Feeding time

[tea cake]

Hello everyone!

So lately I've been having some issues with feeding my darlings. I've got a 2 year old female named Mem, 1 1/2 year old female named Lil and a 4 month old male kitten named Mercy.

The problem is with Lil and Mercy. They get fed in the morning and evening and up until now have been able to eat with each other with no problems. I've never picked the bowls up after they are done eating because Lil is a big time grazer. She never eats her meals in one sitting, but comes back to it several times a day to take a few bites.

It has been fine until this week when Mercy took a taste of the girls food. He stopped eating his kitten food, and started trying to take the girls food at feeding time, and sneaking to Lil's bowl during the day.

Of course we are taking the bowls up now as part of their feeding routine but I'm not sure what to do with Lil. She is used to her habit of grazing but we can't keep her bowl down any more.

So I was wondering if anyone else has a similar situation and what they do about it. I don't want Lil to be hungry but that sneaky kitten needs to eat his own food.

Oh and also Mercy is back to eating his food with no problems since we've started this.

 

[darkmavis]

I'm sorry I don't have any advice to give you, but I am interested to see what others might have to say about this. Genever won't eat a meal in one sitting either. She just won't. I'm afraid of how feeding time will be once we adopt another cat.... if the new cat DOES clean its plate at meal time, will it clean Genever's as well??

 

[katladee]

i promise you, with a few days of consistent feeding, you can very easily make your cats eat their food in meals. i had a house full of grazers and was scared of the same thing -- they all did just fine after about the 2nd full day. cats naturally eat in meals in the wild -- they don't graze on a mouse part here or there. they eat it all at once.

 

[tea cake]

I'll just stick to the feeding times then. It's good to hear that they can sorta be trained out of grazing. Makes me feel like I'm being less of a mean mom!

Thanks for the advice!

 

[missymotus]

Why don't you just mix the kitten and adult food together for a little while? Most kittens can come off kitten food at 5-6 months. Perhaps your kitten is hungry, if he's "sneaking" food.
I feed my kittens 4-5 times a day and adults 3 times, this is without feeding dry food so all are meal times not grazing.

 

[tea cake]

I'll start giving the kitten extra meals. I'm ashamed to admit that I don't have much experience with cats as young as him. I've normally gotten my cats form the shelter at about a year old but this kitten we found in the middle of the road when he was 2 months.

I was not aware that they could get on adult food around 5-6 months. I've been going by the recommendation on the bag which says he should be on it for a year.

I would love to get all 3 of them on wet food. However there a couple problems standing in the way. Right now, I'm unemployed and my fiance is the only one working. He has a really stubborn attitude about the cats food. "Cat food is cat food" is the way he thinks about it. He won't find room in the budget for wet food. I did manage to talk him into buying a higher quality kibble but once I find some work, those cats are gonna be on wet food. He is a good guy, who does love the cats a lot, but for whatever reason I just can't get it into his head that not all cat food is created equally.