Cat not eating

[horsemeatscandal]

Appreciate there's already a thread on the first page re. cat eating habits but not quite the same question that I have. Anyway...

Cat's not been eating over the last few days, pretty much at all. Just doesn't seem interested in his food. We've had a little bit of luck with some cheese and some ham but he obviously can't live off that and he's only eating small amounts of it anyway and only from my hand, not his bowl. He must want to eat because if I'm getting him some chicken ready or something he'll be going wild round my feet but then he'll just sniff it and walk off.

He's been to the vets and she couldn't find anything wrong. No problems with mouth, gut, temperature, etc. He got a couple of jabs for potential pain and infection. His behaviour is pretty normal, still purring his head off when getting stroked and still going out and causing havoc with other cats. He's roughly 11 based on the age he was supposed to be when we adopted him but still very active (hunting, running around like a lunatic) and doesn't seem to have aged a bit in terms of his behaviour or how he looks.

Best guess I've had so far was loss of sense of smell with a cat cold (this is a thing), apparently warming food up helps but again this didn't work.

Any ideas on what it might be or how to help?

Thanks

[Emily's dad]

One of my cats went through something similar recently, he’s around the same age as your cat.

He’d always been fed on the same brand of dry food up to that point.

We ended up buying some of the wet pouches/tinned food and mixed it in with the biscuits.
He wolfs this down.
Seems he was fed up with the same food all the time.
Maybe worth a try if you haven’t already.

[horsemeatscandal]

Appreciate the suggestion friend. We change his food regularly as he becomes easily bored, not working this time though.

There's currently seven different brands of cat food in the cupboard and he's having none of it. He's a little st.

[horsemeatscandal]

Off to the shop for cooked turkey, fish oil and the smelliest fish they've got.

I mixed in some ham with some cat food and he managed to fish most of the ham out. Can a cat live on cheap ham?

[Emily's dad]

Good luck with the shopping trip.
Hope you can find something your cat will eat.

[horsemeatscandal]

Cheers folks, will let you know how it goes. Still half-convinced it's the smell thing. He can't seem to find food when it's close to his face where he can't see it.

He had a go at a Lik-e-Lix yesterday, got him some special Christmas ones, turkey and cranberry haha, we'll have a go with them.

[horsemeatscandal]

So he's just ate a full slice of Tesco Finest butter-basted roast turkey the fancy little st.

He'd only eat it out of my fingers though, if it dropped on the floor he didn't know where it was. He knew it was for him when I was opening it but when I showed him the open packet he was just confused where normally he'd try to shove his head in there. Got some mackerel, sardines and salmon for later.

Sounds he's making when eating sound a bit rough and vet did say he had a small mark on his tongue which looked fine but could possibly cause him pain when eating, so maybe that's a factor.

What a bizarre animal.

[twohoursfromlondon]

My cat had a slight cough/hacking last week, which also meant he wasn’t eating normally. Took him to vets and he had a throat infection, so a week of meds and he is back to normal now thankfully. Your cat may have something similar. Sounds like a fussy eater too, just like mine!

[horsemeatscandal]

Panic over. He's finally eating cat food for the first time in 5 days.

I was probably overreacting but was a bit worried, not like him.

[garythesign]

That’s great news.

They can be incredibly fickle sometimes.