Feeding Cats Wet Food when you also have Dogs

We have two cats. Lamborghini has just been diagnosed very hyperthyroid, and possibly diabetic. He's a 12 year old male cat with one previous episode of urinary tract sludge, a few years ago. Ferrari is a 12 year old female, with severe environmental allergy who has been getting steroid shots about once a month to help with that for oh, maybe the last year(?), as nothing else worked and she was not only wheezing and snoring but licking her fur off and creating raw spots on her skin. Likely she is going to the vet to get thoroughly checked out this week, as pretty sure it's her who is still attacking my beautiful bathroom floor instead of using the litterbox.

We have two dogs, Bo is an 8 year old Chinook type male, 52 pounds, 21 inches tall at the shoulder, and a polite gentleman of a dog. Luna is a 3 year old Mountain Cur, 33 pounds, 17 inches tall at the shoulder, and a real lunatic, wild-child, pack-type dog, tho sweet and loving as can be, hyper, crazy, full energy full throttle all the time (we've only had her a year, and she's calmed down a lot to reach this stage!), who can squeeze through a cat door because of her slender build, run like a greyhound, and can just positively fly when she jumps because of her build, muscles, and energy level.

We need to get the cats on a wet food diet, Lamborghini most definitely because he is in danger of full blown diabetes, and Ferrari because she's likely to end up that way also with all the steroids, and because feeding two cats two different diets won't work anyway. Up until now they've always had dry food available 24/7, and just nibbled whenever they felt like it. No obesity problems from doing that.

I built a "food cage" out of wire shelving to keep the cat food inaccessible to the dogs. Mostly works, Luna can shove herself in if she really wants to, but we have taught her that it's not worth it, and mostly she agrees.

But canned food is a whole different story! Cats have always gotten a small spoonful when dogs are fed, to keep them quiet, but they'd finish it before the dogs were done with their routine, so it was no problem to feed them in corners of the kitchen. To let Lamborghini eat a larger amount, we are now standing there as a human barrier between cat and drooling dogs. And to give him food more than twice a day, the dogs are going absolutely nuts as soon as the food comes out of the fridge or the can is cracked open, but I can't feed the dogs extra for lunch and bedtime, or I will end up with very rolypoly dogs. And not really thrilled with standing there for 15 minutes as a human shield while cat is working his way through a larger serving of wet food (Lambors is still just about 12 pounds even with having lost so much muscle weight, so he should be eating at least 4 cans of Fancy Feast a day!!!) and having to scold the dogs and order them Back!! the whole time.

Dogs love ice cubes, so leaving Lambors' food out in frozen form to thaw during the day isn't going to work unless I figure out how to keep it completely from the dogs.

I can modify the food cage to make the pathway in less direct, so that Luna couldn't get around the corner I'd create to get to the food, but that will make this thing bigger than we have room for, without rearranging the furniture somehow. Really going to get in the way.

Luna can jump as high as my head, from a dead standstill. Luna won't jump up on a countertop if we're there, don't think I'd trust her if I wasn't and there was cat food on it. Luna can squeeze through a cat door. Lamborghini had sudden back leg weakness from his day at the vet's, and only now, 4 days later, is walking correctly but still only short distances at a time and not jumping up on the furniture very well, more like digging in with claws to climb up, so a plan that requires him to be a competent jumper or climber is not so good (plus, he's always been a big klutz. The kind who goes racing through the house, misjudges a doorway or corner, and slams into the wall instead.)

Does anyone have any ideas I may not have thought of yet for making it less stressful for all involved, me too, to give the cats more wet food meals and/or more eating time, with two dogs desperate to get at that food?

 

You can get microchip feeders that only open for the animal with the chip to activate them

 

Oh yes, I've seen those, however they aren't in my budget right now, especially with the sudden vet bills. And five more years of kids' colleges to pay for.

And I could just see Luna following a cat to the feeder, then snatching the food and running as soon as it opened....my wildchild is really somethin' else....

 

Thank you for my laugh for today! Your house sounds like a hoot with your crazy menagerie! I was laughing visualizing the high bouncing dog! I had to look up both breeds, never heard of them.

The only suggestion I have for feeding is possibly putting each cat in a small dog crate while they eat. Thrift stores often have crates cheap.

 

You think what I've described is a hoot? I also have two degus, a canary, eleven budgies (parakeets) and forty-six finches.
And a goldfish.

 

Oh my!

Do you breed/sell the birds? Where on earth did you get a Degu??

I almost recently adopted a cute rat. My local Humane Society had 6 young ones for adoption. From my research, they make terrific pets and are quite intelligent. Did not adopt as it would not be fair to the rat with 4 cats in the house.

I did have 2 parakeets in a very large cockatiel cage. My Harley managed to lay across the top of the cage for his daily nap, he never bothered the birds, just slept. The birds never seemed to mind as they would chatter away, grooming and generally not bothered by the cat. Odd!

 

Lol, I sympathize. I had a rescue border collie mix who was smarter than your average college student. And sneaky and athletic to boot. I'd block her ability to steal cat food, she'd plot a workaround, I'd tweak the plan and foil her again, she'd hatch a new plan. This went on for over 10 years! At one point I had two large dog crates stacked on each other -- the bottom crate had the door open for the dogs to come and go as they pleased (they liked to sleep in their "den") and the top crate was where I put the cat food. The cats could jump in from the floor or a nearby table, so I thought it was foolproof. Until I walked in one day and there was a furry border collie butt sticking out at me. She had moved a chair over to the front of the crate, then jumped up on the chair and then from the chair into the crate. Sigh. Dog - 1, Human - 0.

I finally relinquished my kitchen counter to the cat food bowls. Of course the dog was a master counter surfer, but she never managed to overcome the cookie sheet that was sticking straight up out of the top drawer to block her reach. The things we do...

I later added a feeding station to the top of a book case and built a path for the cats to access it (cat trees work well, as do those cat shelves). Cats love heights, so they were in heaven. The dog began developing schematics to overcome this newest obstacle but died from cancer before she learned to rappel from the ceiling.

 

Seriously though ... If you have vertical space in your home and are somewhat handy, building something like a modified ferret cage can work well. The cats can enter from the bottom level and walk up ramps to get to each higher level. With a door on each level, you can slide food and water in and out easily then close the door. The item in the attached link is made of wire but you can use solid materials too (or throw a towel down over the wire). I have something similar and love it.

https://qualitycage.com/products/ferret-mansion?variant=36601665668

 

The birds are just for me. Only occasionally let a pair breed, as obviously I have too many already. I used to be a big outdoors person, hiking, backpacking, tree climbing (just for fun, would go as high as the branches would hold me, then just sit there, feeling the tree sway in the wind, way out in the middle of the woods), bicycling, cross country skiing, anything to get me outside and away. Then life and health problems started happening. Then some jerk who couldn't stay off his cell phone in questionable weather happened, and nearly killed me, my husband, and my youngest child in a fraction of a second. Then progessive problems and results from all of that happened, and I am fairly well disabled, diseased, halfway to blind, and stuck at home alone all day since I can no longer drive and live in a rural-type area.

So, since I can rarely get out into the woods, I brought them inside to me. Started with us going out to get 2 parakeets, six months after the accident, to keep me company (rather than listen to the tv all day). Since we already had cats, we knew we should get 2, so they could keep each other company since they wouldn't be coming out of the cage to get personal time with me. Well....don't ever bring your kids with you when you go to pick out small pets. The pet store in town had 3 young parakeets. The kids were so upset that one would be left AAAALLLLLLL ALONE. And, son wanted birds A and B, daughter wanted birds B and C. So, we brought home all three. Of course, two paired up and left the third one out, AAAALLLLLLL ALONE. So, we needed a fourth, which hubby and I went and got. But I picked a green one since son liked green the best. And then kept thinking about the blue one I had seen. Well, we had a huge cage, so a week later we went back to get a blue one. BUT WE BROUGHT THE KIDS. Son liked the bright blue one. Daughter liked the dark blue one with the yellow head. I finally decided on son's choice. Store clerk is writing up the bird. I look over at the big parakeet cage, and daughter, whose little head was just high enough to look inside, is sadly looking at her choice, who is at the glass face to face with her, sadly telling him goodbye and how she wished she could bring him home to be her bird, and trying her hardest to be brave and not cry. I go over to comfort daughter, and get a bit misty-eyed myself. Son walks back over, all upset by this, and snarls, "fine! get her bird instead" and HE starts to cry. Daughter loses it. I lose it, because my kids are sad and crying. Hubby looks over at this soggy mess by the bird bin, and tells the clerk, "We'll take both."
And then it continued on like that. I found a HUGE cage on amazon, cheap. Now we have room for more! Go to get two, come home with four. Oh wow, look mom, an albino! Oh wow, a grey, they're uncommon! At peak, we had 17 parakeets.
THEN hubby comes home one day telling me about the cute little zebra finches he saw. And he keeps talking about them....so we got finches. And more finches. And more finches....they come in so many species, and so many different color variations within the species....and after our parakeet experience, you'd think we'd know better than to even think about another pet.....

 

We got the first degu for free at the little pet store in town. Went in for supplies, and there was a 5 gallon fish tank with this brown creature in it, and a tiny wire hamster wheel and a food bowl and water bottle and a sign that said "Free". Poor thing barely had enough room to walk around the bowl and wheel. One of the employees had a friend with degus, one had babies and this one was the only male, so she was trying to get rid of it. Daughter, who was 7 and loved all creatures, wanted it. Kept talking about it when we got home. Crying about how much she loved it (and generally she didn't do that). So, we researched degus, decided we could handle that, and went back and got it the next day. She named him Chester. Had to order in a friend for him, as there were no degus for adoption within many hundred miles of us, that one was Chitter. One morning five years later, without warning, we found Chitter had passed. Chester needed new companions, so we found 3 younger brothers a hundred miles away, and brought them home. Degu introductions can take a lot of time to be successful, so we had divided the cage with a wire divider, and Chester would sit on a shelf on his side watching the three new guys go nuts trying to get to him. Before they could calm down about it, Chester had a small stroke and ended up a bit "tilted", but he seemed fine otherwise, and was satisfied sitting there, watching the others on the other side of the divider. Then he had more strokes, getting more tilted and wobbly each time, until it was time for him to go. So we had the three brothers, Mac, Wally, and Phil (Macadamia, Walnut, and Filbert, since they were so nuts.) A year ago, Wally passed away quietly one night. Phil is not looking good at all, we are now at the point of wondering if it is his time, and hoping he just goes on his own. Poor Mac will have to live alone at this point, I know where I can get more degus from a rescue 200+ miles away, but hubby's job is relocating us next summer 700 miles from here, and the last thing we need is to have two separate groups of degus if introductions didn't go well and we couldn't combine them into one cage. Have seen the occasional degu on Craigslist in the new area we will be moving to, so there's hope we can continue to have them.

 

Aaaaaaand....as long as I'm telling pet stories, the reason we were comfortable taking in the first degu, is we were already champions at hamsters.
The hamster saga begins with a baby bird in a Target parking lot. Came out of Target with son, who was maybe 9?, and there's a tiny baby bird, goldfinch it turns out, fluttering around the asphalt. Scoop it up to keep it from getting run over. Was not quick enough to get to the one 40 feet away in the other direction, I was informed by another customer who stood there and watched it get squished. (Thanks, lady, for telling us that, just what a 9 year old needs to hear.) Baby bird has obviously flown/fallen from the nest a bit too soon. Parents will continue to care for it while it learns to fly better and eat on its own, but we are in a huge parking lot right near the building (nest was up in the letters on the side) and there is no safe place to leave it where they will find it. So, we bring it home, set it up in a little plastic cage. Do our research. Call a wildlife rescue. Find out it is a goldfinch, needs bugs, and needs 3-4 WEEKS of teaching it to eat and survive. Oh no.
So, we bring it to the wildlife rescue. Son is very upset. We get home, he goes into his room and just rails against the injustices of the whole situation, behind his closed door. He never does that. Best way to never get what you want in our house was to throw a tantrum. Even just whining guaranteed an automatic No.
He had been asking about a hermit crab for a while, as they had them at school. So I offer that, instead. He makes a play for a hamster. Hubby agrees, as he had small pets when a kid. So, we do our research. Find out internet cages and supplies are much much cheaper than local.
Stop in a pet store after grocery shopping. They have a bunch of old, fat, ugly hamsters. And then they bring out one young one, two months old they say, male they say, from the back. We can have it for free, since it is the last of a box of hamsters that was dumped on their doorstep. We hold it. It's friendly. We agree. Grab a small bag of woodchips and food and a hut, and head out the door as we had to pick up his sister from kindergarten in a few minutes.
Set up a hamster home in a large clear plastic tub while waiting for the one we order on the internet to arrive.
Kids name him Darth Fluffypants Sootplow. (don't ask.) We love our little hamster.
Nearly two weeks later, son comments on how big Darth Fluffypants Sootplow is growing. Oh no.
Hit the internet, doing the research. Looking at hamster standing up against the side of the clear plastic tub, trying to get a look at his underparts. Not successful.
More internet, then I see it, "Only female hamsters have nipples." Oh no. OH NO.
Yup.
Move the tub to a quiet bedroom. Cover most of it with a dark pillowcase for privacy. Fill with clean chips and food and water and everything.
Next morning I peek in, and Mr. Darth Fluffypants Sootplow is the proud momma of a tiny pile of tiny pink babies. Two weeks to the day from when we brought HIM home. Hamster gestation is 14 days. Those (insert bad word here) jerks at the pet store had this one separated because they had seen some illicit activity and figured out HE was a she and belonged in the OTHER tank, the one with the FEMALES. And then passed "him" off to us unsuspecting novice idiots.
We ended up with 3 babies that survived. And had to keep all of them, because each kid got one, which would have left one to give away, and how do you decide which one you don't love?
So then we had Mama Darth Fluffypants Sootplow, Belle, Fluffernutter, and Cinnamon.
And that is the story of how our young male hamster gave birth.
And why we felt competent to take on degus.

 

I do not think the micro-chip feeder would work since the dog would likely chew it up to get to the canned food. I know my 18 pound do would do that.

 

yeah, I think you're right. And the bigger dog is a power chewer, he slices right through almost every "indestructible" toy there is.

 

I can understand. I have a dog that would clear all the cat bowls (5) if given a chance. I feed all of mine in the kitchen & dining roim. I have a tall baby pen panels that block access for the dog. So far it is working and the cats can eat.

 

This is a toy after about 10 minutes with my dog, Raggy.