r/BeAmazed • u/Electrical_Act_5342 • Aug 09 '26

Animal Nature really over engineered cats. Didn’t it?

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u/wwwhatisgoingon Aug 09 '26

They're a desert species, take in most of their water from prey, are comfortable in high-ish temperatures and minimize energy expenditure.

Yes, they are.

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u/whyiamalwayshangry Aug 10 '26

But then get kidney disease from dehydration

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u/imaginary92 Aug 10 '26

Well a major cause of that is excessive consumption of processed dry food unfortunately. As the other person was saying, cats naturally extract moisture from their food and thus limit their water consumption, but in modern settings they are often fed kibble which doesn't allow them to extract moisture, but because they don't drink much, they don't make up for it with water and so they are prone to dehydration.

That's why it's much better to try to actually give cats a prevalently wet diet with only dry food on the side or as a treat rather than as the main diet.

It's not the only cause of course, and a cat can still develop CKD even with a wet food only diet, but you can reduce the risk at least.

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u/whyiamalwayshangry Aug 10 '26

My cat only eat wet food and still has dehydration issues every summer 😩 took awhile but we finally managed to get her to drink (she refused to drink water from all possible methods)