New kitten, How to feed alongside diabetic cat?

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Gracie85

Member Since 2018
We are getting a new kitten tomorrow, from a rescue. She's about 6 months old, but rather small and very thin. Right now she is on dry food only, I think they said Halo-something? but not sure. We have our two adult cats, one of whom is hyperthyroid but controlled by medicine and also borderline diabetic but being managed by diet only, on Fancy Feast now, no dry food anymore. We still have dry food in the house from converting over the adult cats to canned, half a bag of Purina DM and a bag of Tiki Cat Fish Luau.
I'm figuring we get the kitten converted to our lower-carb dry food, while introducing her to canned food, so if the adult cats get into her dry, it won't do any harm. I don't see much difference between kitten dry food formulas and the Tiki Cat. Ultimately, for our sanity, we will get her off dry and eating canned only. At six months old, is regular Fancy Feast good enough for her, or do we need to get some kind of kitten canned food or what?
It's been 12 years since we had a kitten, and I've forgotten everything I knew about feeding one. And, now we have to be careful of what food the diabetic cat can get into, and if it's in the house, he WILL find a way to get into it.
Help? Advice?
 
You can put the dry food on top of the canned and reduce the amount every day. This also reduces the chance of deveoping diarrhea because of the food change. If you can feed the kitten separately that may keep the other cats from eating the dry.
 
Will definitely be feeding the kitten separately, Lamborghini (hyperT & diabetic) is over 13 pounds, he's a big guy, and Ferrari, our other cat, is a bit over 10 pounds, and this kitten is 6 months old but very very light, felt like picking up nothing after being used to our big cats, so I don't think she'd stand a chance against them at feeding time. Right now, having visited the kitten room today to decide if we were going to take her, it appears they are used to having dry food out to free-feed from, there wasn't much out, but there were bowls and some still had food in them. She and her brothers were only brought in from another state this past week, they are all very very skinny, so maybe they didn't have food available all the time? Don't know. She definitely needs to be fed more.
She's part Maine Coon, a fluffy orange bundle of cuddly purrs. Lamborghini is my son's cat, and he graduates college next May and will then take Lambors from us. We were going to wait to get me my cat until then (Ferrari is a family cat, but not a snuggly one at all, and in the past I had a cat I raised from tiny who was my constant companion, and I miss that), but this one came available, so....
Wish us luck. Don't know how we're going to introduce and manage a kitten when we've got two older cats and two dogs and minor construction going on in the house, but I guess we'll figure it out, as it's now or never for getting her, so here we go.....!
 
How do I figure out how much to feed her? What's the calories per pound or age or whatever for kittens? It must be higher than for adult cats, right?
 
I did a bit of research online, here's a sampling of what I found:

https://pets.thenest.com/correct-amounts-food-adult-cats-kittens-9442.html
Amount for Kittens
Kittens need more food per pound of body weight than adult cats because much of what they consume supports growth. Use the feeding guidelines on the label as starting point, but remember to monitor her weight and adjust accordingly. Consult your vet as to how much weight she should be gaining based on your baby’s breed and size. Typical dry food guidelines suggest ¼ to 1/3 cup at each feeding up to about eight weeks of age, then about 1/3 to ¾ cup at each feeding up to about six months of age. If you’re feeding her canned food, feed her as much as she will eat up to about four months of age, divided into three or four feedings per day. Consider the activity level of your kitten, as well. From four to six months, feed her about 2/3 of a 3-oz. can per pound of body weight per day, and from six months to a year, about half a 3-oz. can per pound per day.

https://www.chewy.com/petcentral/how-much-to-feed-your-kitten

https://www.petmd.com/cat/centers/kitten/nutrition/evr_ct_kitten_feeding_schedule

I hope this helps a little bit.
 
Thanks. We will definitely have to weigh her when we get her home today. She feels like absolutely nothing compared to our adult cats. I have a kitchen scale that goes up to 11 pounds, and we get the cat to sit in a big ol' plastic pretzel jar then put that on the scale (big ol' plastic pretzel jars are evidently just as good as boxes, to a cat.)

We have set up a huge crate for her to be in when we are not home, until we are sure she can be safely loose in the house with the other pets (two dogs, who love cats, and the two cats, who...who knows) so that will solve some of the feeding time problems. And we have remembered what we did when we got our current cats as kittens, and had an older, very fat cat (we adopted her that way, looked like a fur-covered beach ball) that we were slimming down. We got a dollar-store laundry basket, and taped it upside down to a tray, then cut a kitten-sized hole in it, and kept the kittens' food inside that. Fat Callie was too big to get in. She did learn to reach through and pull the bowls to the doorway, so we had to tape them down at the back of the basket, so they couldn't move. But it worked. And as the kittens grew, we kept cutting the hole a little bigger so they could fit. Since we never got Fat Callie under 14 pounds (she started at about 20), this worked until the young ones were big enough to be on adult food and they could just all share.

There's such variability in the recommended amounts, like "1/3-3/4 cup each feeding". Wish I could find a recommendation for the calories per pound, but it's not searching up easily.
 
They should have a scale there that might be more accurate....if they do, ask them to weigh her before you leave.

There's a general starting calorie formula for cats that's {weight in lbs x 13.6} + 70....so a 10lb cat you'd start at about 206 calories per day and then adjust as needed to maintain, gain or lose weight. Weigh the cat once a week.

On the Food Chart on Dr. Lisa's site, she has the calorie count of a lot of commercially available foods listed. (along with the percentage of carbs...for a diabetic, you want under 10% carbs) Most of them will have how many k/cal per ounce they contain somewhere on the label too (if you can read microscopic print)

If you're going to be continuing to offer dry for awhile, that k/cal per ounce should be listed somewhere on the bag too (or on their website)

We're all looking forward to seeing a picture of your new family member!!
 
My new kitten was also fed dry so when we brought him home we started adding kitten FF. He LOVES the FF and eats that first. Once we are done with the dry bag, we will be solely on FF. I don’t think you should have any problems getting the new kitty to eat FF since it appears to be more tasty than the dry food. :)
 
I just feed kittens as much as they want. They sometimes eat as much or more than a grown cat. Lol
 
This is Maggie. She's a Maine Coon mix and about six months old.
Maggie Concert Nutcracker 168.JPG
 
Gave her a little Fancy Feast, plain, and she wouldn't touch it. Seemed like she didn't know what it was for. At dinnertime will mix it in with a little kibble and see if that helps. Could not get her weighed, she won't stay still long enough, even in a box or a jar; but I think she's less than 5 pounds, so she definitely needs some bulking up.
We are in love.....
 
On my, now that's a Maine Coon tail for sure! And she looks like she has the big round Maine Coon paws too. I love Idjit's big ole round paws. I would be in love with that little darling too. :cat::bighug:
 
Chris & China said:
She is ADORABLE!!! Of course you're in love......so am I!!!!

What's your address again?.....LOL
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They have another one, a bit lighter and a bit younger than her, there still, if you're willing to drive to the northeast coast....if we didn't already have two adult cats, we'd have two kittens and they'd have none....
 
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Gracie85 said:
if we didn't already have two adult cats, we'd have two kittens and they'd have none....
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Awww....kittens are always better in two's!!….and they're wonderful and cheap home entertainment too!

If you have older cats, they can also keep each other company so the older cats don't get "hassled" as much to play.

I'm in Missouri and have 3 of my own, so driving all the way up there isn't real convenient....but she sure is gorgeous!! I'm sure she'll make you very happy!!
 
Chris & China said:
Awww....kittens are always better in two's!!….and they're wonderful and cheap home entertainment too!

If you have older cats, they can also keep each other company so the older cats don't get "hassled" as much to play.

I'm in Missouri and have 3 of my own, so driving all the way up there isn't real convenient....but she sure is gorgeous!! I'm sure she'll make you very happy!!
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Along with the now 3 cats, we have 2 dogs, one of whom is just flippin' nuts, and about 55 small birds, finches and budgies (parakeets), and 2 very old degus who are not long for this world. And, within the next 10 months, we are moving 700 miles as hubby's job is relocating us. Now is not the time to get one new cat, let alone two, but....there before me on petfinder was the fluffy orange kitty that I have always wanted!!! How could I pass her up?
 

  • Gracie85 said:
    Along with the now 3 cats, we have 2 dogs, one of whom is just flippin' nuts, and about 55 small birds, finches and budgies (parakeets), and 2 very old degus who are not long for this world. And, within the next 10 months, we are moving 700 miles as hubby's job is relocating us. Now is not the time to get one new cat, let alone two, but....there before me on petfinder was the fluffy orange kitty that I have always wanted!!! How could I pass her up?
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    your husband needs to block that site on your computer. Lol. Petfinder is where I found my CC. Her name on there at the time was Hermione. I saw her and knew she was the one. I went to meet her and they brought up 2 or 3 other cats and I was like yes, they are nice.... But Bring me Hermione. The second they put her down and she walked through the room, tail up like she owned the place, I knew she was the one. :) good luck with your new friend.
 
Hurray! She has figured out that canned food is FOOD! Good Food!
Ate almost a whole quarter of a can of Fancy Feast all at once this afternoon. She likes fish flavors. Cannot imagine her little tummy could hold a whole lot more than that at once. But if I feed her 4-5-6 times a day, while having the dry food always available as well, maybe we can expand her little tummy to eat more at once and get her to fill out and grow. She's six months old, and I don't think weighs quite 5 pounds from her brief moments on our scale (kitchen scale, so it's accurate that low).
Lamborghini is now over 13 pounds, which is right where he should be, and gets 3/4 can FF four times a day. Ferrari is 10 pounds, which is a touch heavy, and gets 1/2 can FF four times a day (she was threatening to fight Lambors for his food when we tried to skim hers down any more, so there she stays for now.) If we can get Maggie up to half a can four times a day, plus whatever dry she wants in between, that should be good for now, right?
Read that kittens can use up to 100 calories per pound per day, but that would put her at eating more than 5 cans of FF a day, which seems insane. The pile of food would be half as big as the cat!
The rescue had Maggie on Earthborn Holistic, Seafood flavor, dry food. Does anyone have the carb count on that? Wondering how careful we need to be that Lamborghini doesn't get into it. Tho he seems to NOT like fish, so that may help us. My rough look at the numbers on this Earthborn dry tell me it's probably not good in terms of carbs, but I could most definitely be wrong.....anyone?
 
Gracie85 said:
Does anyone have the carb count on that?
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I get about 24% carbs so way too high for a diabetic. Grain Free doesn't mean carb free...they just replaced the grains with stuff like potatoes, peas, etc.

Gracie85 said:
Hurray! She has figured out that canned food is FOOD! Good Food!
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YEAH!!!

Gracie85 said:
Read that kittens can use up to 100 calories per pound per day, but that would put her at eating more than 5 cans of FF a day, which seems insane. The pile of food would be half as big as the cat!
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Yeah that's crazy....a normally active adult requires "about" 20 calories per pound.....to eat 100 calories per pound, I think we'd be talking about a baby lion, not a baby cat!!
 
100 calories per lb is very different than the FF recommendations of 1 can per 3-3.5 lb for s kitten. We quickly realized that Shinoda (at 3 lb when we got him) could eat 2-3 times that. I didn’t see the recommendations about 100 calories per pound - could you please post your reference?

Right now we are still feeding him 1 can FF per day plus as much dry as he wants. He was up to 4 lb on our second visit at only 3 months. He doesn’t seem overweight, but I am very concerned since my kitty Bella has been overweight since she was a kitten. Im really not sure how much I’m supposed to be feeding him. I don’t want to under or overfeed. :nailbiting:
 
I did not save the reference. I went searching for info on feeding kittens, and looked at a number of sources, picking ones with more of an unbiased or scientific base, not ones with an intent (like drawing in customers to their practice or product).
The 20 cal per pound for an adult cat is for an INDOOR adult cat. The 25-35 cal per pound many sources say, especially the cat food companies, is for an OUTDOOR cat by the time you are at the top of the range. Didn't make sense to me why there would be such a difference in recommendations, 20 cal/lb vs 35 cal/lb, until one source clearly mentioned the indoor vs outdoor difference. Outdoor cats have a much higher activity level than indoor ones do.

The 1 can (3 oz) per 3-3.5 lbs of cat is what they recommend for adults, from what I've read. Without comparing the calories per can to the weight of the cat, that's a very vague recommendation they're making.

Considering the activity level of kittens, it's no surprise that they would need many more calories per pound than an adult cat does, just based on what they need to support all that movement! Then add in more calories to enable growing, and it's no wonder the kitten recommendations say things like double the needs of an adult and more, and even as high as 100 cal/pound.

Maggie is very thin, you can feel all the contours of her hip bones and shoulder bones and ribs. She's also less than an average kitten of 6 months old, which would typically be 6 pounds (I've read in more than one place it's about a pound a month up to 6 months). And she's half Maine Coon, which is a big breed, so while she could be taking after her non-MC parent, typically she should end up large, if not huge, because of the MC. But the being bone-skinny alone indicates she has not been fed quite enough up to this point. What I've always been told for dogs and cats is that you should be able to still feel their ribs, but not feel their rib-bones themselves. Is why I've been trying to find concrete recommendations for feedign numbers, clearly she needs more, but I don't know how much.
 
Here, this is the feeding recommendations from Chewy.com on one flavor of FF (classic seafood pate):
Feeding Instructions
Feed an average size adult cat 1 can per 3 to 3 1/2 lbs of body weight daily. Feed up to twice this amount to kittens. Pregnant or nursing cats may require two to four times their normal feeding.

But other types have different directions. Suspect someone was not paying attention and did a little too much copy-and-paste on some of these.
 
OMG, she's so cute! She looks a lot like my girl Pants -- Maggie is teenier, but they've got the same ridiculous tail floof!
 
Gracie85 said:
I did not save the reference. I went searching for info on feeding kittens, and looked at a number of sources, picking ones with more of an unbiased or scientific base, not ones with an intent (like drawing in customers to their practice or product).
The 20 cal per pound for an adult cat is for an INDOOR adult cat. The 25-35 cal per pound many sources say, especially the cat food companies, is for an OUTDOOR cat by the time you are at the top of the range. Didn't make sense to me why there would be such a difference in recommendations, 20 cal/lb vs 35 cal/lb, until one source clearly mentioned the indoor vs outdoor difference. Outdoor cats have a much higher activity level than indoor ones do.

The 1 can (3 oz) per 3-3.5 lbs of cat is what they recommend for adults, from what I've read. Without comparing the calories per can to the weight of the cat, that's a very vague recommendation they're making.

Considering the activity level of kittens, it's no surprise that they would need many more calories per pound than an adult cat does, just based on what they need to support all that movement! Then add in more calories to enable growing, and it's no wonder the kitten recommendations say things like double the needs of an adult and more, and even as high as 100 cal/pound.

Maggie is very thin, you can feel all the contours of her hip bones and shoulder bones and ribs. She's also less than an average kitten of 6 months old, which would typically be 6 pounds (I've read in more than one place it's about a pound a month up to 6 months). And she's half Maine Coon, which is a big breed, so while she could be taking after her non-MC parent, typically she should end up large, if not huge, because of the MC. But the being bone-skinny alone indicates she has not been fed quite enough up to this point. What I've always been told for dogs and cats is that you should be able to still feel their ribs, but not feel their rib-bones themselves. Is why I've been trying to find concrete recommendations for feedign numbers, clearly she needs more, but I don't know how much.
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Just feed her as much as she wants to eat.
 
Olive & Paula said:
She is beautiful. But I don't recall a car that's called Maggie. Mercedes perhaps would work.
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But Mercedes is some stuffy greek goddess with her hair all done up .....

What about "Mag wheels"? That's a car thing, or it was. Once upon a time, long ago, they were about the coolest thing a teenager could want...
 
Gracie85 said:
Here, this is the feeding recommendations from Chewy.com on one flavor of FF (classic seafood pate):
Feeding Instructions
Feed an average size adult cat 1 can per 3 to 3 1/2 lbs of body weight daily. Feed up to twice this amount to kittens. Pregnant or nursing cats may require two to four times their normal feeding.

But other types have different directions. Suspect someone was not paying attention and did a little too much copy-and-paste on some of these.
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Omg I have to look again! I could have sworn it didn’t have the seconds part about feeding twice as much to kittens! My poor guy!!! Thank goodness we were feeding him dry also because otherwise he would be starving :(
 
This is from chewy’s website and it’s also what it says on the kitten can. Definitely doesn’t make sense bc that’s what they say to feed to the adult cats. Kitten food is probably higher in calories but not double!
F220A1C4-A463-4B7F-A442-56E94358AB58.png
 
Gracie85 said:
But Mercedes is some stuffy greek goddess with her hair all done up .....

What about "Mag wheels"? That's a car thing, or it was. Once upon a time, long ago, they were about the coolest thing a teenager could want...
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Wheels is a car part, your others are cars. In sticking with that theme how about Maserati.? I do like Maggie though.
 
Ana & Frosty (GA) said:
This is from chewy’s website and it’s also what it says on the kitten can. Definitely doesn’t make sense bc that’s what they say to feed to the adult cats. Kitten food is probably higher in calories but not double!View attachment 41167
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If you look at the nutritional info, the kitten cans have the same calories as the adult cans.
Something is not right in their system. All of these things cannot be correct.
 
Olive & Paula said:
Wheels is a car part, your others are cars. In sticking with that theme how about Maserati.? I do like Maggie though.
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Yeah, I know.
Ferrari was named first, this was back when son was 9 and daughter was 5 and son especially was a rabid Formula 1 fan with his Dad. Every other Sunday for half a year was lost to watching the race. Michael Schumacher and Ferrari reigned supreme. So, our new kitten became Ferrari, both for Fur-ari and for her speed. Then, a few months later when we got another kitten to be her companion (so she'd leave old Fat Callie alone), we continued with the high end cars, and named him Lamborghini.

But, son is away finishing college, daughter couldn't care less about joining in the racing fanaticism, and even hubby only follows it occasionally. To me, a car is just a tool to get you where you need to go within legal and local limitations, anything more than that is unnecessary (so many of you are gasping in horror and disbelief, I know). So my pretty little fluffy orange cat is not going to be named some ugly-sounding car name like Maserati or Bugati. I think she is going to stay Maggie. Maggiekins. Mags. The Mag-inator (she has yet to learn that feet are not for attacking).

Her Royal Lioness, Princess Maggie Amber Eyes of the Fluffy Tail.

(we once had a dilute calico cat--pale orange, white, and grey splattered overall--named Peaches and Cream with Mold (blame hubby) and a hamster named Mrs. Darth Fluffypants Soot Plow (don't ask). Many of our pets need ridiculous titles. They just do.)
 
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