When the cat won't eat

What are you THINKING???

 Some animals are extremely fussy about their food, showing individual preferences that, not being sanctioned in any book available, must be worked out and catered for by the exasperated and often worried owner.

Cats are amongst the most annoying in this respect.  (There were those lions up Tsavo way in Kenya, for instance, who would only eat people – and that was very annoying.)

Of course, we should know our domestic animals well enough to spot immediately when they really are ill.  The puzzling thing is when the Cat of the House comes in when expected, looking perfectly well, turns his back on the company, puts his nose in the air, and refuses to look at his supper.  Or he comes waltzing in, tail up and smiling, takes one look at his dish and marches out.

Before rushing him to the vet, there are a few points that might first be checked out.  He could, of course, have eaten a dirty great mouse earlier, and only wandered in at supper-time out of habit.  In that case, by the time you’ve given up coaxing him, put his food back in the fridge, washed the dish and switched out the lights, he’ll probably be hungry again and demand his dinner – at room temperature.

Maybe he’s found fault with the meat. If it is mince, it may be too sticky, or too slushy, or have too much fat in it – a point to watch in summer especially.  Perhaps it is slightly sour.  Mince goes off pretty quickly, but even fresh mince may have a faint smell of boerewors or sausage to it.  (Change to a butcher who has a separate mincer for steak.)  This taint is often unacceptable to a cat, but may not be noticed sufficiently until the meat has been kept a day or so in the fridge.

If the meat was chopped, maybe the knife still smells vaguely of onion, or the blade is tarnished.  Perhaps the board it was chopped on wasn’t absolutely clean or properly rinsed after being washed.  Letting it drain off in the sun warps the board eventually but keeps it smelling fresh.  Perhaps the hands that prepared the food smelled too strongly of soap or hand-cream.

Can you believe this DISH?

It could be that the dish is at fault.  It may not be quite clean, or smell of detergent or dishcloth.  Or the new dish - but it has such pretty flowers! - may be too deep, so that the cat has to touch the last of his food with his nose and chin to get it off the bottom.  In this case he may only eat the top half.  Perhaps the dish has warped, and moves or rattles as he eats, or it was unintentionally sort-of slapped down in front of him – and if that’s how you feel about it, he will go and eat elsewhere – so there!

An unfamiliar noise or disturbance, even at a distance, can put a cat off his food.  He will probably come and ask for it later when the atmosphere is more conducive.

Or it could be that today, just because you are in a hurry, he wants to be fed by the fingers, morsel by morsel.  This is one of our cat Bounce’s things, but he is twenty years old so we humour him.  Or, when you’ve got everything so clean you hardly know your way around, he wants to eat off the floor.

When the food is not to her liking, our foundling Siamese, Yes-I-Am, shakes her paws at it, one-two-three-four, as if to rid herself of all possible contamination.  Bounce turns aside, sits with his paws sternly together, sinks into his several chins and waits for someone to act upon his disapproval.  Old Boycott slowly, deliberately, and symbolically, covers it up.  That’s what he thinks of that.

Perhaps your problem cat has a secret source of supply, of a class he would not deign to sniff at if you offered it to him – or he’s playing the Beautiful Cat Abandoned routine to the soft-touch lady down the road who feeds him fillet.

A more serious consideration is the possibility of hairball.  Chemists or vets sell excellent preparations for this.  Or he is eating lizards to which he could become addicted: lizard addiction can put a cat right off his food, or cause him to eat with gusto but remain thin, or to eat and promptly bring it back up.

This vomiting, incidentally, can occur merely because the cat eats too quickly, in which case chop his meat into bigger chunks to slow him down; or because of worms.  If it is some time since you de-wormed him, consider dosing him for tape, round and hook worm.

In the end, when you have thought of everything and done everything, and the vet says there is nothing wrong with him, and he still won’t eat, it’s maybe time to tell that cat, “Chum, you either take it or leave it.”

He’ll leave it.  He’ll walk out on you.  He’ll stalk out on you and won’t come back for a day and a half; but don’t worry, he’ll pitch up again.  After all, he employs you as housekeeper, and you probably do your best, and honest help isn’t that easy to find these days.  Well, you are honest, aren’t you?  Has he ever caught you stealing his dinner?

Who needs humans for food anyway?

And you know that a cat

will eat this and not that

and this today

tomorrow may

be that.

A cat

‘s like that.

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