New cat - food portion help please

[Verbena91]

We have a new rescue cat coming and have bed. Advised for the time being to give her 3 meals a day, 1 x whiskas pouch each morning and night and 20g of dry purina one in the afternoon. (We will try moving her into healthier food once she’s settled)

The problem is she’s due to arrive and my kitchen scales have broken! So I can’t measure out the 20g of purina dry. Can anyone advise roughly what that portion size looks like in tablespoons for example? I have ordered new scales!

I just shove a handful in the bowl!

Two pouches in the morning and two in late afternoon, then cover the bottom of a small bowl with biscuits for overnight. Play with her and make sure she has mental and physical stimulation.

Also, a young cat still growing needs more food than an older one. Younger is under 3.

if you read the side of whiskers they recommend 4 pouches a day! Don’t worry about weighing too much but 20g is not a lot at all. What age is your cat? Read the guidelines on the food not what they are telling yours a lot of cats I foster would think the world had ended if I fed them that amount 🤣 my own cat is a dick with food so he currently gets 1 tin a day as he wastes it and then his bowl is full of biscuits and he free eats that and never finishes the bowl. For ref he’s around 5kg

How much you feed is determined by the weight/size of the cat. I have a large male cat who gets 2 X pouches or a pouch and a tin am and pm. He's not too keen on Purina kibble. My small female cat likes 1 pouch or tin am and pm and loves a bit of Purina kibble at lunch time and I leave a bit out for overnight. I give a handful of the Purina kibble.

Like humans, different cats need and/or want different amounts and types of food. Mine currently get 2-2.5 pouches a day between them depending on how quickly they clean up their morning & evening pouches, and have 2 different types of kibble down 24/7. Girlcat eats more kibble, Tobias prefers the wet.

Tobias has digestion issues so I'll feed him as much as he wants in the hope at least some will get absorbed, but Girlcat is only a very little bit heavier now than she was 10 years ago which is not unusual for a 12 year old cat compared to a 2 year old.

Thanks. To be clear I have had cats before so I know different cats eat different amounts but the shelter are saying this is the quantity she needs.

I weigh my cats dry food out too as one is getting podgy. Just checked and 3 ish flat tablespoons is 20g give or take. That was using a normal kitchen spoon not a proper measuring one.

Yes I'd say a flat 3 tablespoons is about right. Not Purina, but my cat gets a 30ml scoop / 1/8 cup measure and that is just under 15g

Mine get a pouch each morning and teatime and I leave biscuits and water down for them to graze on anytime they want. They never eat all the biscuits

2x 75g wet food. Biscuits always out but rarely eaten.

I think 20g is a heaped tablespoon.

20g is lighter than a packet of crisps is not much at all

@Verbena91 We were told at the CP shelter that as she mostly ate at night she preferred dry purina biscuits and 1 pouch of felix original.
That soon all changed when she stopped hiding and came out and asked for food! She soon turned her nose up at the biscuits- although we still put some down (royal canin hairball though as she has long fur).
3 pouches felix as good as and 1 pouch sheba a day
treats of chicken

Thank you @LemonGelatothat's really helpful