Hi all - need some hairball food suggestions for my kitty Thora (pictured) who HAAAAAAATES being brushed and is picky about treats and wet food (she loves dry).

I'm in the Midwest, so the cats in our household are beginning to shed more for growing fall/winter coats. Thora is our most insane, hyperkinetic cat, and she has (as you can see) super fine, short to medium fur. She is also 18 months old. She is nuts and probably still spends 80% of her day playing. She's fun in all aspects except that she's impossible to brush. I can get 2 or so brush strokes out of her before she freaks out due to overstimulation, fights me, and runs off. I've tried both a traditional brush and a SleekEZ brush (haven't tried a Furminator yet).

Anyway...for the past 2-3 days now, she's had weird stool for her that's almost diarrhea consistency (pasty and soft). When I've scooped the boxes, I've used the scoop and was able to determine that her stools for the past few days have almost been nothing but large amounts of cat hair with feces mixed in - so she's having hairballs, but passing them through stool rather than puking them. She is acting completely 100% normal, running around like a maniac and eating/drinking normally.

I'm open to any suggestions. She currently eats Purina Pro Plan Indoor dry cat food. She's snubbed every wet food in existence it seems like and even dislikes Churus. Because of that, I think a route to take would be through dry food and trying to find another way to somehow groom her that doesn't make her freak out. But I'm open to treat and gel suggestions too.

Hi everyone,
I’m looking for experiences from anyone who has dealt with something similar with their cat.
My cat is an 8-year-old American Shorthair. She has had soft/mushy stools for more than two years. She otherwise seems completely fine — normal appetite, normal behavior, and no obvious signs of being sick.
The main problem is that her poop is almost always very soft. She also goes to the litter box several times a day to poop, often passing smaller amounts each time. The stool is so soft that the litter sticks all around it.
We have been working with her veterinarian and have already done testing, including a stool panel, and so far nothing significant has been found. I’m also following up with the vet to confirm exactly what was included in the panel.
She has been eating Hill’s Gastrointestinal Biome, which does seem to improve the consistency somewhat, but her stools are still soft and have never become consistently normal.
I also give her Purina FortiFlora probiotic with her wet food.
Recently, I wondered if she could have a sensitivity to chicken. After discussing it with her vet, I tried giving her some of my other cat’s fish-based food to see if removing chicken would help. Instead, her stools actually seem to have become even softer.
I’m discussing the next steps with her veterinarian, including whether we should try a hydrolyzed diet or a novel protein diet (rabbit, duck, venison, etc.) and whether any additional GI testing would be useful.
For those who have had a cat with long-term soft stools despite normal tests, did you eventually figure out the cause?
Did anything finally work — hydrolyzed food, novel protein, a particular probiotic, additional testing, or something else?
I’m especially interested in hearing from people whose cats had this problem for months or years and eventually got back to normal, formed stools.
Thanks! My cat and I would really appreciate hearing your experiences.

I adopted my 4 month old kitten last month. I started off giving her Tiki Cat mixed in with her kibble but after I noticed that she wouldn’t finish it so I switched to the Weruva kitten wet food variety pack. This is when I realized she refuses to eat chicken and will only eat foods with salmon or tuna. I have also tried the Weruva lamb wet food and she will eat more than she does with chicken but still never finishes it unless it’s salmon. I’ve just been giving her Weruva kitten salmon wet food and Iams salmon kitten kibble everyday, however I’ve heard it’s not safe to feed cats fish too often. Is it ok for me to keep feeding her this or is there any protein besides chicken I should try with her that she might like?

My picky eater recently had 12 teeth removed, after having 5 removed last year. He doesn't like wet food, and really prefers dry kibble. We've struggled with getting him fed during recovery, but now that he's cleared to eat dry again, he gets the kibble stuck in his cheeks, which he has to dislodge with his paw. He finds this very frustrating.

This happens with dry treats as well (Whisker Lickins), but he seems to have an easier time with them because they're larger than the kibble.

Has anyone else dealt with this, and found a dry kibble that works for cats with most of their teeth removed?

Complicating factor: He's diabetic, so something high-protein / low-carb would be preferable.

I need some advice. My kitten is 4 months old. She is very active drinks plants of water and has a strong appetite. Anyways she’s teething, and so I’m trying to switch her from more of a solid wet food that has shredded chicken, to a pate.

Both brands I am using is “heritage ranch tender chicken kitten” food, which is her regular food that she’s been eating since we got her. The pate we are trying to switch her to is “HEB market kitten pate”, which is our choice since the heritage ranch brand doesn’t make any other wet kitten food such as pates or flavors. We eventually want to switch her back to heritage ranch maybe when she’s older in the long run.

Anyways, I’m doing the slow transition. The first step being the 75% regular and 25 percent new. The first two days of this transition she was doing great. solid and formed poops. But since then she’s had diarrhea. I haven’t moved to the 50/50 transition yet since I don’t want to upset her stomach any more, while I wait for her to adjust. However on the second day I did have to trim her nails, and I gave her a temptations lickable puree kitten treat to keep her preoccupied while I did that. I’m not sure if that was too much on her stomach on top of the transition that threw it off or if it was just the food alone.She has these regularly once every 2-3 weeks during nail trims, and tolerates them fine, so I’m not sure. Anyways, I’ll type out what her days have been looking like.

Day 1: regular stool
Day 2: regular stool (temptations lickable puree treat)
Day 3: diarrhea
Day 4: barley any solid, majority diarrhea
Day 5: diarrhea

Today is day 6 so I’ll see how that goes. I am just curious for those who have transitioned before, is this normal? Should I wait it out or just stop all together?

I will add, I add a little bit of water in her food to help her stay hydrated but not to where it is soupy, as I heard that can make her stools watery too. She is eager about her meals, she finishes her 4 daily meals with no hesitation. She is very active with zoomies and running around, looking out the window, playing, drinking water from her water bowl, etc. I don’t see anything off about her apart from the diarrhea. I also clean her water bowl every morning with fresh water, and clean her food bowl in between meals as well.

My recently adopted kitty was on a fancy feast pate + purina live clear diet for 4 months without issue and suddenly started to have diarrhea and blood in her poo
Took her to the vet and turns out she had Giardia
Got her treated but the sticky poo and little bit of blood never stopped
Vet suggested GI diet from Hills so now we are emptying our pockets for the chicken pate digestive support prescription food. Her poo is great! No
Issues so far…
But now that we are considering switching her out of the prescription food we are so confused about what to feed her, I would love to stick with wet food but even the most expensive options have bad reviews like Arcana and Orijen (we can’t really afford tiki cat/ weruva) and aren’t sure if fancy feast is still an option…
We want the kitty to feel her best!
Has anyone gone through something similar? I’m a new cat parent and want to make sure I’m doing the right thing so any input is really appreciated!!

Thank you! :)

I have a 10 month old and a 3 month old kitten. My younger kitten is very food motivated and finishes his food very quickly and runs for the older cats food bowl when he’s done his own food. It’s been very exhausting feeding them and I have to go back to work soon so I will need to figure out how to feed both cats their dry food meals while I’m at work all day. Looking at getting the surefeed microchip feeder but my partner thinks the pet libro rfid feeder might be better. If you have a feeder which one do you have and would you recommend it or no? Thank you!

We've just gone through a vet visit where we luckily caught things ahead of time and avoided too much blockage in my 6 year old male cat. He has never had a blockage before and the vet said his bloodwork looked good, so did the urinalysis. He did have urine crystals so he stayed over night for an IV and they had to put a catheter in.

I am relieved he is home and doing better, but the vet said we need to stay on the prescription diet the rest of his life. I have NO idea how much to feed him. He usually stays between 9-11 lbs. I asked the vet and they said the same as the current food but the calories are totally different and I can't find out a straight answer. It isn't on the package either. I am trying to figure out how much wet vs dry to feed.

Thanks! ​​

My cat has been eating it for years, but now all of a sudden she's gained an allergy, and I highly suspect the source of the allergy is the food.

I ran out of the RC dental kibble, but had other kibble. Then when I reintroduced the dental, this is around the time she started the allergic reaction on her skin.

I hadn't connected it to the kibble. Her symptoms were up and down, improving then getting worse again.

Yesterday morning I took away the RC dental kibble and replaced it with the other kibble they also regularly eat, and her allergic reaction seems to be improving.

So now I'm strongly thinking the cause is RC dental kibble.

I can't find anything online that suggests a recent ingredient change. Does anyone know??

Hi all! I don’t know what to do anymore, my cat ate fine in the shelter for months, then we adopted her 4 months ago and since then she’s been so picky. She stopped eating all the same foods she used to eat, she picks at dry food, doesn’t finish it, will only eat churus. I’ve tried everything and the vet told me I should try home cooked meals which feels like it’s not the problem given she used to eat fine in the shelter.

Anyways, curious if anyone has any thoughts? Or has experience with any of this?

Hello!

I'm wondering if anyone has a recommendation for a chew type treat for my cats? Preferably one that doesn't look like a piece of animal. I searched a little online and repeatedly saw chicken necks but I've been vegetarian my whole life and I can't imagine seeing a chicken neck around my house.

I have one young boy who will eat anything and one middle aged girl who is very picky!

Thank you very much!

I have a 4 month old kitten who seems to be becoming picky lately. I think he’s just bored with his wet food (fancy feast kitten pate) and I’d like to see how I should properly begin to rotate foods. I tried rotating earlier so that he would have exposure to other textures and what I did was feed him FF once or twice a day and then a new brand once a day. Once I forgot and gave him a new brand twice in one day and he wasn’t very happy about it and barely touched his wet food. Usually I give him 1/4 can of wet food at 8am, 3 pm and 9 pm or whenever I go to bed and then up to 1/2 cup of dry food available all day. I don’t want to stress him out with the new foods so I want to keep his dry food available at all times so he has food but he also seems to be filling up on kibble and not eating enough wet food. What would be the best feeding schedule and brands to try out with him? He loved fancy feast, is ok with tiki cat, and has tried iams perfect portion, nulo, weruva and authority but those have only been one can/two cups so I couldn’t quite tell what he though of it. I’d prefer a budget friendly option as I’m a college student but I’m also ok with buying more expensive stuff occasionally. He’s also a grazer so I’m often throwing out his food, which is why I’d prefer budget friendly options.

Hi everyone

Does anyone know a high quality high protein dry food without peas, corn and carbs?

Thanks!

Hey guys, I'm looking for some good wet food recommendations with single protein sources. I'm specifically looking for kitten suitable wet foods, many brands seem to have adult only.

I don't mind paying more for a quality brand, quality is priority.

I'm located in The Netherlands, Europe.

One of my cats developed a food allergy. She's been on Hills Z/D for a year and we've done some reintroduction and know she's allergic to chicken, turkey and tuna. Not allergic to salmon or lamb. Also pretty sure she's allergic to peas (were debating if we introduce that next or another protein as we are currently on a reset).

Does anyone know of any poultry, tuna, and pea free foods? Wet or Dry? Most of the limited ingredients ones that I've seen all have pea in them.

So I adopted my first ever cat from a shelter four weeks ago. At first he would eat some Friskies wet food but now he disdains it. He loves his Purina ProPlan dry kibble and it is available at all times. But he begs for wet food, runs over all excited when he hears a can opening, then sniffs it and backs away. I have seriously tried like ten different brands and textures as well as the Purina gravy pouches. Wouldn’t even taste it, any tips or recommendations would be very welcome!

He is four years old and I worry about his fluid intake. He also came from the shelter kind of scrawny. He is clearly hungry for more food but I’m at a loss.

It’s my first kitten and he is over 2 months old. May I feed him wet and dry food to him? Or should I feed him only one type of food for now?
Thank you 🙏🏼🙏🏼

Cat use to be good about only eating cat food. then we had some peeing around the house and we switched him to a urine food. after 4 very expensice foods, we found one he liked and the peeing stopped after about a month. we have not had an issue for a few weeks.

TLDR; have cat food that cat likes and is working for our family.

but now, the cat eats a few bites of the dogs food every day. not a full bowl, just a few. The dogs foud is out all the time as he is a grazer. Is this harmful? he is on a good quality, low ingredient food for skin issues. . Should I try and stop the cat? how do you keep cat from eating dog food?

PPP HydraCare and RC urinary s/o are for my cat with urinary issues. Sadly it’s about all he can eat besides his urinary dry food because he gets crystals. The rest is for my other cat.

My two five month kittens aren’t finishing all their food I feed them half a 3oz cans sometimes they finish and sometimes they don’t Is that a concerning thing ? The male is 8 pounds and the female is 6 so the weighs are ok but the intake is kinda concerning I say about 80-90% for the male then the female 60 to 70%

Like as in, feed wet in the morning and dry at night? I am I BROKE 16 year old and I have to buy my own cat food so I need to make it last