My 9-month-old indoor cat is getting fat. How should I feed her?

Yes, you should definitely cut the food back. If she seems overly hungry when you cut the food back you may need to talk to your vet about putting her on a prescription weight loss diet. Prescription diets are low in calories (so they can eat more of it) and it is very filling (they are high in fiber). If she doesn't lose weight I would be very worried about her developing diabetes. Remember, you need to feed the amount of food recommended on the bag for their IDEAL weight. Ideally she should be between 10-12 pounds. The average indoor cat should have 20 calories per pound so you should only be feeding her 200-240 calories per day INCLUDING her treats.

Hello, thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach. At 9 months old, if spayed/neutered, they should be eating adult food. Kitten food has A LOT of calories and they will get overweight very quickly eating that. It has nothing to do with cost. Hope this helps. Best wishes.

Hi there! Hunny Cat is very cute! I believe it's better to feed cats canned food. It has more moisture and adds a little bit more hydration to their daily intake. Later in life, cats can commonly develop kidney disease and/or urinary bladder disease. In both cases, cats will benefit greatly from the increased water content of a canned diet. The canned food is a lot better too to help keep an indoor cat's weight in check. All indoor cats have a tendency to become overweight, as they don't exercise as much as feral cats. Since cats usually will ingest the canned food right away, it is easier to portion the food out and also provide cats with meal times. This is very helpful to increase their metabolism, and to help discourage them from gaining weight. Far too often, we see cats being fed a pile of dried food in a bowl where they eat buffet-style on and off all day long. This can easily lead to weight gain and obesity, as well as all sorts of health problems. Nutro is good food, and so is tiki cat, weruva, science diet, royal canin, and iams/eukanuba, Purina is also good. I just like for pets to have a balanced diet. Grain free isn't really a necessity, but thus far in cats, we're not really seeing too many issues. I hope you find this answer helpful! Best of luck!

Hello, depending on her lifestyle, indoor only cats should be fed atleast twice daily. This can be a variety of dry and wet food and should not exceed more than 1 cup of dry food per day or more than 1 can per day. There may be differences depending on how many calories each food contains so it is hard to determine this. Your kitten should be consuming around 201 Kcal per day. Hope this helps and best of luck.

It looks as though my answer was cut off. Be sure to feed Chacha meals twice daily and measure how much goes into her bowl each time. The bag of food should have a chart to follow with her current body weight to determine how much she should eat. Try to avoid offering too many treats or people food because this can easily pack on weight. I hope this helps and that all goes well!

Yes, there is a low calorie food that is formulated for growth, it is made by Royal Canin and is called Kitten spay/neuter. This food will allow Tasha to continue growing but not have as many calories. You may also institute feeding her less amounts but more frequently like 1/8 of a cup four times a day. In the wild cats eat 9 to 16 times a day so their metabolism is geared to run constantly. Make sure to keep her active with lots of play. Best of luck.

You are feeding correctly, and grazing on food all day is normal and a good way to eat for a cat. I would have dry food out all of the time, and I would check the calorie content of the dry foods at the store and get Zoii the one higher in calories. You may also consider feeding some canned food daily. Some animals prefer to be on the thin side and they self regulate how much they eat so they stay thin and fit. In my experience once the cats mature and get to be adults they become less active and put on weight. Please make sure Zoii doesn't have intestinal parasites by bringing in a fecal sample to your veterinarian. If she's healthy and active with a shiny coat then I'm not concerned about her weight. Thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach to help you care for Zoii.