Need to change a feeding behavior

[katachtig]

I now have the kittens and Carly eating canned and raw with no dry. They are doing wonderfully at it.

My problem is Lucy. I cannot get her off the dry. But because she eats the dry, we have to supervise her eating or the others will clean the bowl out. She is driving me absolutely insane. She wants to nibble, walk away then five minutes later wants her food again. We've tried to keep it to a timed interval of doing this but she gets into an absolute tizzy until she's fed. We could be doing this all day if it was up to her. I'm stuck right now and need ideas. I'm really losing patience with her.

 

[furryfriends50]

Katachtig, have you read any of the below four articles on how to switch over finicky cats? They all have lots of tips and tricks on getting dry food addicts to eat wet food - maybe they can give you some idea's.

http://catinfo.org/docs/Tips for%2... 1-14-11.pdf
http://www.rawfedcats.org/practicalguide.htm
http://feline-nutrition.org/answers/...inicky-kitties
http://feline-nutrition.org/nutritio...-to-a-raw-diet

Also, below is my story of how I managed to get kibble addict Clover to switch to canned, and then eventually to raw. Clover is one stubborn kitty, but unfortunately (or fortunately) for her, I am more stubborn when it comes to them eating something healthy. Mikey was also a previous kibble addict, so his story on the switch is also quoted below. I wrote a lot of my own "raw feeding testimonials" a while ago, so these are two of several success stories that I have had personally.

Clover had been fed all dry food – mainly Purina – her whole life. I rescued her when she was about four years old and she was underweight. You could feel her backbone and ribs no matter how much quality food I tried to feed her. Getting her onto wet food was a challenge in itself. She hated wet food. Detested it. Sheâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]d eat dry food (yuck!) just fine but would not touch wet food. She is a very stubborn cat but I even more so when it came to getting her to eat something good for her. It got to the point that I was syringe feeding her a three ounce can of wet food a day and I let her eat a tiny portion of dry on her own. After a few weeks of my syringe feeding her wet food she decided that the stuff wasn't so bad after all! In fact it tasted pretty good. Once she was happily eating wet food (and on her own!) I took away her dry. But she still wasn't gaining weight even with getting twice the amount of wet food as all the other cats. By that time I had everyone eating a raw diet and wanted her to switch over as well.

The problem was that she would not touch, look at, or sniff the raw food. I tried all different kinds of raw meat – chicken, beef, pork, turkey, beef heart, liver, kidney, lamb, even rabbit. But Miss Picky Pants Clover wouldn't eat any of it; she just wanted her wet food. I donâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t know how much later it was – maybe a month – but I put a ¼ of a lamb heart on her dish as well as some wet food. She devoured the lamb heart! After that day she was very happy to eat any type of raw meat I gave her! And you know what? She started to gain weight. Today she is a very muscular cat and at the perfect weight.

Quote:
Mikey is a 7 year old DSH cat. His whole life he has had problems with hairballs as well as keeping his food down. Up until the age of 5 he had been eating all dry food – mostly Science Diet (yuck!) and it was the Sensitive Stomach formula (double yuck!). Once I learned that Science Diet (non-prescription) is really a horrible brand of food I switched him to foods like EVO and Wellness CORE. The problem was that it was still dry food. Luckily for him I learned a few months later that dry food – no matter what brand – is bad for cats. But getting him onto wet food was a real challenge as he would only eat Fancy Feast Gourmet Chicken and nothing else. It took him about a year to convince him that all wet food is edible and actually good! In September 2010 I was able to switch him over to a raw diet. While Mikey was not overweight when he was eating all wet food after a week he started to lose weight – which was fat – and is now beginning to gain weight back as muscle. Already his plaque covered teeth are started to look white and his fur is softer than it was before. But the best thing of all? He doesn't have hairballs anymore. It took less than a week of eating a raw diet to get rid of them after him being plagued with hairball problems his entire life! So not only does raw feeding help control allergies, controls the herpes virus, helps cats gain weight, helps cats grow, and makes them act 10+ years younger than they really are – it also helps cure hairball problems! Itâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s truly a miracle diet!

Something else, that can be helpful when you have multiple cats, is feeding in a crate. I do this with the two kittens at the farm, so that they can eat all they want without the adult cats getting their food. Of course, the kittens are let out once they have had their fill!

http://www.petco.com/product/100343/...0Crates-100343 Petco has one door dog crates that are on a really good sale right now - and have free shipping. I just got the 42" L X 28" W X 30" H model, it is good quality, and it shipped fast and safely. The reason I have that size is because, during the summer, it can get up to 120 degrees F. in the strawmow. The cats up there need to be moved down, because else it is way to hot! So that crate is going to be a temporary home for 2-3 cats during those times.

You could put Lucy in there whenever she thinks she is hungry - and let her eat without having to worry about the others stealing it. Try feeding once every hour, then move to once every two hours, to see if you can slowly get her used to a feeding schedule that works for you. If she gets to bad, the best advice I have gotten, is just get yourself out of the house so you don't have to look at those pleading eyes

I'm glad that the rest of yours are happily eating canned/raw!

I feed a combo of 1/2 wet, 1/2 prey model raw to eight of the barn cats at the place I am feeding calves - they also love it

 

[katachtig]

Originally Posted by furryfriends50

Katachtig, have you read any of the below four articles on how to switch over finicky cats? They all have lots of tips and tricks on getting dry food addicts to eat wet food - maybe they can give you some idea's.

http://catinfo.org/docs/Tips for%2... 1-14-11.pdf
http://www.rawfedcats.org/practicalguide.htm
http://feline-nutrition.org/answers/...inicky-kitties
http://feline-nutrition.org/nutritio...-to-a-raw-diet

I have read those sources and I've tried some things like sprinkling dry with wet but she is rather stubborn. We're also having problems with introductions between her and the kittens so I stepped back for her to calm down. I will go through the links again.

Originally Posted by furryfriends50

Also, below is my story of how I managed to get kibble addict Clover to switch to canned, and then eventually to raw. Clover is one stubborn kitty, but unfortunately (or fortunately) for her, I am more stubborn when it comes to them eating something healthy. Mikey was also a previous kibble addict, so his story on the switch is also quoted below. I wrote a lot of my own "raw feeding testimonials" a while ago, so these are two of several success stories that I have had personally.

thanks for the stories. I still want to get Lucy on wet and can come back to this thread for inspiration.

Originally Posted by furryfriends50

Something else, that can be helpful when you have multiple cats, is feeding in a crate. I do this with the two kittens at the farm, so that they can eat all they want without the adult cats getting their food. Of course, the kittens are let out once they have had their fill!

http://www.petco.com/product/100343/...0Crates-100343 Petco has one door dog crates that are on a really good sale right now - and have free shipping. I just got the 42" L X 28" W X 30" H model, it is good quality, and it shipped fast and safely. The reason I have that size is because, during the summer, it can get up to 120 degrees F. in the strawmow. The cats up there need to be moved down, because else it is way to hot! So that crate is going to be a temporary home for 2-3 cats during those times.

You could put Lucy in there whenever she thinks she is hungry - and let her eat without having to worry about the others stealing it. Try feeding once every hour, then move to once every two hours, to see if you can slowly get her used to a feeding schedule that works for you. If she gets to bad, the best advice I have gotten, is just get yourself out of the house so you don't have to look at those pleading eyes

I will look into this as well. Today Lucy was in a really bad mood so I took a bowl of food and water to the basement and that is where she is at. My husband doesn't like this because Lucy does spend a lot of time there away from the kittens. I think it helps her more if she has time away from them. She does come upstairs eventually.

Originally Posted by furryfriends50

I'm glad that the rest of yours are happily eating canned/raw!

I feed a combo of 1/2 wet, 1/2 prey model raw to eight of the barn cats at the place I am feeding calves - they also love it

I'm so happy with how they are doing. I started it because Carly had gained a lot of weight last year when I was free feeding to get Much (RIP) to eat. Carly was up to 13 lbs in July, was waddling, and wasn't losing weight on the diet food from the vet. She's down to 12 lbs 2 oz.

Her feline herpes has gone into remission leaving her eyes clear and gunk-free. And her coat is so soft. The vet saw the kittens last week and complimented us on how beautiful they look.