Does "Hairball Control" food make your cats hairballs worse?

[MosMom]

Both my cats are having a problem with hairballs lately. I bought my normal brand of food (Iams) but in hairball control and it is making their hairballs worse! One of my cats will eat petromalt but one hates it (the one with the most hair ). Anyone try anything else that works in getting the hairballs to go the OTHER way out. I was looking at Booda Mix 10 Plus, anyone try that?

We brush her frequently so I know that isn't the problem. I'm really at my wits end. I've never seen either of them with hairballs this bad before. Blech!

 

[jel0511]

Unforunately I have the same problem with my kitty. Any type of hiarball food makes him sick. It upsets his stomach, and even regula hairball medicine does the same thing, must be the vegatebe protein. We've since switched him to a sensitive stomach food from Science Diet and it helps. We also have started getting him groomed once every 3-4 months and that does help a lot!!! Brushing does work, but getting them washed does WONDERS!!!!

 

[Aurora63]

I haven't tried that for my kitty, tought about it, but now that you've posted this, I will think twice. My cat is long-haired, and also gets a lot of hairballs, as well as just vomiting. She will puke maybe twice a week. I have no idea why, she is in good health. Maybe it's just a cat thing.

 

[NHAnn]

We have a kitty with pretty long hair too, she's been on Hills Hairball formula a long time. She normally will have hairballs 3-4 times a month, but occasionally periods where she has more often as well as the vomiting. Yuck. I think it is just a "cat thing".

The vet gave us a tube of some thing called Laxatone...gooey brown "stuff", I put about 1/4 tsp on her ( top of front paw), she licks it right off. Seems to help if she's really bad/frequent.

My sister is a vet tech, she has suggested to me that a dab of petroleum jelly works just as well, a couple times a week. The cat will naturally lick off anything dabbed on their fur, so if you put it on the paw, they'll lick it off and it keep things moving through the digestive tract. She also said that a spoonful of canned pumpkin in their food a few times a week is good for that too. My kitty didn't like the pumpkin though.

 

[scarlett873]

my poor kitty has such a sensitive tummy anymore...she can't have anything but the purina one brand. no treats. nothing. if she does have anything but her purina one, she leaves nice surprises all over the place for us!!

 

[mzmickey]

My 4 year old cat, Spaz, gets the worst hairballs. We had her on the hairball food, but she put on a lot of weight. The vet recommended the stuff in a tube instead. So we tried that.

Well, Spaz absolutely hated that stuff. We would put it on her paw, she would fling it off. We would put it on her nose and she would fight us every step of the way. It was awful.

Someone told us about the petroleum jelly, but we went one step further and used butter. Worked like a charm. At first, she didn't care for it and you would have to put it on her nose. But now that she gets a weekly "butter treatment", we have had only 1 or 2 hairballs in the last 3 years.

I've found the best way to give her the butter is to let her little sister Spooky get it first. Spooky will eat anything so she happily licks the butter off of your finger. When Spaz sees that, she thinks she is missing out and will come up and lick your finger clean as well.

So try the butter. Hope it works!