Quote:
Originally Posted by sugarcatmom
Couple questions for you: do you free-feed the dry? If so, that could be part of the problem with Hamisch not eating raw, and also a big factor in Jarydd's weight gain. Have you tried canned? Perhaps that would make the transition to raw easier for Hamisch. It's also less likely that Jarydd will gain weight if there's no dry in the picture.
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We did free-feed the dry, but at that point we had them only on dry. About three months ago, Jarydd started throwing up more than we would consider normal (about twice per week) and it seemed to be associated with the food, as it was after a drink where he'd then throw up the food. The cats were on Medi-Cal Hypo-Allergenic Gastro. Jarydd's always had a pretty sensitive stomach, but our vet suggested that as he's getting older (10 years old) he's become less tolerant of dry. But Hamisch has no problem like this. And even though we free fed, neither had a weight problem.
So we went to the Orijen dry and raw. We thought they'd both eat raw, as Hamisch was a virtual *Pig* for the raw chopped chicken, but she really wouldn't touch it. We think there's something in the Nature's Variety mixture that just simply doesn't appeal to her. Possibly the apple cider vinegar, but I don't know. So she's been eating the Orijen and the chopped chicken.
We free-fed at first, but that was a disaster with both cats' weights ballooning virtually overnight. When we checked out the calories, Orijen literally has about 200 more calories per cup than their previous food. So we stopped free feeding. But it's very stressful for Jarydd to see Hamisch eating the Orijen dry and for him not to have any. A mixture of jealousy and habit I'm sure. So he gets both. But it's almost like we're spending half our day putting the food down, then picking it up etc. etc. so that Hamisch gets enough without Jarydd seeing it. And then he just gets a bit. So we thought if we had a hard food with *less* calories, he could have the raw still, but maybe it would be more forgiving weight-wise.
So, I'm not sure if it's realistic to think Hamisch would accept raw food. But we don't want to do something to make things worse for Jarydd. So we're hesitant to let him have the California Naturals dry *and* the raw after what the pet food lady said. That's why I was wondering if this really was something that shouldn't be done.
The Hans