How to Get a Cat to Eat Prescription Food

There comes a time in every cat owner's life when Fluffy needs to eat a special kind of food. Whether it's because Fluffy has put on a few too many and needs to go on a calorie-restricted diet or has a more serious ailment like crystals in the urethra, switching your cat's food is a challenge at best. Here are some ways to get a cat to eat prescription food without losing a finger.

The Gradual Switchover

If you need to get your cat to eat prescription food and a serious medical emergency doesn't call for an immediate change, many pet owners have had good luck using a gradual switchover strategy. Sure, you could plop Fluffy's bowl down and demand he eat nothing but this new (and probably gross, from his perspective) prescription diet. Or you could introduce the new food a little at a time.

The main idea behind the gradual switchover is that you change Fluffy's food from the old stuff to the new stuff a little at a time. For example, the first week you may feed Fluffy a mix of three-quarters old food with one-quarter new. The next week, you may mix his food half-and-half. The third week, you would ramp it up to three-quarters new food and one-quarter old. After that, your cat should be fairly acclimated to his new diet.

The gradual switchover method has a couple of advantages. The first is that introducing new food slowly can ease stomach discomfort and minimize any barfing or diarrhea your cat might experience as a result of the change. The second is that you can adjust the timing and proportions to meet you and your cat's own needs, and the basic principle still works.

The Overpowering Smell

Cats figure out what they want to eat by smell. You can and should use that to your advantage. There's a pretty good chance Fluffy won't like the smell of his new diet, but you can get him to eat prescription food by making it smell like something he really wants.

Warming bland prescription food in the microwave is a great way to make its smell stronger and more appealing to cats. You can also try mixing it with other stinky treats like tuna fish oil or the juice from a can of Fancy Feast. One trick that worked with a particularly stubborn cat of mine was putting his prescription food in empty Kentucky Fried Chicken containers.

And Finally, Catnip

Hey, it works for glaucoma and chemotherapy patients, so why not your cat? Catnip is known to increase appetite in cats, and most love it for other reasons as well. Sprinkling some fresh or dried catnip directly on top of the new diet will get your cat to eat prescription food in no time!