12 yr old kitty can't hold down dry food, what am I to do?

Question

The problem is I am away for a long day often 15 hours. I have a few cats that I leave (easy to digest) dry food out all of the time. The problem is she eats it and piles of it are all around my house.

The cats get wet food at night, and she only keeps certain kinds down (so I stick with those).

I've been to the vet and he said she only has 3 teeth left in her mouth and this is what is causing all the problems.

I feel it would be cruel to not give the other cats access to the dry food during the day.
Would grinding the dry food work?

Any suggestions would be appreciated

My cat gets checked yearly by the vet, and he never suggested cleaning her teeth. Said that he thought that the loss was genetic.

Answer 1

yes grinding dry food would work , dont leave so much for them to eat, moist cat food is good for a cat with no teeth, might have to spoon feed it after all the cat deosnt have teeth to grab its food with, had a small dog that was 15 yeras old had no teeth we had to spoon feed him lol he loved spagetti lol

Answer 2

Wet food is much better for your cats and can be left down all day. Even when it dries up, it is still very edible. Water can be added and stirred in to make it look like it did
More on nutrtion
Nutrition since there are so many bad things out there is very important to your cat’s health
Contrary to what you may have heard; dry foods are not a great thing to feed a cat.
Please read the label on what you are feeding? What are the ingredients? Do you know what they mean? Is the first ingrdiant a muscle meat like chicken or meal or other things?
http://www.catinfo.org/#Learn_How_To_Read_a_Pet_Food_Ingredient_Label
Dry foods are the number 1 cause of diabetes in cats as well as being a huge contributing factor to kidney disease, obesity, crystals, u.t.i’s and a host of other problems. Food allergies are very common when feeding dry foods. Rashes, scabs behind the tail and on the chin are all symptoms
The problems associated with Dry food is that they are loaded with carbohydrates which many cats (carnivores) cannot process them. Also, Most of the moisture a cat needs is suppose to be in the food but in
Dry, 95% of it is zapped out of dry foods in the processing. Another thing, most use horrible ingredients and don't use a muscle meat as the primary ingredient and use vegetable based protein versus animal. Not good for an animal that has to eat meat to survive.
You want to pick a canned food w/o gravy (gravy=carbs) that uses a muscle meat as the first ingredient and doesn't have corn at least in the first 3 ingredients if at all. Fancy feast is a middle grade food with 9lives, friskies whiskas lower grade canned and wellness and merrick upper grade human quality foods. Also, dry food is not proven to be better for teeth. Does a hard pretzel clean your teeth or do pieces of it get stuck? http://www.felinefuture.com/nutrition/bpo_ch4a.php

Please read about cat nutrition.
http://www.newdestiny.us/nutritionbasics.html
http://www.catinfo.org/feline_obesity.htm
http://maxshouse.com/feline_nutrition.htm#Dry_Food_vs_Canned_Food.__Which_is_reall

Answer 3

Its too bad your vet let your cat's teeth get this bad - there should have been dentals done! Please get the remaining teeth checked to make sure that they are not damaged or infected.

Cats can have canned food throughout the day and you do not need to take it back up after 30mins. You can get timed feeders with ice packs if you need to feed once or twice while you are away.

Canned food tends to be healthier than dry food so it would be good if all of your cats were on it, especially if you feed something that doesn't have fillers like grains in it.

Answer 4

You may have to keep her in a room by herself since you can't control herself around the dry food. Grinding it would help her, but she will still go for the other cat's food.

You may also want to try those feeders that are on a timer that release a small portion of food at the time.

The problem is that she is eating too much too fast.

I feed my cats two meals of wet food daily, but if I will be gone past their meal time, I leave a small snack of dry food to hold them over, so you may want to consider that.

You can't leave wet food out for more than 30min-1 hour, so don't listen to anyone who says to leave the wet out. It will grow bacteria and can be very harmful to your cats.

While I don't like to feed dry food because it is not as healthy, I would never leave it out for more than 30 minutes. If I need to leave out food during the day, it is a high quality dry food. I use Wellness canned and dry food for my cats.

You also never want to add water or wet dry food since dry food has bacteria on it to begin with and it breeds rapidly when the food becomes wet.

Most cats do need a dental cleaning at least once in their life, but it is a fairly new practice, and would never be done on an elderly cat since they need to use anesthesia and it really isn't safe at that age.

Answer 5

As long as you are making sure your other cats have adequate feeding time available it's not cruel You have to provide for the senior citizen of the group, the other's wil be fine. The other option is to give the senior kitty some sort of mild canned food, 2 times a day to ensure adequate nutrition and easier eating.

Answer 6

you will need to feed your cat wet food during the day now too. The cat is getting to old and may need to be taken care of like they do with elderly people. You need to get a cat sitter whilst you are away

Answer 7

My old girl used to vomit all the time and was very skinny with a dull coat. Since we changed her to a raw diet of meat, edible bones and offal she has gained weight, a glossy coat and no longer throws up. At 15 she also has all of her sparkly white teeth.

She eats kangaroo, chicken, beef and lamb as well as whole fish. She gets offal (including liver and heart) a few times a week as well. With this diet a cat and dog will get all the nutrition they need. The organ meats contain taurine for the cats' eyes and the chewing will keep their teeth clean. Cats are obligate carnivores - this means they HAVE to have meat and cannot digest vegetable matter. Most commercial foods contain unsuitable ingredients like grains and high salt levels.

Answer 8

put the cat food out of her reach. She wants the cat food because it tastes better to her.. she may not necessarily be hungry, it just may be something that she never had before and she wanted to gobble it up. Keep the cat food out of her reach. Put the dog food down, leave only the dog food down. If you are doing scheduled meals, put the food down at meal time, leave it down for 10-15 mins, then pick it up if she doesnt touch it in that time. Offer NOTHING else until her next scheduled meal. She will eventually get hungry enough and eat her dog food. Healthy dogs dont starve themselves.

Answer 9

Well yes! Put the food in a baggie, take a small hammer and crunch the dry food into smaller parts. Or feed them dry food designed for kittens; those are usually smaller pieces. (Check with your vet on that last one due to nutritional needs.)

You know there are automatic feeders. Can't you separate her in another part of your place and put an automatic feeder in there?

Poor cat. It's too bad you never took her in for regular teeth cleanings; she might have kept more of her teeth longer. Can you imagine her discomfort with only three teeth? She's probably hungry all the time. Now you will have to go to a lot more trouble to ensure she is getting enough soft food and nutrition. You might also consult a vet who is board-certified in dentistry for help. He or she might be able to give you suggestions. We are fortunate to have one that flies in once a month to our area and it's a big difference compared to a GP.