One of my mom's kitties has always had this big hard stomach. She's a petite-ly built little calico, about a year old. She literally looks like she's got a grapefruit implanted in her tummy region.

We've had her to the vet, she's had several courses of dewormer, and our vet put her on Hill's Prescription diet m/d. According to her, it's a low carb, high protein food (kitty Atkins, basically). Well we're getting to the point where the bag is almost empty, and my mom thinks that kitty has lost a LITTLE bit of weight, so they'd like to stick with the low carb thing.

The other night we were comparing the m/d to the food that their other cat, Charlie, eats (ProPlan Adult Salmon food)...and I'm certainly not an expert, but looking at the ingredients and the guaranteed analyses,the two foods seem comparable, and in fact, the ProPlan actually sounds better...

Can anyone *in the know* here compare these two foods and tell me what you think/what the differences are?

Hill's Prescription Diet m/d
ProPlan Adult Salmon & Rice

Edited to add, I was just looking at the Evo site at their cat food...depending on the price my mom might also consider switching to something like that...would that be a good thing for fat cat? Evo Cat Food

Has the cat had an ultra sound?

There are grain free diets for cats just like there are for dogs. I suggest you go on Petfooddirect.com and enter "grain free cat food" in the search box.

One of our cats was heavier and I switched them to Taste of the Wild grain free food. I also am very careful about how much I put out. While the cats free-feed, it is only a specific amount per day, not just fill up the bowl like we did when I was a kid. 3 of the cats are now at good weights, and the chunkier one has slimmed down some and the vet is fine with him, too. It can be tough switching foods with cats. Mine will only eat certain shaped kibbles. sheesh!

I use the ProPlan Selects Salmon & Brown Rice and the kitties do really well on it! Check out the Selects - they have a pretty good ingredient list...

Honestly, the two aren't that great since they both still contain a lot of filler...which is likely a big factor in the weight gain. Some cats...likely many cats....just can't metabolize the carbs added to foods...particularly the dry foods (a lot of carbs added to form a kibble). I have a cat that LOVES his food...had to be placed on adult food at 6 months because he was porking up....and then placed on adult light food by 10 months. He has always struggled with his weight. I started reading up on better foods and found information regarding canned foods vs. dry food. Canned food tends to contain less carbs (depending on the brands of course) than dry food. I decided to give it a whirl and switched him to Natural Balance canned food and no longer feed any kibble. Believe it or not...he lost 4 pounds over the next few months...eats more than he used to on the kibble and is no longer starving all day long. He is just one of those cats that can't metabolize the kibble. Perhaps your mom's kitty is the same...would she be willing to try canned food? I high quality one that contains lots of proteins and little fillers? I will admit that I have recently had issues with Natural Balance where my garborater of a cat stopped eating it. I think something went bad with the formula cuz he eats anything and everything. So, I have switched to EaglePack Holistic canned food and he is gobbling it all up again.

Merrick makes a newer food called Before Grain. It is not too expensive.

Innova Evo is one of the best low carb, high protein foods for cats, IMHO. I have some samples of Natural Balance Green Pea & Duck formula. Just picked them up yesterday, and haven't had a chance to try them.

Several of my herd are doing well on Solid Gold Indigo Moon, however it's not a low carb product.

my cats eat Evo, it was the only thing all of them could agree on They are all older, and had started to put on a little weight, but I noticed since we went to Evo exclusively, they have all lost a little and are at pretty good weights. Rhere are other grain free foods too, if they don't like the shape (yeah, I had one of those)

What about doing a grain free food for an old cat. Ziploc had just turned 12 when we adopted him in spring. He eats like a horse. We started him on Felidae Platinum, and he DID NOT do well on it. So he's on Fromm Four-Star salmon now. He loves it, and is doing well on it, but gaining weight. I feed him about 1/2 cup of food daily, and he's always begging for more.

I might try the canned food idea, though...

The "hard" tummy thing is worring me . Is your vet sure it's just food related?

That said, I feed my kitties Nutro Natural. I tried Evo but my little devil did not like it. Kimba, my older cat loved Evo.

Yes, I'm worried about the hard tummy thing too.... Has the vet done any other testing?

That said, we feed our cats Blue Buffalo's Wilderness because it's available at our local PetSmart - which means I don't have to remember to hit the specialty food shop on my way home from work!

She wanted to start with the worming and a diet change. She said some kitties get fat and actually the fat grows inward rather than outward (causing the saggy tummy). I think kitty HAS lost SOME weight, but I would think after almost 2 months of a very strict diet she'd have lost quite a bit of weight.

I think our next step is to do some more testing. I saw our vet at our annual greyhound reunion, and she said that maybe kitty is just one that has a thyroid problem, which is rare for cats, but it does happen. She also mentioned xraying her tummy.

Poor little Ellie Mae...well, I call her Ellie Moo She's so playful and funny, but she gets winded easily when we really all-out play with her with her toys. That's not normal for a young kitten, and the vet was concerned with that too. Her heart is just fine, and her breath sounds are fine also.

Guess we'll be off to the vet soon, maybe this weekend.

Edited to add, I was just looking at the Evo site at their cat food...depending on the price my mom might also consider switching to something like that...would that be a good thing for fat cat? Evo Cat Food
[/quote]
I have my 2 overweight kitties on Innova Low Fat dry cat food. If the EVO kitty food is like the EVO dog food, I believe it's high in protein. Whenever I've feed my pups that, they seemed to have gained more weight so I just stick with the regular Innova.

I'm askeered that something is growing inside of her, causing pressure on her lungs/heart, which is why she gets winded.
I don't think there's a food issue going on here at all.
EM could actually be losing weight, as the growth gains weight.
Is there any way you can get moving on this hard-growth issue sooner than the weekend?
x-rays are a start, but if it's soft tissue, you'll need to have other/additional tests.
Get going and Good luck!!!

hugs,
~Pat

My cat is on Evo and loves it (well, loves the dry -- for some reason she went off the canned). She tends to have a weight problem, though, and I'm finding she has a definite tendency to gain on Evo; I'm feeding her really little. Not sure quite what to do about this yet.

(She used to be on Prescription w/d, but when my other cat got cancer I started reading up on animal nutrition and switched them both ... also I'm low carb and grain free myself, have lost weight and am a total believer that this is far healthier for humans as well as animals! I've put my new grey on Evo too, but we're still sorting out the poop issue.....)

I feed my shelter kitties raw. Compared to the moose that is Mac, they are a breeze. A couple of thighs, some innards....they eat 4 oz. at a sitting--and it isn't sitting long!! Cats do not need anything but meat! They are TRUE carnivores. (although mine DO get some carbs now and again...)

Jan

Mac, who likes that the cats eat jack mackeral....takes the pressure off him....

The fact that the tummy is hard is a bit concerning. Two of our kitties are fat (I'm a bad mommy) and I would not call their tummies hard, at least not hard like a grapefruit. They are just about what you would expect fat to feel like.

We have ours on Eagle Pack Holistic (whatever the fish kind is) and they do really well on it. They have not lost weight but they haven't gained weight either.

I guess HARD isn't exactly the best description...one of MY kitties gained a bit of weight and she had that "udder" look to her...hangy fat...Ellie Moo doesn't have an "udder"...if I turn her on her back and jiggle her tummy area, it's *slightly* jiggly now that she appears to have lost a few pounds, but nothing "hangy-ish" like my Violet has (now that she's lost that weight, she's got the excess skin that hangs down). Kind of feels like she's got a thin layer of fat covering up an inflated balloon (roughly the size of a grapefruit) in her abdomen....that's the BEST way I can describe it.

Saturdays are pretty much our best bet for getting into the vet we've been seeing with Ellie...my mom doesn't like to go alone with her as it's a bit of a drive. Plus, she likes having me there to ask any questions she won't think of, and to remember what the vet tells us. Since I'm working and in school all day and night, Saturdays are pretty much the only time I'm available.

I'll call out there tomorrow, they're a small practice so they usually have plenty of appointments available.

I too feel the description of "a thin layer of fat over an inflated balloon" still sounds like there is more of an issue here than weight alone.

Hopefully you get her in today, I am interested to see what testing reveals!

Can't get her in until Friday, so, we're going Friday at 11am. The doctor that's been following her case isn't available until then.

cats from what i've learned are supposed to have high protein, low carb diets so it's not really a special diet to put them on a high protein/low carb food, it's actually what is supposed to be their normal diet. i have mine on evo - for some cats i know, it's too rich because it's high protein and high fat so it gives them runny poop which is icky in the litterbox. another good one is wellness core, it's lower fat but still high protein (although not as high as evo) and cats who have runny poop on evo do well on wellness core. something else people have said works really well for losing weight is putting them on an all wet food diet - i have a skinny cat so i don't know of this first hand but lots of people say that's all that's needed to get the cat's weight down as it's usually the fact that they're having too much carbs that makes cats fat. cats aren't like dogs, dogs are ominvores so having carbs and extra fillers, although not good for them, isn't so terrible for dogs but cats are actually carnivores and really should have primarily meat in their diet. so i always tried to feed diets that were kibble versions of feeding raw: evo, wellness core, and orijen are the closest thing to feeding raw that i can think off of of the top of my head so maybe you can try those and see if it helps and try wet food too. the only thing is, with wet food, you really have to be on top of teeth brushing or else it makes their teeth deteriorate much faster than eating dry food so that's a big drawback of feeding wet food. maybe put them on one of the three raw-like kibbles that i listed above and see if that helps first if you don't want to try wet food.

but, all that aside, the tautness of your cat's belly as you describe it doesn't really sound like fatness and sounds like something else, gas maybe? i don't know but all the fat cats i know have flabby bellies, not taut ones.

I just read this but skipped over it earlier b/c the subject was kitties. I have an 18 yr old cat who now has ageing kidneys (she urinates a lot more and its more ammonia smelling) Her values read lower normal which is probably due to her age. Of course he wanted to push k/d and before I resort to that, does anyone know of a quality, lower protein food I could try first. She gets CSFTCLS adult and a can of fancy feast per day. I am willing to go 100% canned

An interesting article I came across regarding dry kibble food for cats: --> Article

Thanks-- it is an interesting article, but Molly is almost 19and did really well on dry and canned food up until now. (maybe if she got all dry food she would have been gone already) If I get a new kitty there will only be canned food here.

Update on Ellie Moo: We went to the vet last Friday...we did some xrays and everything looks completely normal, except for the amount of fat she's got on her body We did some bloodwork and her liver and kidneys are fine...some blood was sent out for a thyroid test.

She'd been on m/d food for a few months and hadn't lost any weight (despite her very small portion of food)...she weighed EXACTLY the same as what she weighed a few months ago when we were at the vet. So, we've switched her to r/d food and we're going to try that. r/d is low calorie and high fiber, as opposed to the m/d which is low carb and high protein. Since apparently that wasn't working, we'll see how low calorie works for her.

I'm just relieved that we didn't see any masses or anything, I was worried about our itty-kitty!

The advice that I got from my cat breeder who has had incredible luck with her animals since switching years ago was to feed what I now consider the absolutely best cat food on the market - Eagle Pack Holistic formula for cats. They always have discount coupons on their website. It perhaps is a bit more expensive, but you get what you pay for.

Nyla my piggie Siamese gets Flint River Lite mixed with their regular food to help keep her weight down. Her and her sister Maya absolutely LOVE it and they are very picky eaters. Best part about it, it is delivered right to my door and quickly