How much to feed my cats?

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monty_dweezil (GA)

monty_dweezil (GA)

Member Since 2014
Ok, so i'm confused again. Lol.

We are feeding Dweezil more moist food now and unsure of exactly how much to feed him each day.

The Ziwipeak cans say to give him four per day. FOUR per day!!!? They are 180g i think, so about double the FF size cans. He could not eat that much in a day!

He tends to eat half a can at breakfast and half at dinner. Then he has a very small amount of his royal canin diabetic biscuits before i go to work and before i go to bed.

But is this enough food?

For cats on all wet food diets, how do they get sufficient protein when dry foods have say, 50g and wet foods have say, 10%?
 
Well, the cat food cans or tins often overstate the amount of food our kitties need.

One formula for gauging how much to feed your cat is based on calories and weight. Let's see if I can out this in kilos for you. Ok, 33 calories per kilo of ideal weight + 70.
So if Dweezil weighs 4.54 kilos that would be 33 * 4.54 + 70 or roughly 220 calories a day.

So check the cans/tins of food to see how many calories are in them and give him the amount that would be roughly 220 calories. Adjust food intake up or down as needed.

When Wink first came to live with me, he was unregulated, he was eating 11 ounces of food a day. He is now eating around 5.5 to 6 ounces or about 180 calories of maintain his weight.

One good way I check, is to weigh Wink at least once a week, pre-breakfast. If his weight is down a bit, increase the food by a tiny bit. If his weight is up a bit, decrease the food a bit.

For the second part of your question, we'll wait for @BJM to come on later this morning. I've tagged her by putting that @ sign and then her user name, so she'll come look.

Sorry, back to bed for me. It's 1:30 am on the east coast of the USA. Insomnia, couldn't sleep, so thought I'd pop on to read a few posts.
 
Thank you! I've got two good friends on the East so i know very well the time difference (new jersey and orlando) :)

Dweezil weighs 5.6kg at the moment. Hmm. I must do some calculations.
 
On the actual can label it says to feed two cans per 3kg of weight. But i just realised my cans are not the 170g ones, but are 80g i think.
 
I'm free feeding 16 cats. It seems to work out to 1/4 to 1/2 ounce of food per pound (divide by 2.2 to get amount per kg) per 12 hours. Subdividing into mini-meals helps if you've a scarfer.
Edited to fix math above.
The canned foods are designed to provide enough protein, fat, etc for the cat. You can take the can values (%), which are minimums or maximums, and multiply the weight to see how many grams are in the can.
Ex 11% protein * 80 grams = 8.8 grams protein in the can.
Per Cat Info you may add 20-25% plain meat or poultry, then portion out, to boost the protein and reduce the fat and carb proportions.
 
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Hmmm. I need to still get my non-mathematical brain around this. :)

I also read on the Fancy Feast site that they recommend one can per 1kg of weight. What!? So Dweezil would have 5.5 cans and Monty 6 cans each day!? Oh my god! Lol
 
Dweezil is a big boy at 5.6 kg (about 12 pounds)!

I'd probably be feeding him between 4.5-6 ounces of food am and pm; that'd be 1.5 to 2 of the 3 ounce cans per 12 hours. You'd adjust based on weight maintenance.
 
Lol. Easy to do (hence my uncertainty over amounts!)

Yes, he is quite stocky. A manx breed. Very strong with wide shoulders and a little butt, heh. He does not LOOK big though anymore. He used to be 6.2kg 1-2 years ago.

Brother Monty is 5.8kg and used to be 5.5kg. Too much Diabetic dry food! (We are weening them off it)
 
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