Kitten will only eat sardines!!

[Sillywillywoowoo]

Please help! My almost 5 month old has had a respiratory illness and gone off food. He's mostly recovered now but will only eat sardines or lik e lix. He will NOT eat anything else. What do I do? He can't love on sardines alone! 😭
I've tried wet food including Felix, Lilly's kitchen, blinx and whiskers as well as biscuits. Can anyone recommend a cat food that their cat can't resist? He's even been turning his nose up at tuna!

Does he eat dry food at all?

Sardines are definitely not nutritionally complete, so if he really won't eat anything else I'd add in some fishy cat food and slowly shift the sardine:cat food ratio until it's all or mostly cat food.

When our cat had suffered from a respiratory illness, the vet once told us to offer mashed-up tinned sardines to the cat, as the respiratory problem meant they were unable to smell usual tinned food, so needed strong smelling food to tempt them to eat. Do check with your vet to be sure, as we were told this a few years back, but something you might like to bear in mind. If so, it's a temporary thing - ours was back to scoffing cat biscuits and usual tinned food within a couple of weeks!

Have you looked at untamed? Only the gravy version is complete but since trying this ours won't eat blink anymore. He will only eat the fish flavours though, nothing with chicken.

Took these to show someone at work.

He'll get over it.
If my cat is poorly or off his food for days I might tempt him with tuna or chicken. I know full well that his majesty will then decide all cat food is beneath him for a while.

Have you tried warming up his normal food, or adding the oil from some sardines to it and mixing it through?

Why are you giving him the option? Just stop giving him sardines

Presumably because, at five months old, it's better for him to eat something than nothing, especially when he's recovering from an infection.

Salmon oil can make things actually smell and taste good when they can't get the full flavours. Half a teaspoon a day for an adult cat, quarter for little ones.

Our old cat did this - we gave her some new treats and she gave up eating any other food, because why would she eat that when she could eat nothing but treats for the rest of her life. I think we did a mix of putting the treats on her wet food (and went gravy rather than jelly based) and mixing them in with her dried food. Took ages though because she's old and stubborn but then so am I

Thanks everyone. To clear up a couple of questions - no he currently won't eat dry food (he used to though!) And I do know that sardines aren't great for a kitten. It was a sort of hail Mary because he was turning up his nose at everything else and he's already underweight. I hadn't even thought about sardines till I was eating some on Thursday and he showed an interest. I will try mixing some with proper food like suggested above and see if that helps. The salmon oil is a good tip too.
I did heat the sardines for 20 seconds in the microwave because they'd been in the fridge, which I haven't been doing with his regular food, so will also try that. He has a vet check up on Friday to see if he needs antibiotics for his infection (she's been reluctant to give them up to now as for mycoplasma - which is what he has - you need to give for 30 days apparently, and he's been showing improvement) she's weighing him every time because he's so teeny.

We had a similar issue with our kitten - he was underweight and had a URI - he barely ate for a week and I was trying everything I could think of to get him to eat something. He would have a bite and then wander off again.

The vet was on the verge of ordering more tests when I came down to feed him and his brothers and he was just screaming for food - I put down half a pouch of his normal kitten food and he scoffed it lol. I guess he just didn't feel like eating until then.

He's eight months old now and is still not the most food motivated but he's a good weight and super healthy. Good luck!

Mix sardines with normal cat food.
It will eat it if that's all that's on offer

I would also say put a little of the sardine onto the regular food. One of my cats can sometimes be like this and I have found that adding chicken (his favourite) onto the cat food often works, or giving him a little piece of chicken or another treat beforehand stimulates his appetite.
Cats are clever though. He may sense that he will get the sardines if he doesn't give in!