Boozjee needs to slim down. Are you a kitty fitness coach?

Question

Please help me with my rotund 8 year old neutered male tabby. At last weigh-in, he came in at a whopping 33 lbs. I've put him on high quality dry food diet. No canned food anymore and no treats. I feed him the daily reccommended amount of 2/3 cup, but he's not active enough to burn off any calories.

He developed asthma a few years ago wich is under control for the most part with medication. Running or playing sometimes results in an asthma attack. I think this is the reason he has lost interest in playing.

I want to use a feeding ball but he doesn't seem to be able to figure out how to use it. I'll bat at it to show him how to get the food out, but he just looks up at me with those big green eyes like he's saying, "When are you going to stop playing with that stupid ball and put my food in the dish?"

Does anyone out there have any other ideas? What else could I try to get him to move a little? Thanks.

Answer 1

Have you tried a laser pointer? Not sure how well they work from cat to cat, but we have one who'll chase it endlessly -- and quite actively. Once straight into a (full!!) bathtub of water. Several feet up the wall; the jumps are quite impressive. Up and down the hallway. Everywhere, to a point where it's exercise for me, too.

They're pretty cheap, and found in your basic better pet store.

Answer 2

Poor baby. Asthma yet! It is tough when a cat has a hard time playing. The exercise is usually a big help in keeping weight off and taking it off. They are really so small, that you would have to be almost obsessive about weighing him constantly, to see the result of the new diet food. It is really better for his health to take off the weight gradually.

Has you vet run a blood profile on him? You might be surprised at the number of things cats can develop that contribute to weight gain. Just something to think about.

Answer 3

How many years has it been since you have been to a zoo? Do you remember a fat tiger? A fat cheetah? A fat lion or panther?
They are not running about chasing down their food and they eat raw meat. They don't get any more exercise for their size than Boozjee does.

Why would you cut out canned meat from his diet? Dry diets are disasters for cats. I use some Nature's Organic and Nature's Logic canned meat with my cats. They are both high quality protein meat and nothing much else in that can (taurine of course). I order from petfooddirect.com to get them.

Boozjee is in a very dangerous condition at that weight and I wouldn't presume to have the answer to his weight problem and I do feel that any pet nutritionist would support the use of quality meat in any cat's diet.

Answer 4

Wow I thought my 5yr old male tabby, Fred (looks just like your Boozjee) was huge at 17 lbs.! I feed mine Iams weight control formula and only twice a day 1/2 cup according to my vet recommendations. He is still pretty active I have also a 2 yr old black and white tuxedo cat. She keeps him pretty active. They chase each other all night long. I play with my cats with the laser pointer it gets my tabby moving. Or you could try a kitty leash and take him for a walk or....drag!! Ha Ha Good Luck!

Answer 5

This is a very dangerous weight for your cat! Here is something I did with my overweight cat and it worked. Place small amounts of food in different spots in your house, not a whole meal in one spot. Put some where your cat has to jump, or at least move around to different areas. The cat will work for food. Your cat should also play/exersice around 30 minutes a day. Lasers pointers are also great. GOOD LUCK!

Answer 6

Hi there...as a general rule one should consider seeing a veterinarian before starting a diet loss plan especially with asthma involved. A thorough physical exam, blood chemistry profile including Thyroid hormone evaluation, and record an accurate weight for the cat will create a baseline. Then you should gradually… over a period of three to four weeks… add greater and greater proportions of the suggested feline weight-loss diet. Mix the new diet with the old, slowly decreasing the percentage of the old diet and increasing the percentage of the new one. Pay close attention to how much the cat is eating every day. When the cat acclimates to the improved, high protein diet (fed in small amounts frequently during the day), reweigh the cat at four-week intervals. If there is no weight loss at all, or even some weight gain, the amount of food you may be allowing is simply too much. Some people think in human-sized portions, not feline. Every three to four weeks reweigh your cat on the same scale each time so that accurate weight measurements are done. A fifteen-pound cat should not lose more than half a pound in four weeks.

Getting an obese cat to lose weight needs to be done gradually… no crash diets allowed! Cats have a unique metabolic response to fasting and whenever a feline’s food intake is rapidly and markedly depressed, a serious and potentially fatal disorder can occur called Hepatic Lipidosis.

One of the reasons for the success of a high protein diet for feline weight reduction is the importance of an amino acid called Carnitine. Carnitine is present in good quantities in muscle tissues, but found in miniscule amounts in vegetable matter. This amino acid plays an essential role in the uptake of stored fat reserves and conversion of fat by the liver back to into glucose. The ability to mobilize fat tissue to be used as glucose for energy (and for subsequent weight loss to be accomplished) requires Carnitine in the process. Supplementing a cat’s diet with L-Carnitine in amounts approximating 250 to 500 mg per cat per day will aid in mobilizing fat into glucose and will improve the health of a cat that is on a weight loss program. Avoid cat food which contains corn, corn meal which is a high carbohydrate and makes weight loss difficult to achieve. Most commercial grade cat foods contain this ingredient as the primary which is a filler to bind food together for longer shelf life as well.

Always be observant and report to your veterinarian any time a cat stops eating for two or more days. (That’s one of the subtle problems with the “free choice” method of feeding. When cats are sick the first clinical sign is often a loss of appetite; so a non-interactive, free choice feeding protocol provides less information to us than an interactive portion controlled feeding method.) Any cat that hasn’t eaten in three days is in trouble! Seven days of fasting actually impacts the cat’s immune system.

Once you have established a feeding plan that induces gradual weight loss over a period of months the cat will reach a point where weight maintenance occurs. At this optimal weight the cat should not “look fat” nor “look skinny”.



To get a cat to lose weight, do the following after consulting with your veterinarian:
1.) Have a thorough physical exam, lab tests, and accurate weigh recorded. Be sure to rule out hypothyroidism or other metabolic disorders.
2.) Feed less food than you have been
3.) Feed foods high in protein and fat and low in carbohydrate
4.) Feed small portions at intervals (2x to 4x per day) rather than continuous free access/ free choice
5.) Increase the cat’s activity/exercise by enriching the cat’s environment (e.g. laser light toys work well for many cats including for asthma related health problem cats)
6.) Reweigh the cat at three to four week intervals to assess your weight loss diet’s progress
7.) Reconsider the total daily amount fed if weight gain or no weight loss is noted
8.) Once the cat is at an idea weight, adjust the total amount fed so that the cat’s body weight remains stable.

Answer 7

fit a figure 8 harness on him backwards, with the crossover in front so the leash would come out under his chest. hook him up to the leash. carry hi m downstairs or outside. hold on to the leash. see where he wants to explore.

feed him mature/fat cat food, only feed him a little bit--cut him down or make him walk. good luck. also--more water.

Answer 8

well my thought is a cat is a cat and you got to love them fat or skinny. but i am sure there is diet food that you can buy for him and just give him little amounts at a time. like a person would diet. but good luck cause some cats are just well........ Just FAT!

Answer 9

Catnip his toys. I had an overweight kitty too. She was relatively unplayful so I got catnip and dunked her toys in it.