Making sure your new kitten is eating enough is one of the most important jobs you have as a pet owner. A newborn kitten should gain roughly one pound a month for the first 6 months of its life. If a kitten does not get the proper amount of food and nutrients, it can have a detrimental effect on its future development. On the flip side, it is also dangerous to overfeed a kitten.
Can you over feed a kitten?
Yes, it is certainly possible to over feed a kitten. This could happen in two ways: feeding a kitten too much in one serving, or feeding a kitten too many times in one day. While you should steadily increase the amount of milk/food you give a kitten as he/she ages, it is important to remember that you should simultaneously reduce the number of times you feed him/her a day.
How to tell if your kitten is full?
There are a couple signs that your kitten will show if they are full. When a kitten is full, it will usually have small bubbles that appear when they are full. A kitten that is full will likely move to the water bowl to wash all the food down. At this point they have most likely eaten all the food they want. If your kitten leaves the food bowl with some food still in there, it is also a sign that they have eaten enough. A kitten that is still hungry will likely follow you around and whine, and may try to lead you back to their food bowl so you get the message.
What happens if you overfeed a kitten?
There are many possible health problems that can occur if you overfeed a kitten. The most common is diarrhea. A kitten has a fairly small stomach, and overfeeding causes the stomach to overflow. This forces that digestion system to work harder and faster than it is used to. Thus, a lot of the food is not properly digested. In return, the kitten will then release diarrhea as a way to get the excess weight out of the body as quickly as possible.
Over feeding a kitten can also cause dehydration. This is because your kitten’s body requires a certain amount of water in order to digest food. If your kitten eats too much, it means that its body must provide more water to pass the food through the digestive system. If your cat doesn’t drink enough water, its body will take liquid from reserve parts of the body, which in return can cause serious dehydration. This can prove to be deadly, especially in young kittens.
A kitten that is overfed can also develop obesity. This comes with a plethora of problems, with the most serious being heart issues. When a kitten becomes obese, it heart has to work way harder to pump blood throughout the body. This puts a lot of stress on the heart, which can eventually lead to a heart attack.
One great way to monitor if you are over feeding your kitten is to do weekly weight checks. If your kitten is gaining more than one pound per month, it is likely that you are giving them too much food. Also make sure your kitten is getting enough exercise so that it can burn off the energy/fat from the food.
