Constantly crying for food

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Fairly new rescue who is overweight. 7kg. After initial settiling in period constantly mothers for food all day. Sits staring at his food and goes mental with delight when feeding time.

Has been checked over and no physical concerns.

He is on James wellbeloved dry 20g.

We have been ignoring crying but it doesn’t seem to stop him. How long until it would sink it?

Thanks

Don't give in to terrorism! 7kg is a right lump, he's clearly habituated to troughing it continuously.

How long is a how-long-is-a-piece-of-string question, but the answer is probably "longer than you'd prefer for your sanity's sake" I'm afraid.

Stick to exact and regular mealtimes, and he should get the hang of at least only yowping for food in the runup to those times.

Terrorisim is exactly what this is!

Are other cats like this?

Try playing with him as a distraction method and don’t leave the food dishes out except the water?

Are you sure you're giving enough food ? 20g doesn't sound much. Do they have wet food too?

So even if you feed to the weight you want him to be (4kg?) You are giving half of what he is allowed each day

20g was on advice of vet to be reviewed when he starts going out

I'd be mithering for food too if it was just that tiny amount. Does he not get wet food alongside? It would be hard to split that amount into 2 meals too. Are you sure it wasn't 20g twice a day?

That doesn't sound enough! Even for a fatty! My 5.5kg cat has 30g twice a day.

But mine is v tall and long and muscular.

OP, please ring the vet and check it wasn't meant to be 20g per meal. And if it was, seriously question it.

20g of food per day is incredibly low for a cat, even an indoor fatty. It's a starvation portion that can be dangerous if done for more than a few days - breaking down body fat that rapidly will increase ketones and risks ketoacidosis.

The usual way to get a cat to lose weight is to set the portion size slightly below the maintenance level for the cat's target weight. So an average sized indoor cat with a target weight of 5kg would have maintenance portion of 47-53g in that chart. A diet portion of 40g per day would be reasonable, which would be 2 x 20g meals per day.

My cat is 16 months and he is after food all the time. He looks big but any attempts to cut him down result in him driving us mad looking for food all the time. He is in danger of causing an accident running under people's feed literally every time anyone moves. I am fed up with it tbh but apart from giving in I don't know what I can do. He is within the guidelines in terms of quantities for his food and is a v muscular male cat with huge paws so not overfed but he just seems a particularly big cat.

Sorry it’s 20g per meal. Three meals a day as was struggling with twice

Phew! Well in that case, you just have a regular food-obsessed cat who will test your sanity.

We have one. It took about a month of consistently small portions to re-train his stomach to small meals, and about 3 months for him to get used to 2 meals rather than 3 without screaming at the "missing" mealtime.

Have you spread out the daily food allowance since you moved to 3 meals? As in if you started out at 2 x 20g, then that would be 3 x 13g now.

It was advised 30g and 30g so now 20g three meals

Fat but not starved cat!

Oh he is gorgeous!! I've always had rescues and many of them have mithered for food. One vet told me it was a comfort thing, it helps them to feel in control. They also may have not always known where their next meal was coming from.

we now give a mixture of wet and dry. Wet is lower in calories and the cat seems to feel like she is eating more when she has wet...not sure if that is helpful!

Our 18 year old rescue has elderly royal canin Dry and some wet fancy feast. She's just followed me up to bed shouting as DH forgot the fancy feast!

Okay, 60g a day is pretty generous for a diet portion in an indoor cat. Unless he's the size of a Maine coon (and he doesn't look like it in the very cute photo!), he might not lose much weight at that level.

Stay strong, OP. There's no easy way around a dieting cat whose world revolves around food!

One thing that helped our fatty was a switch to wet food with a high meat content. The extra water in wet food compared to dry seemed to fill him up better on his little diet portion, and the high-meat wet food kept him full for longer than regular wet food (that usually had a high proportion of carbs).

Former fatty kitty is now maintained on 150g per day of food like Mac's and Smilla (from zooplus). It sounds like a tiny portion of wet food, but it keeps him happy 😸

Oh, what a sweetie! We've got one (of three) who moans continuously for food, she's smaller and half a kilo heavier than the other two. She had a starvation day when she was a tiny still on milk after getting lost, we put it down to that.

Um, by which I suppose I mean "he might not stop", since ours has been doing it her whole life. Fingers crossed!

He's very handsome! He does look a bit big around the belly.
Our lad would eat more than we allow given half the chance. We had him since he was around 9 or 10 months but was handed to a vets as a stray (allegedly) so could have found food hard to come by. He's due his booster soon so hope the vet will be happy with his weight otherwise reducing food will be hellish!!!

He does hide his weight well though. I think!

Ignore that! That’s not my cat just one that looked like him!

My cat is a skinny (formerly obese rescue) with hyperthyroidism, she is constantly crying for food even when I've put the sodding food in her bowl.

She is not on a diet and can eat whenever she wants but I can't go into the kitchen for a cup of tea without falling over the wailing animal.

I am just hoping her booked thyroid irradiation will sort this out.

Some cats just never stop doing this.