As humans, we make numerous mistakes in feeding ourselves every day. We either have too much or too little basic requirements in our daily diets. It makes it hardly surprising that we make the same fundamental errors when it comes to feeding our cats. We never realize these mistakes until the cat falls ill from the wrong diets they have been subjected to.

So how then do you know what is proper and what is not? If you are here, then you are in the right place. This article aims to let you know some of the feeding mistakes you are committing knowingly and unknowingly.

We will be taking a look at some cat feeding mistakes below.

Feeding a Cat with Dog food

Giving a Cat food that is meant for a Dog is one of the more common mistakes people make in feeding a cat. This is likely to happen in a household that has a lot of pets around, leaving their pets to eat from whatever feeding bowl they come across.

This, unfortunately, causes various and serious health complications in the health of such pets. A cat feeding off dog food doesn’t get the essential protein and taurine requirements it needs from a daily dose of food consumption.

A dog that feeds on a cat’s diet eventually ends up having kidney problems and being obese as cat foods are fattier.

Too Little Water In A Cat’s Diet

As humans, we cannot overemphasize the amount of water we should consume daily for the proper functioning of our body systems. The same goes for cats, as an adult cat’s body weight consists of 60-70% of water alone. A water deficiency problem in a cat’s diet can have serious health implications.

Wet foods go a long way in making up a cat’s daily intake of water, but several sources of fresh water should be made available in the house, especially in areas where the cat likes to be. Some cats have a distaste for tap water as they don’t like the taste of chlorine that comes along with it whilst some others have a preference for running water.

A great way to make cats drink more is by:

• Getting fresh catnip leaves,
• Crush the leaves in the cat’s drinking bowl and fill it with water. A cat will be more encouraged to drink more water when that is done.

Giving A Cat Too Much Tuna

A steady diet of tuna in a cat’s meal isn’t ideal for the general health of a cat as it results in malnutrition. This is because tuna does not have adequate amounts of Vitamin E. This could lead to the cat having a health case of yellow fat disease or Steatites as is known in veterinary medicine.

Cats can also become addicted to tuna because of its strong smell and taste, to the detriment of feeding off other types of food. Tuna junkies have the problem of forming the habit of not developing a taste for any other kind of food.

A steady and slow case of Mercury poisoning will also occur from a steady diet of tuna. It is advised to add tuna as part of a cat’s diet sparingly.

Raw Fish Feeding

Feeding a cat with raw fish is terrible as it usually results in a case of thiamine deficiency. Fresh fish in itself contains the enzyme thiamine which rapidly breaks down vitamin B components of the body system.

Thiamine deficiency usually results in loss of appetite and extreme cases death. There is also the risk of parasite infection of the cat when you fed him with raw fish. Cats do prefer a diet filled with meat in contrast to fresh fish.

Giving Milk Frequently

Most cats past the weaning stage of their lives, develop zero tolerance for lactose. Milk treat once in a while as part of a cat’s diet is good but making it a frequent part results in severe cases of diarrhea for the cat as well as dehydration.

Offering You Cat Table Scraps

A cat diet made up of more than 10% table scraps leads to a lot of deficiencies as the table scraps are mostly fatty and filled with spices. Apart from the nutritional deficiencies, a table scraps diet could lead to a cat forming bad habits such as stealing of food off the table, begging for food.

Also, injuries to a cat’s esophagus resulting from eating table scraps food that is bony is a significant occurrence as well as choking

Placing Cats On A Vegetarian Diet

Placing a cat on a diet of no meat is denying a cat of its vitamin A requirements which it gets from eating meat. A cat’s diet lacking in vitamin A could lead to death. Cats as carnivores need their daily dose of meat.

Giving A Cat Too Many Supplements

Once a cat has been placed on a well-balanced diet, giving him more supplements is of no need as this could make the food taken in more toxic for the cat. The addition of more supplements to a cat’s diet, if it’s prepared at home, should be done after consultation with a veterinary doctor, who will give a measured quantity of supplements to be given to the cat.

Inappropriate Life Feeding Stages

Feeding a cat with the right type of food at various stages of its life is of the essence in the general health of a cat. For example, the food for a kitten different from that of an adult cat as that of the kitten contains more proteins and fat than that required by an adult cat.

There are also specific diets for feeding cats when they are going through therapy. Some feeds are for adult cats, some for cats that are developing and some are for inactive cats to make them more energetic.

Further advice should be sought after from a veterinary doctor as regards a cat’s diet to ensure a cat gets a well-balanced diet for every feeding stage of its life.

Feeding A Cat Too Many Treats

Treats don’t contain the necessary nutritional requirements that a cat needs and you should not use them as a replacement for a well-balanced diet. Feeding a kitten with too many treats at an early stage results in the cat having a distaste towards it been introduced to a regular cat’s food.

You can make use of treats mostly in the training of a cat and in aiding behavioral modifications of a cat. Feeding cats with treats in little portions are ideal, especially in training.

But if a cat is obese, separating a portion of its daily meals for training purposes is ideal. This helps to reduce the calorie intake of the cat whilst helping in getting the cat to reduce its weight.

Including Garlic To A Cat’s Diet

This is commonly done by people when they notice their cats have a parasitic infection of tapeworms. But this is a great misconception that has tried to veterinary experts have tried correcting.

Adding garlic to a cat’s diet has been known to be very injurious to the cat as it does destroy the red blood cells of the cat.

Getting a prescribed oral deworming medication from a veterinary doctor is advised in contrast to feeding a cat with garlic.

Allowing Your Cat Get Overweight

Obesity is not only growing at an alarming epidemic rate amongst the human race but is also an issue in the pet world. Pets nowadays are been overfed, resulting in many pets having severe obesity issues. Most cats practically engage in no sort of exercise whatsoever as they merely eat and sleep.

Giving a cat too much food without providing adequate exercises leads to a cat becoming obese. Seeking advice from a veterinary doctor on the levels or amount of food to feed a cat daily is very important in dealing with weight problems noticed in a cat.

Obesity can also be caused by feeding a cat with too many treats or feeding a cat the wrong kinds of food. Obesity can be tackled by a gradual reduction in the amount of food supplied to a cat and complementing it with an increased amount in the number of exercises a cat gets.

Healthy Cat Recipes

Healthy recipes for feeding cats have been developed over the years, but some basic recipes for feeding cats healthily have remained as well. A healthy cat makes for a great companion in the house, so one must take pains to give a cat healthy recipes.

Many recipes can be used to feed a cat healthily. These include meat broth, tinned cat foods meat and fish.

• Feeding a cat with fish even though it’s not quite as nourishing as meat for a cat is highly favored by most cats. This is because it is easily digested and highly abundant in minerals. A point of caution is not to make it part of the everyday diet of a cat as they tend to lose the taste for fish when fed too much of it. Too much fish also causes cases of eczema, a cat with bad body odor and problems with digestion.  A well-cooked fish is better than giving a cat raw fish as it reduces cases of Steatites or yellow fat disease, alongside making it easier for one to remove bony parts of the fish that could cause injuries for the cat

• Meat broth is also a healthy recipe to give to a cat. But one should make sure that the broth is not highly seasoned as this could result in digestive problems for the cat as a result of the broth been too spicy. The broth should also be made free of bony scraps while having lots of meat scraps, skin, and gristle for the cat to feed upon.

• Tinned cat foods are a convenient means of healthily feeding cats nowadays. This is as a result of the faith people have in them as a result of the medical research that has been put into making such canned food. The fact that they are also tinned foods specified for the feeding stages of a cat is also of great importance as it helps cats to thrive. Sometimes cats having been used to treats could develop a distaste for canned foods, but this you can remedy this by mixing these canned foods with fresh foods and the cars will get used to eating canned foods with time.

• Fresh meat is best for a cat even though cooking it could be of greater essence. Well-cooked meet, as opposed to raw meat, is preferred if the meat can’t be served fresh. Cats are very picky when it comes to meat that is well cooked in contrast to one that is not well cooked. One has to be observant of which a cat prefers; a lump of meat that is lightly cooked whilst still retaining a little bit of its freshness in contrast to one that is not. If the meat is given to a cat whilst it is fresh, it could be as a result of the cat having a very sensitive nose.

Conclusion

There you have it, the most common feeding mistakes people make while feeding their precious felines. However, this list is not by any means exhaustive. There are loads of other feeding mistakes people tend to make while feeding their cats. Nonetheless, working on these above will take you a step further into having a healthy and happy feline.