It's So Hard To Find A Balance

[orange&white]

LOL That's so sweet!

When Tangent went off food for a few days after I brought in the new kitten, I got him eating again with four egg yolks a day for the last day and a half out of four days he didn't eat on his own. Not a balanced diet, but 220 calories a day with lots of protein/fat/vitamins.

 

[lalagimp]

Keeping up with the daily egg yolk. Spent an hour scanning all Tom's medical records in since we moved to Maryland. Going to weigh in tomorrow and then supposed to Skype with Dr Pierson Wednesday evening. We started weighing out the ice cubes last week and the calories are inconsistent. Occasionally we run into an ice cube that's off by an 8th of an oz. I was weighing out food for the feeders earlier, and had the fridge open, and Tommy found the ramekin of bacon grease and started sampling with his front end deep into my bottom shelf.

 

[orange&white]

Everyone loves bacon! That'll put some weight on him.

I'm not sure I would worry over 1/8th of one ounce, if you are getting a consistent 1 ounce average cube. It should balance over time, right?

Is Dr. Pierson doing something for you that is significantly different from the published recipe at catinfo.org?

Looking forward to the results of the weigh-in!

 

[lalagimp]

Her assistant said she may want us to get some tests done to look at certain values at his regular vet's office. Her website says that the cats will usually eat 4-6 oz of food per day, but that's not working for us so what steps does she want us to take as a professional? Change the formula; change the volume?
I could just take him to the vet and they would tell me blah blah well if you're trying to get weight on him try x Hill's product, I'm pretty sure because that's what they do. They aren't trained in this diet so we're going to pay the money and go to the source.

 

[orange&white]

I just thankful my vet has never said a word to me about diet. He knows I feed raw, and I know that he is opposed to that generally...and we leave it at that. I'm sure if I asked, I would get a Hill's recommendation.

Last week I read an article citing a study that cats did better on a diet where they were fed below their resting caloric needs for 2 weeks and then at their needs for 2 weeks. I'm thinking about trying that with Tangent, but think that 2 weeks is too long....more like giving him low calories for 3 days, followed by high calories for 3 days and averaging what I want him to eat by the end of the week. I thought about you too while reading that, and wondered if it might work the same for weight gain.

I'll try to find a link to the article.

 

[orange&white]

Found it: Research Shows Effective Ways to Put Cats on Diets for Weight Loss | petMD

Seems to me like the intermittent approach of varying calories might work for weight gain or weight loss.

 

[lalagimp]

12 lbs 4 oz
And shipping has gone up from Hare Today. There're upcharges on smaller orders to keep them cold enough. I saved almost $40 by combining the next three months into one larger order.
Interesting article. I wonder if that method would help me lose weight lol.

 

[orange&white]

Interesting article. I wonder if that method would help me lose weight lol.

The author, Dr. Ken Tudor, has some good articles and cat (and dog) metabolism and diet at that website.

I think most humans use the intermittent method without thinking about it. I don't eat the same number of calories day-to-day, so I'm not sure why my cat needs to have a measured "dose" of the exact amount of food every single day. I think I'm going to try, instead of 4 ounces of food per day, 3 days at 3 ounces and 3 days at 5 ounces. Then on the 7th day, he gets 4 ounces and has the same calories over the week. Seems plausible that the method might make his metabolism work a bit better.

 

[lalagimp]

We talked about so many things. Big bill. But no bigger than a vet bill and I didn't have to listen to my vet chastise me about his diet or run a bunch of tests that don't actually give me answers about monitoring his bladder health.

We are changing the formula. Instead of 2:1 skinned whole ground rabbit/turkey, we're going to do 1:1. More boneless meat, less mineral content, and adding more skin back in.

 

[orange&white]

The turkey adds more boneless meat by changing the ratio, or you are going to 1:1 plus adding more boneless meat to the mix (on top of the ratio change)? So slightly fattier, higher-calorie mix with less bone, yes?

Dr. Pierson's fine reputation allows her to charge a pretty penny for consultations, I'm sure, but I agree. Better to pay a vet who has studied feline nutrition in-depth than have a standard vet run tests and then tell you to feed Science Diet.

 

[lalagimp]

I switched last week to giving Tom and Stew both an egg yolk. Stewart has gained a few ounces and Tom is at 12lb 3oz, just kinda holding. We made the new batch yesterday with all the skins, but the skins were just wrapping themselves around the food processor blades, and the boneless turkey was taking forever to cut up, so we took the rest of the turkey and then skins and broke out the meat grinder for the first time and did a coarse grind.
Overall the skins were less than 1 lb, so if it was 24-25 lbs of meat, the fat content would still be pretty low. I'm probably going to start Tommy on 7 ounces of food and Stew at 5 1/2 ounces and then continue to keep an eye on their weights. I'll have to talk to the boyfriend on when to implement the changes I'm thinking about.

 

[orange&white]

Yeah, defrosted poultry skin can gunk up anything including a sharp knife on a cutting board. It is very easy to cut, or blend, or grind if it is frozen - or only defrosted barely enough that it isn't rock hard still. That's how I try to work with meats, but it's sometimes hard to catch "the perfect moment". Sometimes, I'll stick meat that's a little too defrosted on a baking sheet and pop it back into the freezer for 20-30 minutes so that it cuts cleaner.

 

[lalagimp]

So far so good. Discontinued the egg yolks and raised boys to 5.5 oz for Stewburger and 7 oz for Tommy Gargoyle. Stewart is 12 lb 2 oz and Tom is roughly 12 lb 4.6 oz, but his big blue butt kept moving on the scale.
Yeah the yolks were beginning to create a problem. Stew didn't really need the additional calories, but he caught on to Tom receiving them and he's a firm believer in "what's fair is fair".
Tomorrow morning Tom goes into DC with his sissy for a teeth cleaning. We've kept his weight pretty stable so I feel he's prepped to go under general anesthesia.

 

[lalagimp]

Stubbs is 12 lb 4.6 oz
I think I can cut him back to 5 oz. His dad wanted him between 12- 12.5 lbs
Tom is 12 lbs 7.x oz, so he's getting there. Trying to get him back to 13 lbs.
My boyfriend says that my ice cubes I made this batch were larger than my old average so while Tom is getting 7 ice cubes, he's getting between 7-8 oz per day.
His teeth cleaning came out ok but boy was he messed up on his anesthesia for the rest of the day: big, black eyes, inattentiveness, couldn't track a laser, attacked his dad, couldn't sleep. We just had to wait it all out. He was fine the next day.

 

[lalagimp]

12 lbs 10.x oz
Slow and steady.
I was gone for 11 days and his father has been in charge.
I'm happy to say that he had no behavioral changes with my being gone. Confident, calm, and chatty... Super adjusted to both parents.

 

[orange&white]

Nice job!

I've been meaning to ask you, after the boys' weight loss how long did it take for the elasticity in their skin to bounce back? They look perfectly normal in their photos, like they were never overweight cats. Tangent has only lost a little over 1.5 pounds in 10 months, but his loose skin sags. When he lies down, all that skin spreads out, which makes him look like he hasn't lost any. I know it's only "cosmetic", but I'm wondering if his skin will ever tighten up. Maybe he's too old for that.

 

[lalagimp]

Tom started when he was around 4 years old and you're right; I can't tell the guy was a big bulk of cat. I'd imagine as he gets older his skin may begin to sag a bit even if I keep him at this weight. He just got sleeker over time. I talked with his dad this year and explained to him that I don't know how Tom did that.

 

[lalagimp]

Today he was 13 lbs 3.x oz so we're going to back off on the raw by 1/2 ounce. Plus he's been eating commercial for the last few days from Nature's Variety. I should have went to The Big Bad Woof and seen about rad cat instead, but we just made new food today

 

[orange&white]

So he's hanging in right around his goal, yes? I'd say that is success. The last two weeks, I decided to weigh Tangent randomly through the week instead of just one "official" Sunday weigh-in. His weight goes up 2 oz or down 2 oz around a "medium". ...still trying to get "medium" to be a little lower.

 

[lalagimp]

Does Tangent like playing or is he getting a little stiff? We have lasers and wands but I spent like $1.99 buying a Cat Dancer and everyone but princess LOVES it. It's just a bent coat hanger with some cardboard dohickies on the end and even my little tortie, Amalie, will insist on having her very own party with it, playing like I've never seen her, and then heading to the water fountain after a small rest.
We just got done making a batch of raw yesterday. Boyfriend doesn't have any school or kids right now and I had zero energy so he did most of the work with the meat, and I ended up doing the slurry, mixing, and the portioning.
We also changed the feeders from Feed and Go to two Petmate feeders. The guy at Feed and Go wants us to take down our negative encounter with his partner to fix our out of warranty feeders (they weren't out of warranty while we were trouble shooting previously) and so there's that. I also found 10 cans of Nature's Variety Instinct Ultimate Protein chicken for Yue and Amalie on clearance at Petco making it cheaper than by the case at Chewy. I also did a small piece for Chewy on my blog over Blue Wilderness variety pack and Yue didn't really appreciate the duck or chicken, only the salmon.
One of these days I'm going to make a little batch of chicken raw for Princess Yue Pants and see if she recognizes it as food. I have a sample of EZComplete Fur Cats I can try on some cooked chicken for the girls. Amalie was sitting next to me last night giving me the guilt face while I was eating chicken wings. She loves cooked chicken.

I still haven't received the replacement adapter for my scale though. I checked when I came back from vacation and they'd sent it to Arizona and I'm in Maryland. I'm giving it another two weeks since I asked them to fix it before I try it again.