Overly picky cat - what would you do?

**Clutterbug Jen** · 09-26-2008, 07:43 AM

Okay, I kind of already know for the most part as to what every one is going to say but still thought I'd post this anyways.

I have a 6 1/2 year old cat who I've had since she's been 5 months old.

I'm divorced and my kids are grown and on their own so she's my baby and I know that I spoil her big time.

The thing is, I buy her both dry and canned foods and she absolutely loves the canned food ... as long as it is a kind/flavor that she likes.

Lately the flavors she'll eat are getting less and less ... I've spent 89 cents per can many times when they come out with new ones but a good deal of the time, she'll just smell them and walk away and will refuse to eat them so there goes that $ down the drain.

I keep thinking that if I keep trying then I'll hit on something she'll eat but in the mean-time, I'm wasting so much money on this.

I guess one big reason that I do it is that she is an indoor cat [due to where I live at and also because she's scared to death to be outside even with me holding her.]

And with living in such a small place, I feel that the canned food is one of the few luxuries that she has, ya know?

But, here goes ...

What would "you" do - keep buying her canned food at all or just cut down on buying it [she eats it like 3 times a day] when I do get her some she does like but even those, it depends on if she'll eat it or not [one time she will and the next she won't.]

Or, would you just slowly ease her off from it and then just give her dry food?

Should I feel so guilty about just doing the dry food since she'll always had the canned as well?

Sorry this sounds like I'm a nut-case but maybe I know already which I should do [slowly ease her off the canned] but I still would feel so guilty about it.

**Ebbie** · 09-26-2008, 09:23 AM

I can relate. I have a finicky eater too (he's a really svelte cat). Here's what I feed him:

- he gets one small can of premium cat food a day...I was feeding more but it was going to waste...like you, walking away etc. So now he gets one small can of Fancy Feast. He always liked the chunky turkey the best but latey has been turning his nose up at it so I'm also trying out different flavours. But there are about 4 or 5 others he will eat, so it's not a total loss. Anyway, one can a day is all he gets of the canned

- But I do leave out dry for him at all times. Like I said, he is svelte and doesn't overeat so he just nibbles on the dry. I figure it's good for cleaning his teeth etc since it's hard, but I wouldn't feed dry exclusively. I've heard things about it being harder on a cat than a wet food (even if they drink more water, eating dry just isn't like eating wet, which is more like what they would eat in the wild).

- finally I give a bit of human food, usually chicken or turkey, or cheese. Not much, just as a little treat. This is his favourite by far, but it's not his regular diet.

Anyway, I find this works best for us...there is little waste (and what waste there is is usually some of his wet). The dry gets eaten eventually and the treat is always gobbled up. I'm happy with the system, because when I was feeding him wet twice a day I was throwing a lot of it out.

**modamom** · 09-26-2008, 10:26 AM

Is she hungry? Maybe she is picky because she has too much food available. I love and spoil my darlings, but my philosophy with pets and kids is, They will eat it when they are hungry.

**CristiK** · 09-26-2008, 10:32 AM

I think you should leave out the dry as the norm and then only occasionally offer the canned as a treat. My oldest cat is 13 and has been on mostly dry her whole life with only an occasional treat of the water drained from tuna when we have tuna sandwiches. I agree with the previous poster that cats will eat when they are hungry.

**pip** · 09-26-2008, 11:17 AM

I've heard that cats could actually starve if they don't like the food offered to them, who knows if that is true or not, it bothered me to read that as I have two old, finicky cats to deal with. My cats had only dry food most of their lives, but now they are 16 and 19 years old and they will not eat dry food. They are VERY boney and their teeth are not good. I, too, have spent $ and energy on trying to find ANY food they will eat. Right now, they will eat 9 Lives, but only 1/3 of a can at a time, maybe. So, it's putting the food out a good 4-5 times a day and not leaving it unattended as the dog and younger cat will gladly snarf it up for them. It's almost like a full time job!!! I could also go on and on about litter box issues, but maybe I'll save that for another thread. Good luck, I understand what you are dealing with.

**cab54** · 09-26-2008, 11:51 AM

I have the same kind of pet in dog form.

His front teeth are all crooked (I mean they stick every which way!) and we think this comes from when he was getting his adult teeth, he used to chew on the rocks around my rock garden.

So he has a hard times with dry. As he's gotten older (he's 13) we've caved and given him canned to make it easier.

Well, one day he doesn't like the flavor anymore that he's liked for several days........then the next day, he decides he only wants people food (yes he gets scraps too, it saves me $$ rather than throw stuff out).

Does your cat like YOUR food? It might even be cheaper to give her some of your leftovers. I wouldn't feed her 3 times a day. Some said she's probably not hungry that often, and I agree.

I spoil my old doggie. I don't care. I try to make it as cheap as possible, but he's old and I WUV him.

**Starlight9803** · 09-26-2008, 03:17 PM

I have picky cats too, and I had to cut back canned food to once a day (one can, divided between 3 cats) and dry food available all the time. I just slowly cut back and they seem to be find with it. I also have the benefit that my grandmother has a picky cat and we trade out food (when we bought more than one can of a new flavor/brand) that our cats won't eat. Oh yeah, and for me, if the cats won't touch it, my beagle is nowhere in the vicinity of picky, so it keeps me from wasting it.

**DonnainME** · 09-26-2008, 04:12 PM

I'm glad that our 2 cats are NOT picky. They will eat ANY kind of food. They LOVE any canned food - I get it when I have coupons OR the cheap stuff. I also almost always have dry food out for them.

Good luck to you all with finicky kitties.

**Gibs** · 09-26-2008, 06:37 PM

My cat is a little picky, she will only eat certain hard foods and certain wet foods. I keep her Dry food out all the time so she can eat it whenever she wants. As for wet food I only give her half a can per day around lunch time. If its a smaller can such as fancy feast i will give her the full one.

**misscas** · 09-26-2008, 07:33 PM

I have a 9 year old tabby cat. I used to feed her a half a can of food a day when I ate my dinner so she would leave me alone and I had dry out for her all the time. It got to be too big an expense. She was never a picky eater. I continue to free feed her dry food, Purina One. Her weight is perfect at 10 lbs.

Let your cat go hungry for a while and leave out dry food. I bet it disappears.

**zakity** · 09-26-2008, 10:07 PM

I have one semi picky cat (Kiki), one really picky cat (Coco), and three "eat anything" cats (the "kittens": Whitey, Fluffy, and Socksie). Our semi picky will only eat one certain kind of wet food and only a few of the dry ones. Our really picky cat won't hardly eat any of the wet food and will eat the dry food, but she picks out the ones that she likes. The kittens will eat anything.

I buy expensive dry food and mix it with cheap dry food. Kiki pukes if she eats just the cheap food. And, Coco won't eat the expensive food. The kittens don't care as long as there is food in the bowl.

We only give wet food like every other day. Kiki will only eat two or three kinds of fish flavors and they have to be one specific brand (name brand, of course). Coco rarely gets any wet food because she is scared of her own shadow and every time she gets near the wet food someone moves and she runs away. The kittens will eat whatever is in their bowl: Kiki's leftovers, cheap canned cat food, fatty bits from our meat, dollops of bacon or sausage grease, anything.

Side note:
The "kittens" aren't really kittens anymore, but that is their "designation". They were all three part of the same litter that started living on my porch.

**madhen** · 09-27-2008, 12:12 AM

I don't have a cat, but I've fostered quite a few. If she likes certain flavours, I'd just get maybe a half dozen of those, in small cans, and offer them daily. If you put it out, and she turns her nose up at it, you can put it in a baggie and in the fridge, and try it the next day.

I feed my dogs raw, so most of the cats that I fostered ended up going that direction as well. I have found that kittens just gravitate toward raw, which is excellent for their development, but adult cats are very hard to convert, so I don't typically try, as these cats will be going to homes that likely will not feed raw. I DO feed cooked chicken and canned tuna, and most cats seem to really like those.

If you are feeding canned primarily because you feel that she needs a treat, rather than a real desire on her part to eat canned, and if the canned food just isn't cutting it, maybe you can save that little bit of money every week/month/etc and occasionally buy her a new toy or piece of cat furniture?

**Clutterbug Jen** · 09-27-2008, 01:10 AM

I want to thank every one of you for your replies ... I feel so much better now with reading everyone's insights on this.

Ya know, I honestly had never thought of it that way but it really could be that she has too much food available to her.

She always has a full dish of dry food of dry food out and fresh water out all of the time as well. Many times she not only has one, but two different kinds of dry food out.

I am going to start cutting back on her canned food [just pray that I can make it through her little crying, I've tried this before and ended up giving in to her.]

How can a bitty thing like her make me feel so guilty at times? *lol*

Forgot to mention that she only weighs 5 pounds at 6 1/2 years but she's always been small [she's a manx, all black and no tail] and needless to say - too cute.

As for saving money and buying toys, I've bought her nearly every toy there is that I could find and 99% of the time, she just looks at it and doesn't bother with it.

BUT, let me put a bent up pipe cleaner on the floor, she's knock it all over the place or will play with a piece of the colored tissue wrapping paper. *lol*

Okay, I'm gonna start this tomorrow [wish me luck!] - What I'll do is to cut her back to only giving her canned food twice tomorrow [will cut back a bit at a time to start with.]

I'd cut down on her canned food and give her treats but she has never eaten them [she tries to bury them!!]

The one treat she will eat believe it or not is generic cheese curls [she licks all the orange off from them] and believe me, that is the only generic anything she eats.

**LastDragonfly** · 09-27-2008, 01:18 AM

Good luck, I hope she doesn't cry too much. Maybe she's bored. kwim? I agree that maybe she's not really hungry. Put away most of her toys and rotate them, she's like the little kids at Christmas...cool toys and gifts...what do they play with first? The great big box.... hugs

**InDiAnNa** · 09-27-2008, 07:07 AM

Well everyone has said pretty much what I was going to say!

I have an old girl, who is picky as anything. She has a box of dry biscuits down all the time next to her water, which she loves and munches on all day. She does get wet food too, as from a clinical point of view I am concerned about cystitis and UTI's (vet nurse here), but the little madam only likes certain stuff! And when you get a multipack cos it's cheaper, sometimes she has no choice in the matter.

I find the trick with her is to only put a spoonful of wet stuff in her bowl at a time, and when she does eat that, 3-4hours later she can have another spoonful. It seems that she can tell that she is only going to get a bit and that if she doesn't eat that, Mama isn't going to give her any more! I'm chucking out so much less by trying this tactic, but it might not work for every puss!

One way I get her to eat it too is to pour a little bit of boiling water over the food in the dish, mix, temperature test, then offer again. The heat from the water makes it smell more I think. Even in the hottest of temperatures, this might be worth trying too?

And feeling guilty bout her crying? I hear ya! Mine is deaf, and so howls hauntingly at me when she's displeased and I find it so hard not to rush out and buy tuna and sardines to pacify my baby!