Kitten food - advice on a couple of matters

aniahill

Hello!

So, we were planning on adopting 2 adult cats, so I bought some Arden Grange as I was told it's one of the best quality, while it was on offer.

The female cat we chose to go with the male one we wanted irrespective of what happened (from RSPCA) decided she didn't like the male and battered him about the head when they were introduced...

As the centre knew we wanted 2, they introduced an un-confident 4 month old kitten who the male started grooming immediately and they are perfect together.

So my question is, do we go from RSPCA kitten food to AG kitten food, then eventually to adult AG? Or keep on with the RSPCA kitten until she's adult? Is a brand's kitten easier to transition to adult? Or is it better to do just one transition? I know to do it gradually to avoid "explosive tummy upset" as a woman in the centre described it...

And in your experiences, how do you know when to transition? Is it when the kitten is adult sized? Or is there an age?

I'm so concerned to make everything right for her because she's so scared and nervous - they warned us she will hiss and spit at us but she didn't and just took a nice stroking until the male barged her out of the way! I've never lived with a kitten before...

lisajane8482

I would gradually transition her on to the arden grange. To be honest I don't thinnk there is much difference between kitten and adult food so you could just feed her the adult food. When we adopted our second cat he was eating adult food when we got him at 12 weeks old (he's now coming up 2) and it didn't stunt his growth or anything. We were raw feeding him and our 9 month old kitten but they went off the raw food and are now back on wet pouches. Both are eating adult food and both are doing really well. Our kitten reminded me of goldielocks when we first got her as she'd eat some of hers, then move on to his and then have some of our third cats kibble before starting the cycle again. We now use a plate for the two wet fed cats to eat from as they happily share.

aniahill

I was wondering about just giving her adult food - she's quite small for 4 months I think, if she's going to be full size at 9/12 months. If she looked a bit bigger I probably wouldn't even question it.

I looked at the AG nutritional info and there's really not much difference and as both of them will need to be in for a while, and eating together, I think I would struggle with them not goldilocksing!!!

lisajane8482

Our 9 month old cat is small for her age. She was living outside before a lady found her, she kept her for four weeks before advertising her on gumtree and then we rehomed her. She was smaller at 7 months old than Gizmo (our middle one) was at 12 weeks old when we got him. We've had her for just over 9 weeks now and she hasn't really grown much but she has put weight on which is the main thing. Our vet said that she will most likely stay a small cat and probably won't grow much more. You wouldn't think she was the smallest the way she play fights with the other 2 (4kg and 6kg) but she rules the roost and puts them in their place.

hoglet121

We have 2 adult cats and 7 month old young cat that we recused as a stray when he was about 11 weeks old. We have always attempted to gradually introduce new food but we haven't stuck it out very long. We haven't had any explosive poo problems!

Vet said to feed him kitten food... and we did... he'll eat kitten food, adult cat wet food, adult cat biscuits, he won't eat kitten biscuits, he also tries it on with any food we're eating, has eaten weetbix, fried egg, explosively hot curries, a variety of newly and not so newly dead animals.... We've decided he's one of life's fighters, nothing seems to do him any harm, and apart from vomiting in the bath the night he arrived, he's been remarkably resilient.

During this time, one of the adult cats has decided he will not deign himself to eat adult wet food any more, it's kitten food for him if we wouldn't mind....

aniahill

I'd think the explosions come from when they rescue a cat, have no idea what it's been fed and have to just go with a type of food, without even the hint of what they had before. Or they've been eating some really weird stuff...

Ha ha that's so funny! The roulette of cat food...

We're picking them up on Thursday, so I'll see what they say (though I know they might want to sell their stuff and go strictly by the book)