UNHEALTHY CAT ALERT!!!!!!?

You're going to want to put your cat on a high quality wet/canned food. Wet food has far less carbohydrates in it than dry so it makes weight loss easier, plus it's healthier for cats anyway.

The reason is, in the wild, cats normally get most of their water content directly from their prey items and drink very little. Domestic cats are no different, and because of the fact that they are designed to take in water with their meal, they have a very low thirst drive. Cats often just don't drink enough. This leads to urinary tract infections and crystals. The bit about dry food being better for teeth is a myth and has not been proven in the least (cats barely even chew their dry food and, really, does a pretzel clean /your/ teeth? Cats should have their teeth brushed with cat toothbrushes and cat toothpaste at least a few times a week as well as see the vet for dental cleanings when necessary /regardless/ of what they are being fed). Canned/wet food is better because it more closely mimics the cat's natural diet. More on why canned food is best:

http://www.catinfo.org/ (Excellent cat nutrition information by a vet)

http://cats.about.com/cs/catfood/a/canned_food.htm (Canned Cat Food: Can Your Cat Afford to Live Without it?)

http://www.littlebigcat.com/index.php?action=libra... (Why Cats Need Canned Food)

http://www.felinefuture.com/nutrition/bpo_ch4.php (The Dry Food Crisis)

http://maxshouse.com/feline_nutrition.htm (Max's House: Feline Nutrition)

Another option to get cats to drink more would be a cat fountain. Cats tend to like to drink from running water and cat fountains see to that need, encouraging cats to take in more water.

Make sure the food is a high quality one. A high quality cat food also won't have as many carbohydrates and grains in it.

Examples of low quality foods to avoid: Anything you can find in a grocery store will be low end, Purina, Iams, Eukanuba, Science Diet, Royal Canin, Whiskas, Fancy Feast, Friskies, Meow Mix.

Examples of high quality foods to look for: Innova, Wellness, Solid Gold, Felidae, Fromm Four Star, Merrick, GO Natural, Nature's Variety Prairie, Nature's Logic, Artemis Fresh Mix, Timber Wolf Organics.

Seriously on a budget? Two of the most affordable of the higher quality foods would be Chicken Soup for the Cat Lover's Soul and Felidae.

You could even go entirely grain free. Diets high in grain/carbohydrates have been attributed to problems with diabetes in cats. Many of the high quality foods now put out grainless formulas. Some good grainless diets include: Innova EVO, Wellness CORE, Blue Wilderness, Nature's Variety Instinct, Orijen, Horizon Legacy, Merrick Before Grain, Fromm Surf & Turf, Now!, Sold Gold Indigo Moon, Ziwipeak, and Taste of the Wild.

Remember that foods should be switched gradually (mixing the new slowly in with the old over the period of about week or so), especially when switching to a higher quality one, so as not to upset tummies. For example:

Days 1 & 2: 75% old food, 25% new food

Days 3 & 4: 50% old food, 50% new food

Days 5 & 6: 25% old food, 75% new food

Day 7: 0% old food, 100% new food

If you're freefeeding... STOP. This is the fast lane to feline obesity. Read the feeding guidelines on your cat's food and feed accordingly. Adult cats are typically fed two meals a day.

Lastly, you want to keep your cat active. Get your cat engaged in games and playtime!

Darksong~

It's not a matter of over feeding him,It is what you are feeding him that is causing the problem

Nutrition since there are so many bad things out there is very important to your cat’s health

Contrary to what you may have heard; dry foods are not a great thing to feed a cat.

Please read the label on what you are feeding? What are the ingredients? Do you know what they mean? Is the first ingrediant a muscle meat like chicken or meal or other things?

http://www.catinfo.org/#Learn_How_To_Read_a_Pet_Fo...

http://iml.jou.ufl.edu/projects/Spring04/Perhach/P...

Dry foods are the number 1 cause of diabetes in cats as well as being a huge contributing factor to kidney disease, obesity, crystals, u.t.i’s and a host of other problems. Food allergies are very common when feeding dry foods. Rashes, scabs behind the tail and on the chin are all symptoms

The problems associated with Dry food is that they are loaded with grains and carbohydrates which many cats (carnivores) cannot process. Also, Most of the moisture a cat needs is suppose to be in the food but in

Dry, 95% of it is zapped out of dry foods in the processing. Another thing, most use horrible ingredients and don't use a muscle meat as the primary ingredient and use vegetable based protein versus animal. Not good for an animal that has to eat meat to survive.

http://www.catinfo.org/#My_Cat_is_Doing_Just_Fine_...

You want to pick a canned food w/o gravy (gravy=carbs) that uses a muscle meat as the first ingredient and doesn't have corn at least in the first 3 ingredients if at all.

THE BEST CAT FOODS CONTAIN NO GRAINS NO BYPOODUCTS NO MEAL

Cats are meat eaters not cereal or rice eaters

Fancy feast is a middle grade food with 9lives, friskies whiskas lower grade canned and wellness and merrick upper grade human quality foods. I would rather feed a middle grade canned food then the top of the line dry food.

Also, dry food is not proven to be better for teeth. Does a hard pretzel clean your teeth or do pieces of it get stuck? http://www.felinefuture.com/nutrition/bpo_ch4a.php

Please read about cat nutrition.

http://www.catinfo.org/

http://www.catinfo.org/feline_obesity.htm

http://maxshouse.com/feline_nutrition.htm#Dry_Food...

Vetinarian diets The reason your vet thinks so highly of the pet food they sell probably has more to do with money than nutrition. In vet school, the only classes offered on nutrition usually last a few weeks, and are taught by representatives from the pet food companies. Vet students may also receive free food for their own dogs and cats at home. They could get an Iams notebook, a Purina purse and some free pizza. http://iml.jou.ufl.edu/projects/Spring04/Perhach/P...

Like another user, I agree with the idea that its what you are feeding. Switch to a high protein canned food diet (like Wellness), and get the cat off the high carb dry food. Cats are obligate carnivores, that means that they can't digest grains, the manufactures add an enzyme to the dry food to make it possible for a cat to digest this, grains are cheaper than meat in pet food. But grains are not good for cats. Its like living off junk food for a human, all carbs diet isn't good. Cats need lots of protein, up the quality of the diet and the cat should loose weight, I would start with 2 cans a day (5 oz size), one in the evening and one in the morning, and no table food, snacks or dry food left out. This should definitely help him lose weight. When he is skinnier, maybe one can a day or so, about one can a day per 8 lbs of weight is a good maintain point.

ok heres an option for you... go to you vet and ask him about the prescription diet R/D basically its a weigh loss diet once he looses a certain amount of weight you need to put him on W/D its a diet maintains his weight it will probly be a lifetime food though semi expensive but you can buy it at any vet it needs to be prescriced though. it works really well with cats especially or you can try slentrol its a liquid you put in his food and makes him feel full (its like diet pills but for animals its a brand new product and has great success so far). ask your doctor about both see what he feels about either or the two. and also keep him active maybe 30 mins a day at least play with him with his favortie toy and try and keep him from sitting down too much within those 30 mins. its a long process but you cat will have a few extra years without that unhealthy weight

good luck!

Get it checked out at the vet in case there is any other underlying cause. If it's purely a case of too much food - stop overfeeding; talk to the vet about lower calorie foods.

Could the cat be being fed at a neighbour's house - plenty of cats have multiple homes. If so, talk to the neighbours and ask them to stop feeding him.

Try and get the cat to play/exercise more.

well my cat weighed 26 lb and we put him on a diet and feed him only 1/4 cup of food in the morning then another 1/4 cup at night.. it doesnt sound like a lot but few years later now he only wieghs 19 pounds. cats don't loose weight quickly but if you keep him on a diet he should loose weight. also play with him a lot. good luck!

Go get him some mature cat diet food but a good brand not from the grocery store and some cat nip maybe it will give him some spunk,I have the lazyiest cat in the world so i do not know if yours would play with toys mine won,t.But there is a feeding ball you can get that you put his food into and they have to play with it to get it out .That works well.

Get some cat dancer like toys. The ones where you hold the handle and the cat chases what is hanging off the end. I have several kinds of these and my cats like to play with them. You'll have to put some time playing with him, buy hey, it's likely that you'll have fun too. You may have to do this several times a day as he is likely to get tired fast. Good luck............

Play with him more. If he likes to eat, make sure that he gets his daily excercise. Whether you give it to him (throwing small cat toys across the room for him) or him just running around the house. He will need excercise!

feed him only at meal times and also get some toys and play with him (my cats favorite is a laser pointer and catnip is always a favorite) also though you have to watch out with stress if you change too much. there is a diseases that cats get when they get too stressed or freaked out and they strave themselves. (fatty liver i think that's what it's called) and that's how we think we lost my cat because she was sick and on med.s she got soo stressed from it that she starved herself to death and we tryed to force feed her but in the end it didn't work.