Putting one cat on a diet in a multi-cat home

[catonabin]

We have three cats and one of them is getting very fat!

They currently have free access to biscuits and graze during the day. The overweight one is the dominant cat in the house and will barge the other two out of the way to eat.

i’m looking at getting microchip controlled feeders so we can control how much they are each eating - but they are about £100 each!

Before I spend £300 on this, are there any solutions to controlling one cat’s diet when you have multiple cats?

Stop the grazing and give them all set meals at set times.

I’ve always had cats that graze a bit - even if we feed them at set times they don’t really wolf it all at once so we would leave it down for them to come back to. Is that not typical - have we trained them to over-eat by leaving food down during the day?

They’ll learn to eat it all in one go if you take it off them - we have three boys and had to put our oldest cat on a diet a couple of years ago - we removed the dry food and just fed them all wet food at set times. He lost 5kg (he was a rescue) and while they did moan a bit they soon got used to it.

Don’t blame yourself for his weight - loads of cat owners leave food down and don’t have any issues - it really does depend on the cat!

5kg! Wow!

Yes two of our cats are absolutely fine regulating themselves. The other has been gradually piling on the pounds. I was just looking back at some old photos and realised quite how big she has got!

Did you not have any issues with the overweight cat stealing food from the others? Did you feed them all together or separate them for meals?

We fed them together but stayed in the room to supervise - but he’s actually quite a submissive cat, so he never stole, just grazed because he could, I think! It’s the youngest (orange of course!) who steals and has to regularly be removed from his brothers’ bowls!

I think we will have to give it a try. She’s so domineering - if the one of the other two is eating and she decides she wants their bowl, they just back down and let her have it! But they all get on well (they just accept she rules the roost!) - my worry with controlling food is that it might create a bit of drama between them.

I guess we can only try it out and if it’s too difficult then we spend the money to get microchip bowls so the other two get their dinner protected!

I have to regulate Tobias, as he can be a bit of a fatty, but Girlcat has been a grazer since the day she came home long before him. I leave Lightweight formula dry down, so though he's eating enough in his mind it's fewer calories.

Doesn't seem to have affected Girlcat's weight, and if she started to lose some I can always sneak her the odd extra treat 😉

We had three and eventually got the microchip feeders, when one needed to go onto special food. Very expensive but really worth it and I wish we had got them sooner, it was reassuring to see how much they were each eating, including our smallest cat, and meant no one could steal from her.

Two of them used them confidently from the start but our scaredy cat took a little while as they have to hover by the right feeder for a moment while it senses the chip and opens. He kept approaching the wrong one / jumped if he happened to find the right one! The feeders have a few intermediate training settings and he got there in the end.

It’s good to know it’s been worth the investment for you and that the cats got the hang of it (one of ours I didn’t think would ever figure out the microchip cat flap but got there in the end!)

What my DSis did when one of hers was stealing from the other was to feed less but more often. She'd feed just enough so the little one ate as much as she wanted each time while the bigger (in all directions!) one was occupied with her own bowl.

I don't know how that may work with more than 2 cats though, or whether your own schedule would allow it.