Cat experts- feeding wet food?

[puffkin]

Coming to my fellow DISer's to get advice on how to feed wet food to my cats

We have two cats 5 & 1. Lilly has sensitive stomach and now has teeth issues. She is very underweight and is having dental surgery on Tuesday. Her bloodwork came back clean so they think her teeth are causing her not to eat and that is why she lost so much weight. Riley is a PIG and inhales everything. She is definitely overweight. They are both on Halo dry food and both seem to like it and it sits well in Lilly's stomach.

With the teeth issues we are being strongly encouraged to switch them to wet food. I think it would be easiest to switch them both. The costs are a bit hard to stomach though. I think the Nature's Balance line is a good choice for us due to the variety, no fillers and fairly reasonable cost compared to the other foods. I would like to continue using the Halo dry food.

So how would you do it? I was thinking of splitting a 6 oz. can with them twice a day and then leaving down 1/2 cup of dry a day to nibble on (1/2 cup is the recommended daily serving for 1 cat). Do you think this will be enough food to sustain Lilly but help Riley lose weight. Riley is about 11 lbs now and should be about 8 lbs. Lilly is 9.5 lbs now but should be about 11 lbs.

Thanks for any advice!

 

[puffkin]

Anyone have any suggestions? Thanks!

 

[Seewhatimesdone]

I have several cats myself and your plan sounds like a good one. The wet food will help Riley lose weight because it will be a lot less carbohydrates. It will also be easier on Lilly's teeth. I would just try your plan and if you notice that Lilly still isn't gaining weight than maybe feed her a little more seperately. You could take her into another room and give her some more wet food. But i'd give your plan a shot. I hope they both do well!

 

[disbridemimi]

we have two cats, we put out one can of wet food in the morning, one can at dinner time and we leave a bowl of crunchy food out all the time with a big bowl of water.

We have had some teeth issues, we feed our cats Friskies for both wet & dry. When we tried Meow Mix, they barfed a lot, 9 lives they barfed a lot, it was really trial and error in the beginning. The vet sold us "teeth" food that was phenomenally expensive and neither cat would touch it, so we fed it to a lost kitty we found living in our garage, he loved it. (we found his home, he's back there now)

DO they still make tender vittles? My older cat used to love them they are soft little chewy thingies.

 

[walkerag]

I know it's difficult but you may have to separate them during feeding, trust me, I never liked having to do that either but it sounds like the underweight cat needs to be able to eat all of her food and it may take her some extra time with teeth/gum issues. The larger cat will most likely finish all of her food and eat the other's food as well. If they go for a long enough period of time without eating they can develop liver problems (it doesn't really take a long period of time for this to happen. I would also suggest putting the larger cat on a weight management food because she could get diabetes. I learned that the hard way.. my cat, Grover, was overweight and developed diabetes. Never did get him completely regulated and he died from a secondary infection at 12 years old

Maybe you could separate them in the morning for 30 minutes while you're getting ready for work and give the smaller one some canned food and then again at night for 30 minutes so she would have ample time to eat.

 

[swandiverpatt]

I'm hopping in here with no suggestions, but more of a question.

HOW do you get a cat to eat soft food? I know the moisture content is better for them than the hard food, but the hard food is better for their teeth.

We share a house with our DD and her two 9-year old cats, who eat both hard and soft good. We have 2 brothers we got when they were 4 months old, now 2, and they show no interest whatsoever in the soft food given the older boys.

I'm not in any hurry to give them soft food, but I'm sure it'll be an issue that comes up some time in the future.