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- Dec 2, 2005
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It's a serious question. Is there some body mass index for cats? She is growing and maybe getting a little porky and i dont want that to happen. how do I tell?
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How can i tell if my cat is getting fat
- Thread starter abigail
- Start Date
The next time you take her into the vet, he should be able to give you an estimate of an ideal body weight by looking at your kitty's body structure and age.... like Oliver is 15 pounds (at 4 years old) and the vets tell me thats a great weight for him and he shouldn't weight much more than that at all or they'd consider him overweight... but he is a big structured cat. I've compared him to other cats his age or older and I can just tell by the size of their heads that he is a bigger structured cat (and he doesnt have like a fat face, hahha) and so I'm not surprised when he weighs more than them... I can tell very easily when he's wet that he's not overweight as well - he looks fat sometimes because he has a thick undercoat, so he looks poofy... but its just hair and not a beer belly, haha.... I keep tabs on his weight at home on my bathroom scale: I step on and note my weight, then without adding or subtracting any clothing, etc I grab Oliver and step on and note the weight, then subtract the two weights to get his individual weight.... it's been consistant with what shows on the vet's scale when he's there... I just did this the other day and he was 14.5 pounds - the exact same weight he was at the vet's in October (which made me really happy, since he's free-fed his kibble so I can never really measure how much he eats in a day... he takes a few nibbles here and there, lol)....
This link might help: http://www.placervillevet.com/feline...0condition.htm
I've always been told that you should be able to feel your cat's ribs, but not see them.
I've always been told that you should be able to feel your cat's ribs, but not see them.
That's always a good rule of thumb too! But like us, haha, animals can put on lots of weight in one place and if its in their bellies, the rib test wont be totally accurate.... I'm sure they don't worry about the size of their butts as much as we do though!
The rib test is a good guide, but there are definately other ways as well.
When I got Miss Kitty she was 3 years old, a stray, and hadn't been fixed. She had many loads of kittens before I got her, so her belly and nipples were already streched - not fat, but streched.
Coupled together (being fixed, going from a stray to an indoor home cat) Miss Kitty put on close to 4 LBs the first year - going from about 9 to just under 13. I was also using hairball reducing food, which has more fats and oils and is obviously more fattening to kitties.
After this visit I noticed when looking at her from above she was a bit plump in the middle, so I put her on a diet of sorts. I changed her food, and opened up the basement for her to run around and play in. She has shed the extra bulge and now isn't skinny, but isn't overweight - I'd say she's about 12 pounds now, which we both feel good about.
MKD
PS - This is kind of a funny post-script...my friends thought I was loony because I put up a feeding chart for Miss Kitty (I work odd hours and I wanted to ensure I didn't over or under feed her), and...I went to that Fat Katz website, and found the biggest, fattest grey tiger kitty picture I could find. Then I pritned it out huge, on four sheets of paper, made a poster...and put it right above Miss Kitty's food dish. I wrote, "Miss Kitty - do you want to look like this??" on it. >:-) I thought it was quite amusing. My friends think I'm batty.
When I got Miss Kitty she was 3 years old, a stray, and hadn't been fixed. She had many loads of kittens before I got her, so her belly and nipples were already streched - not fat, but streched.
Coupled together (being fixed, going from a stray to an indoor home cat) Miss Kitty put on close to 4 LBs the first year - going from about 9 to just under 13. I was also using hairball reducing food, which has more fats and oils and is obviously more fattening to kitties.
After this visit I noticed when looking at her from above she was a bit plump in the middle, so I put her on a diet of sorts. I changed her food, and opened up the basement for her to run around and play in. She has shed the extra bulge and now isn't skinny, but isn't overweight - I'd say she's about 12 pounds now, which we both feel good about.
MKD
PS - This is kind of a funny post-script...my friends thought I was loony because I put up a feeding chart for Miss Kitty (I work odd hours and I wanted to ensure I didn't over or under feed her), and...I went to that Fat Katz website, and found the biggest, fattest grey tiger kitty picture I could find. Then I pritned it out huge, on four sheets of paper, made a poster...and put it right above Miss Kitty's food dish. I wrote, "Miss Kitty - do you want to look like this??" on it. >:-) I thought it was quite amusing. My friends think I'm batty.
Do you have scales perhaps you could weigh her each week for a month and see if her weight is increasing or perhaps cut her food back a bit.
