Longest You Have Gone Between Meals?

Hi there, both of my cats are 9 months old and eat 3 times a day. All canned food. I like to feed them on a schedule, so I feed them once in the morning before work (6am), once when I get home (6:30pm-7ish), and then once more at night before going to bed (11pm).

They are both young and in good health. I've never gone without their schedule and I haven't gone on a trip longer than a weekend. We always get my partner's mom, who lives upstairs, to feed the kitties if we are leaving.

This evening I completely forgot that I have a work dinner to go to, as well as my partner. Her mother also had a knee surgery so she can't walk, and therefore can't feed them tonight. I fed them this morning around 6am as usual (3oz cans each) but I won't be getting home tonight until 10pm. I feel awful about it! Has anyone ever had this experience? Should I cancel my dinner?

I wouldn’t cancel your dinner, I’ve been exactly there. I actually feed Olive on the exact same schedule. The other day I went straight from work to a movie and didn’t get home until 10 pm or so. I forgot entirely I would miss her dinner, and what was worse I fed her Tiki Cat for breakfast, which is lower calorie than her normal 70 kcal.

She was absolutely fine, although she rightly gave me an earful when I did get home! It happens, I think we all do it. In the wild they wouldn’t eat this well or this consistently. The main issue is the disruption of the routine.

Go, enjoy your dinner, and give extra snacks and cuddles to your kitties tonight!

So what is that? 14 hours from 6am to 10 pm? They'll be hungry and they will tell you all about it, but no harm will come to them.

Thank you both so much! I feel better... it's hard being a cat mom sometimes!

12 hours. Mine eat at 7am and 7pm.

ramscici said:

but I won't be getting home tonight until 10pm.

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If your kitty already had some food earlier on, it shouldn't be a problem if the next meal is real late.

Longest in between meals for my boy is 12 hours. No snacks and not free fed.

When I travel, my pet sitter comes about 8 in the morning and 6 in the evening so it’s 14 hours overnight. They don’t seem to be stressed by that but I feed them closer to every twelve hours when I’m home.

When I was in college I was working full time (well basically, just under 40 hours a week so they didn't have to pay me full time benefits ) and had a cat. It wasn't uncommon for me to be gone by 6am, and not get home until 9 or 10pm once a week (worked opening to closing almost every Saturday). So that would be, 15 or 16 hours between meals.

You can look into getting a timed feeder for future times when you can't get home to feed and the upstairs person isn't able to either. You'd probably need two so the cats aren't fighting over one small compartment of food. Canned food can be used with timed feeders. I like the Petsafe 5 compartment on. There's a 2 compartment model as well.

LTS3 said:

Canned food can be used with timed feeders.

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I hadn't realized this, thank you! That's great.

You can either put the canned food into the feeder as is with extra water or freeze the food into portion sizes and put the frozen blocks into the feeder. The frozen blocks will slowly defrost.

It really depends on the cat. I'm not sure what the norm is. For bile build up. My cats get 4 meals a day. And some would be fine. Others would probably throw up if they went to long.

If I have an event in the evening I normally feed Toffee and Fudge before I go and break up their schedule a bit, and then give them some treats when I get in. On holidays or if I'm staying overnight somewhere I normally get my neighbour to feed them.
Normally they have a four hour break between their three meals a day.

I have two 3 year old cats and a 5 month old kitten. The older ones (pre-kitten) would easily go 14 hours between timed feedings. Now, before I leave for work, I leave out some kibble for Dexter only because he is so young that I don't want him to go that long between feeds. I would imagine by 9 months old that yours will do just fine.

While many cats will "go" without eating for long periods of time, it is ideal to feed them multiple small meals throughout the day. In the wild, they would eat about 10 small meals a day. Some cats with sensitive stomachs will also develop bilious vomiting syndrome because they can't handle long periods without food.

I know with busy schedules this is easier said than done, but there are ways to portion out smaller meals like using a timed feeder.

They will be ok. Cats’ stomachs can handle some “fasting”. A wild or stray cat doesn’t always eat 3 meals a day. So their bodies are designed to go longer periods without food.