Rotation diets help expose cats to different food brands, flavours and textures. Ultimately, they are intended to avoid creating a fussy cat, developing food allergies and allow maximum flexibility for you and your cat. Similar to exposing a child to many different experiences, exposing a cat to as many different foods earlier on in its life will help them adapt to new foods more easily down the road. If you have a kitten, you may want to check out Indy’s kitten rotation diet here.
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Indy’s stats
Breed – Domestic shorthair cat
Age – Adult (1 year+)
Weight – 5kg
Food brands and Types
Indy is on a rotation diet composed of various brands of wet and dry food. His diet includes multiple brands of wet food such as Feline Natural, Meat Mates, and Ziwi Peak. To see out where we source his food from, check out – where to buy cat food. Over time, his rotation continues to expand to other brands and flavours (in particular, ones we cover positively in our reviews).
While Indy has always eaten both wet and dry, his adult diet is primarily based wet food with a different food most meals. This is in-line with most recommendations that cats should primarily be fed a moisture rich diet. Cats prefer to obtain most of their water through food and have a low thirst drive. The added moisture is a huge benefit that will help prevent future health problems such as kidney issues and urinary tract diseases.
Eating dry food as their primary food can increase their risk of these issues and are highly preventable by establishing a wet food diet. That being said, Indy does eat some air dried food namely as a topper to hit his calories for some days. We aim to keep his dry food calories to below 10% of his total weekly intake.
As we review more foods, you will notice that wet foods tend to have a better macro-nutrition profile with less fillers and carbohydrates than dry foods. It’s probably not a stretch to say that the worst wet foods are often still better than the best dry foods.
Feeding quantities
As Indy’s metabolism slowed down, he moved from a high caloric kitten intake (~350kcal/day) to approximately 160kcal/day. As different foods vary in terms of its caloric density, we portion his food based on the guidelines. We generally try to purchase the larger cans and portion them over two days. For example, a large Ziwi Peaks chicken has 245 kcal. We can serve half of a can for 122kcal and a serving of Fussy Cat adult for 46kcal.
When the numbers don’t work out well, we use dry as a topper. As mentioned in his kitten diet, we still add water (~30-40ml) to every meal to ensure high water intake.
In terms of finding the right quantity for your cat, we recommend using a calorie chart to get an appropriate range of what a typical cat may consume and adjust accordingly. If your adult cat maintains their weight (check weekly) alongside maintaining their ideal body shape, that is a good indicator that you have found the the right caloric intake.
Tip: We highly recommend tracking food quantities (kcal) (at least for a duration) and adding water to each of your cat’s meals. Doing this will help establish the habit as he/she grows older as cats are more susceptible to kidney issues often related to their low thirst drive.
Feeding Frequency
Like most adult cats, Indy transitioned to two meals a day at approximately 6 months. Occasionally, he will have a mid day snack of raw food such as chicken neck. Raw food/snacks are factored into his caloric intake to avoid overfeeding. The general recommendation is to not go more than 12 hours between meals as this can cause health issues such as hyperacidity.
In addition to food and water tracking, we previously tracked Indy’s litter patterns and weekly weight during the first year. As a new cat owner, we would highly recommend it even if they are only estimates. Doing so helps to identify any abnormalities in their patterns and tracking/journalling is a huge help. Once they are adults, they will reach an established baseline and it will be easy to monitor any changes from it.
Dry interesting! I might try this 😊