how much to feed ?

[admin]

Taj gets a bit chubby when there are kittens around as he goes around cleaning up all the leftover food. When the kittens leave for their new homes, Taj gets back to normal.

He is the only Savannah i have that can put on weight like that, so i watch his diet normally.

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[Patti]

I have two Savannah girls who both got chunky after being spayed. One is seriously obese. Of course, she is one of the few cats who has no interest in running on the cat wheel...

 

[Kaorin]

And this is exactly the issue I wanted to ask about today, so I'm just gonna add my question here:

I have two F5 cats that are 1 year and 8 months old, not very far between. They get along okay, not the best of friends yet, but at least they don't fight over food. I feed them twice a day two cans of this food: http://www.petprinces.com/ (which is the only they seem to like and agrees with both).

My breeder tells me that the amount is enough, but they always come begging for more. Everytime I'm near the kitchen they start to meow and demand food. I don't think they overeat, because if I give in and feed them more, they will sometimes only eat a part of the food and let the rest be for a while. If I leave some dry food for them at any time they will gobble it up, so I tend to only give it to them as snack, as they don't really care for drinking, strangely enough.

Both are healthy and very active with a lot of energy, neither of them seems chubby. On the contrary, especially the male cat seems quite lean, no matter how much he eats. I read that you should feed them as much as they want as long as they're still growing, and I'm all for that, but how can I tell if they're still in the kitty-growth stage?

 

[Brigitte Cowell]

I tend to just feed my adults as much as they want too... none of my adult Savannahs are chubby. They are active cats so I think burn energy fast. Especially my crazy F1 girl Missy who probably eats more than my other F1 who is twice her size but she is just so frenetic I think she needs more calories.

 

[WitchyWoman]

I read that you should feed them as much as they want as long as they're still growing, and I'm all for that, but how can I tell if they're still in the kitty-growth stage?

Cats reach full maturity at 3yrs of age. Your two still have a long way to go and you should not hesitate to feed them as much as they want. They will put on length and height the first 2 yrs and pack on their adult muscle by end of 3rd yr.

As a general rule, if there is food left over at the end of their meals, decrease the amount. If they act hungry at the end of their meals, increase the amount of food.

 

[WitchyWoman]

I have a chubbo in my F2 Juba. He is not as active as the other 2 SVs and if I don't restrict him to 4-5 oz per day, he gets fat. No thyroid or other physical problems. The other 2 are very active, thin & muscular with the long, tall SV body.

 

[Patti]

I've had a couple of girls gain weight after spaying, one is downright obese, but the rest of my cats are healthy and a nice weight. I free feed all of my cats kibble and the only other one who likes to overeat is my bottle baby, who seems to think I starved her the first five weeks of her life... ;-)

 

[Jacq]

This thread has got me thinking. I am curious in that i have read a lot of posts about lean or very lean SV's, but not about overweight savannahs? Does anybody seem to have SV's that have a reserve for winter?

Razi always gains weight in the winter. Right now he's really overweight. Odd too, since he is much more active when the weather is cool. He always loses it in the late spring though.


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[SV Dad]

Isn't Razi the "outlier" in John Popp's weight data? Yeah, he is. How much does he lose in the spring?