My lost cat is malnourished. How can I help her gain weight safely?

Thank you for submitting your question regarding your cat. What an amazing story to find her again after all that time. I recommend that she sees her veterinarian. She will need a thorough examination and possibly bloodwork. Starvation could certainly account for her weight loss, but so could a new underlying disease if she is an older cat. A rabies vaccine booster will likely be given as well. I hope this information helps!

I would recommend feeding regular adult food and just giving her a bit more than you typically would. She should gain weight pretty quickly if the flea burden is gone. It is a little unusual for a healthy adult to lose weight from fleas, unless her nutrition was also poor or she had a another underlying disease. If she is not gaining weight with the increase in calories you may want to check in with your veterinarian to make sure there isn't something else going on.

Your cat needs to be fed a complete commercial cat food. He will not gain any weight from cat milk. He may also need to be wormed. I recommend you take him to a veterinarian for a wellness exam to make sure he is not ill. Offer him some canned cat food. I guarantee he will love it.

I would feed canned food twice a day and have a high calorie dry food available at all times. The calories are now on the bag so you can compare different food’s calorie content. Also limiting the amount of exercise, or time outside in the cold will help her regain the weight. Thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach to help you care for Sapphire.

Your kitty is not feeling well. I suggest you take her to a veterinarian for a check up and blood tests. She may be ill, and therefore defensive when the other cats come near her. She may also need special food to gain weight properly .

I recommend feeding Hills a/d. It’s easily digestible, cats usually love it and it is very calorie dense so Watson will start to recover quickly even if he doesn’t eat that much. I would also have a dry kitten food available at all times and offer some tasty cat treats to stimulate his appetite. In addition to feeding many meals daily increasing his exercise will help build muscle and also stimulate his appetite and speed his recovery. Thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach to help you care for Watson.

I would talk to your vet about checking her thyroid hormones. It is probably unlikely but definitely possible that her thyroid is too high causing weight loss and hair loss. I would also make sure she is on a high quality dry and canned cat food to help increase the caloric intake. If you aren't planning on breeding her, I would consider getting her spayed as long as she is healthy enough per your vet. I would definitely continue the vitamins. Also, I would talk to your vet about ruling other things out if they haven't already like parasites, giardia, feline leukemia, feline aids, and more. I hope this helps!