New cat constantly looking for food

[Bichette]

We have just adopted a cat, he’s been with us for a week now. He has settled in really well - he’s friendly and confident, not hiding away at all. The problem is he’s is CONSTANTLY looking for food. We can’t eat any meals or do any cooking with him in the same room as he is jumping on the table and work tops. He is trying to jump in the fridge whenever you open it, he’s in the dishwasher trying to lick the dirty plates and he bolts his food down as if he hasn’t been fed for a week. He doesn’t look particularly thin as he has longish fur but he feels quite bony. He weighs 4 kg but has a large frame with a big head and feet. At the shelter he was getting 1 pouch of wet food a day and 35g of dry food split into 3 meals and after a discussion with them we have upped his dry food ration to 40g but he is still hungry all the time. Apparently he was given up to the shelter as he wasn’t getting on with another cat but not surprising imo as he wasn’t neutered and wasn’t allowed out. He is now neutered and will be allowed out in a couple of weeks. Anyone have any advice? I wonder if just giving him unlimited biscuits might calm him down and help him self regulate his appetite or is that a recipe for disaster?

Cat tax

I've always free fed dry and given wet twice a day with new rescues. At the start it seems to help them settle to know that food isn't scarce. As they settle and I learn their habits I'll adjust the schedules/amounts.

He might benefit from a puzzle feeder to slow him down and keep him busy.

As he's so food motivated you could also use that to teach him tricks!

I would split the wet pouch half in morning and half evening. And unlimited good quality dry food. Maybe once he knows it's always available he will chill out. (Or maybe he will eat so much he makes himself sick...) But try it.

I also have a puzzle feeder - more to stimulate my cat when we aren't around, but you could try it.

Also a water fountain....in case he's thirsty and doesn't recognise that.

FosterCat was like that when he first came to me. He's really calmed down a lot now, though still pesters for my food when I sit down to eat. If yours was a stray he will have never known when his next meal was coming from and that I think causes food insecurity.

Get a slow/puzzle feeder, make sure you feed at set times of the day (including any dry food) and use a timed feeder for when you are out of the house. Cats like that routine. Edited to Add: i don't free feed him dry as he often eats it too fast and vomits, so he gets smaller portions more frequently during the day.

If he continues to be ravenous I'd get get him to the vet for a blood test as constant hunger can indicate thyroid issues (and other medical conditions). I did that for FC and he was normal for thyroid but does have Inflammatory bowel disease meaning he wasn't absorbing the nutrients from his food and probably feeling hungry as a result. He's put on 1kg since I've had him on a special diet, which he needed as was very scrawny.

Thanks for all this advice. He wasn’t a stray but wasn’t an only cat so maybe there was some competition at mealtimes. Though he had been in the shelter for about 5 weeks where he was fed 3 times a day. I am putting his biscuits in an egg cup tray and have a puzzle feeder on order for the wet food.

That’s nowhere near enough food. I would give him at least two full pouches of wet a day.

Ideally I would like to get him off the wet food eventually. All our other cats have been on dry food only. Maybe once he can go out and catch some mice, we are very rural.

My cat was like that when he came to us from a shelter. He'd been neglected and starved so it took him a long time to realise that he would always be kept fed. About a year in was the first time he didn't bolt his food the minute I put it down (and this was so out of character I phoned the vet in alarm). Two things helped which were keeping to a rigid feeding schedule of breakfast/ dinner/ second dinner and swapping to a natural/whole meat food. The latter we did in response to vet's advice for stomach troubles, but it actually really helped him be less anxious around food.

Male cats should never have a solely dry food diet as it increases their risk of urinary blockages.

He probably doesn't feel secure yet, he has no idea if you are going to keep feeding him or not so he keeps asking. Our cat was like that when she first came to us, even though she had come from a loving home where she had been well looked after. Whenever she goes to her bowl, which might be several times a day, we put a small amount of dry food in it. She doesn't obsess over food because she knows that it is always available and just eats as and when she wants and isn't overweight.

One of my girls was like this when she first came to me. She’d been fighting for most of her life for food. I decided to give her a much as she wanted for the first few weeks and always have a bowl of good quality dry food down also. I wanted her to know that she never had to worry about food in her new home. And this seemed to do the trick as, after about a month, her anxiety disappeared. She now eats perfectly normally.
Your new kitty is very beautiful 🖤

We leave dry food down all day. He will self regulate if you do that

Several years ago we fostered an adult family group of 4 related cats. They were insanely food-driven (my kitchen door looks like a tiger has had a go at it), and it went on for many months before they finally calmed down.

You might find that giving the cat something immediately before your own mealtimes helps enormously, and you won't get pestered for some of yours. Also, they can sometimes be satisfied by a drink instead of food, so do offer cat milk as well. We squirt lik-e-lix into a dish and spread it out thinly so it takes them a while to lick the bowl clean.

How many times a day are you feeding the cat? He's a big boy. At the moment he is confined indoors and doesn't have anything else to think about other than food. To be honest, for now I'd be tempted to give a large cat like him three square meals of wet food a day, with biscuits sprinkled on top to slow down the gobbling. It might be worth buying tins instead, as it works out a lot cheaper if you have a gannet.

I wouldn't leave dry food down ad lib just yet, because he'll gorge himself silly. A pp's idea of a puzzle dry food feeder is really good.

Getting a Feliway plug-in will make him calmer and more relaxed.

Lots of good advice here, thanks. I guess we should just be patient and hope he calms down. On the plus side there are no flies in the kitchen and no crumbs on the floor!

At the moment he is getting 20g of dry food at about 7am then half a pouch of wet food at 9am, another 20g of biscuits at 4pm and then the other half of wet food at 7pm.

I keep food down all the time, I certainly know when the auto feeder is out as I get 3 of them in the kitchen whingeing at me.

Mine are all ex ferals or ex strays, and live mostly outdoors, and I found when we were just dishing it out at specific times they would hanker for it and at times, one would jump up and harass us every time we left the house. They rarely overfeed once they know it is there and they can get it sorted if it runs out.

They get wet food for breakfast 9am ish and again around 6 or 7 pm, I do evenings as well as the mornings in summer to up their liquid intake.

100% keep the wet

This. Also I believe cats like 2 pouches/tins a day, 1 morning and 1 evening with kibble bowl refreshed at lunch time. My male cat who is not overweight often eats 2 little tins at bedtime, 1 in morning and he isn't too keen on kibble. I've tried 4 lots my female cat eats it but he's not keen so eats extra little tins of meat and both cats like half a chicken breast each chopped up. I just pop an extra piece in foil in air fryer when I cook my own piece.

Ok I will do this. I didn’t know that, we mainly had females before

Difficult to see exactly how big he is. My ( very) big male cat would be constantly meowing, begging for food too on such small portions! He has at least 3 pouches of wet food plus dry ad lib plus perhaps a tin of tuna, bits of my chicken etc .

He's not at all fat but does roam far.

That’s not enough food for a big cat like that. He needs to have kibble out for grazing constantly, alongside a big bowl of water, and regular wet.

I say this as the slave of 2 big cats (tax included) one at 8kg and one at 5.5kg

Not every cat can self regulate with free access to kibble.

Of my two one can self regulate to a bit podgy and the other would just keep eating until she was perfectly round and dragging her stomach on the ground.

I had this issue with one of my cats. He'd eat everything in sight and was constantly snatching our food out of our hands and trying to break into everything in the kitchen. He was rapidly putting on weight (like a football at one point) and seemed to get more and more stressed the longer he went without eating.

Turns out he had major food insecurity and needed to know where his next meal was at all times. We put down a huge bowl of kibble - enough to feed him for 3-4 days and he calmed right down. He over ate for a few days but once he trusted that the bowl would always be there and would always be full, he calmed down and ate normally. Within 3 months he was skinny again and maintained a healthy weight. It's been 12 years now and he still panics when the bowl is empty but I rarely let that happen.

Wet food is still his main food source, but the kibble means he knows he has food available and that he'll never starve.

Omg he is GORGEOUS! We have two boys that came to us with food anxiety and were like this- one even stole my dinner off my fork on the way to my mouth once!!!

We tried feeding on demand and DCat1 gained 2kg and had to be dieted back down, which was not fun in a food anxious cat!

So we calculated the exact amount of calories to maintain weight. Both my cats are 6kg, indoor cats and slightly older so get 240 cals a day. Some wet pouches are as low as 30-40 cals and some up to 90 cals for a same sized pouch so it can make a huge difference which brand etc you chose. Our boys are on Hi Life which is only 35 cals a pouch, which means we can feed them more frequently.

They get 2 x Hi Life pouches per day, 40g of biscuits and that leaves 10cals for treats.

Oh and the other thing we did was totally fixed feeding times, like, to the minute (because my cats can apparently tell the time and escalate from meowing to screaming at 7.31am and 5.31pm!). Cats love routine and they find it reassuring when food is the same time every day.