Well, it’s official; Dolly is approximately 25% overweight, with a mass of 12.6 pounds. The gut-poking and belly-teasing hasn’t been based on nothing. Sometimes I wish she could talk so that I could know whether she would rather live a life of gluttony and go out like Chris Farley sans the cocaine, or whether she would rather live healthily and restrain her eating. I always leave a dish of food out and it’s obvious that she doesn’t know how to control her eating habits. My decision will probably be to make sure that she’s a healthy weight, instead of spoiling her and letting her eat as much as she wants. That way there’s less chance of diabetes, heart disease, or other health complications down the road. I could start cutting back on the amount of food I give her, or start buying diet food, but for now I’ll just monitor her weight. 25% I can live with, but any more and I’ll have to take action. After all, I like having a kitty that has a bit of a paunch. I’ve come to identify the belly swaying walk with her now. And as Aaron says, “A fat cat is a happy cat.”
Actually, a fat cat is an unhappy cat — one extra pound on a cat is the equivalent to about 10 extra pounds on us, possibly more.
As you said, it runs the risk of diabetes and such, but also heart disease, arthritis, and many many other ailments.
A fat cat is a less playful one, if nothing else.
Finally, it’s quite easy to adjust Dolly’s weight, especially as she is the only cat in the house. For one, if she’s over a year old, you can switch her to adult “less active” formula foods, or you can simply monitor her food and ensure she doesn’t get more than the recommended dosage (which tend to be generous to begin with) per day. Put her food for the day in a measuring cup, and don’t exceed it, or just use a measuring cup to dole out how much she gets.
Feeding cats at regularly scheduled mealtimes is better for them than leaving food out all day (although many cats won’t eat all of their food in one sitting anyhow).
Forgive the lecture, but it’s left over from working at the animal hospital where diets were a large concern, as well as seeing the change in my cats when their weights went up and down.
She isn’t the only cat though, and its funny because you say a fat cat is less playful because Dolly is much more playful than Nala, who is the correct weight.
Not the mention the fact that Dolly is the happiest cat that I know.
That’s as much personality as weight, though.
Sorry, I thought there was only one cat in the household.
There was, but we just moved in together so our feline saturation has been doubled :)
I think my demon beast needs company, or at least someone to keep her in line. Too bad my place is so small. :P
My point was the fact that I’m happy as long as my cat is happy.
Hi I saw you were talking about your cat ;-)
I’m a black labrador called Sam, and im chairman of http://www.sempo-tahoe.com
(a search engine club for animals)
We have a major inequality problem with our species distribution and we would really like some cats to join.
We’re having soooo much fun and we’d love it if your pets would join too!
Regards
Sam ~ Woof Woof!