How to deal with a cat that is always hungry

[NewCatAnxiety]

I've had my 1 year old rescue cat for 2 weeks, and had kept her on the same food as she was used to at the shelter. I was told she is very food motivated so she's been on slow feeding for her wet food and the dry food was given in small portions through the day. This helped to cut down the begging a bit so it wasn't a huge issue.

However, she had some significant vomiting issues at the beginning of this week so on the vet's recommendation she is now on Royal Canin gastrointestinal food. From what I've read, this is very calorie dense but not necessarily filling - and as a result she is yelling at me constantly for food, which is torture for both of us.

Obviously I will mention to the vet, but does anyone have any suggestions on how to manage the yelling in the meantime? Or suggestions for food that will actually make her feel full?

Royal Canin is awful food - I personally would never feed it unless I had absolutely no other choice. Did you get the route of what was causing her vomiting?

The vet couldn't find anything underlying to cause the vomiting so has basically put it down to stress, given that she's had a lot of upheaval in the past month or so.

If it wasn’t her old food causing the problems then I would personally just put her back on that - it makes no sense to me to switch her to a gastro diet if the issues are stress related

So you’ve wormed her? My cats love the Gimcat paste, it’s very satisfying to them, and of course it’s nutritionally dense too, so I think they aren’t craving food for nutrition.

My cat vomits when she manages to eat too much in too short a time. So she gets small amounts spaced out through the day

I feed untamed - there’s loads of better quality cat foods out there now which have better nutritional value. My cats were constantly hungry on commercial pet foods. They haven’t totally stopped begging but it’s made a huge difference. I got in touch for feeding instructions and now they get their allotted daily allowance and no more.

Thanks all. To clarify, she has been wormed and she was previously getting her food spaced throughout the day (otherwise she would vomit from eating too much too quickly), but on Monday even small amounts were immediately vomited back up.

My preference is to get her onto a better quality food (like untamed), so will ask the vet if there is any reason she needs to continue on the gastro diet much longer.

Vets love Royal Canin for some reason. I'm not as much of a fan.

We had a cat who had been a stray and we were told that basically his ability to udnerstand when he was hungry had been turned off. Putting him on a diet actually made him GAIN weight as he used to go out and scavenge and hunt.

We tried a number of low calorie dry foods and the one that finally seemed to do the trick was the Hills one. We could give him quite a lot and it seemed to mostly satisfy him and he started to lose some weight. Our current cat is on the James Well Beloved light one - so he gets a bit of meat and then the dry is out all the time. But while he loves his food, he's not quite so difficult.

I'm not sure a food starved cat will ever change. My little rescue was 3 when she came to me, three years ago. I feed her 2 pouches a day, the ones she was on through the rescue. So i know they are rubbish. She has all day access to cat crunchy- James wellbeloved, which my other cat prefers. But she rarely has that - teeth issues. I give her cooked meat, perhaps twice a week for protein. But she will steal anything she can.Adores cheese sauce! Becomes very nippy and yowly (Siamese) at about 4pm, but that's too early, otherwise she wants more food later.

My rescue used to vomit if she had been left hungry for too long, so either frothy bile or she would throw her food back up because she'd bolted it down. This was mainly in the mornings so we sorted that by giving a handful of biscuits for supper when we went to bed. This also meant she didn't do the 4am wake ups that other people mention. Win, win!

Don't forget 1 year cats are still growing and are equivalent to human teenagers who are permanently hungry. Make sure you are making the food transition from kitten to cat with the right amount of food too. Maybe give her food over 4 meals instead of 2.

Finally, you can get appetite control, or food for sterilised cats etc, which are supposedly more filling. I say supposedly because we are struggling too with The Stray (different to other rescue) and are looking at other types. She's now fairly balanced on half a whiskas pouch mornings and evening, with measured out portions of appetite control mixed with hairball given over several meals including a late supper. It can be a long process to get it right. I'm fortunate to be at home for these extra meals but if I wasn't I would get a timed release feeder.

Edit - but on Monday even small amounts were immediately vomited back up.
If your previous change sorted out her vomiting previously then this is either a different stress or a hairball blockage. Have you tried any hairball medication?

Both my cats came to me skinny strays and then got enormous 🤣 I’ve had cats growing up and had never had a cat overeat to the extent they became obese, they were always fed ad-lib by whoever was in the kitchen so not monitored. One will eat so fast she’s sick too. I do agree with PP and wonder if it’s partly due to having been strays.

i also wonder if commercial cat foods are essentially UPF and addictive for cats.

Things to try

• a licky mat for wet food. Take ages to eat
• a dry food feeder that they have to join out the pellets with their paw

Both impossible to guzzle.

I have a very vomity cat. She vomits when stressed, when hungry, when the bedding has been changed. When we have new carpet. When visitors are about to arrive. When I've just washed the rug. 🙄.

I still luffs her fluffy little face though ❤️

I wonder, if you can be bothered, 'cos it's a faff, whether cooking up your own mix might work?
I used to buy frozen white fish, cook/boil it lightly & mash it up with cooked white rice. Can keep it in the fridge, can also freeze it. Vet advised this for v fussy/poorly Siamese. It seemed to work. This was years ago when white fish (coley, in this case) was cheap. Maybe not such a cheap option now.