an 8-10 pound cat should eat according to this feeding guide, but what exactly does kcal/kg (per cup) mean?