It’s no secret our feline friends can be fussy. If dinner time is a struggle or you just want to make mealtime fun and engaging, try preparing a special meal for your cat!
Build a nutritious bowl that will excite your cat’s senses! How? Start by understanding how your cat sees the world.
How to excite your cat’s five senses when building a bowl?
- Smell: Smells are so important to a cat. Their sense of smell is 14 times stronger than ours! Pique their interest with a range of delicious smells to get them running in for dinner.
- Taste: Cats are obligate carnivores. This means that they must have animal proteins in their diet to live happy and healthy lives. Build a nutritious bowl with high quality proteins.
- Sight: Despite being naturally skilled hunters, cats have relatively poor vision when it comes to things directly in front of their noses as they have a blind spot directly below their nose and chin. That’s why they have whiskers to help sense what’s around them. Their whiskers may be sensitive if brushing against a deep, narrow bowl so ensure you prepare their special meal on a shallow bowl or plate.
- Sound: Get your pet excited by using various sounds to signify mealtime. Dry food pouring against a bowl or a spoon rattling around a can is a great way to call them to dinner and create an exciting ritual!
- Touch: As a hunter, cats prefer food that is warm. Warm food also enhances smell. Combine their dried food with warmed up canned, rolled or frozen food for a delighted kitty.
By adding more variety to your pet’s bowl you’re activating their senses and making feeding time more enjoyable and satisfying. What’s good for you isn’t always good for your pet though, so before you start thinking of feeding them last’s nights leftovers or all organic produce, it’s important to understand how to build a bowl that’s not only full of nutritional benefits but is also exciting for your pet.
While we celebrate creativity, it’s also a timely reminder of the foods to never feed your cat: Caffeine containing foods, chocolate, dog food, yeast or raw dough, onions, chives or garlic, alcohol, grapes and raisins, fat trimmings and bones, just to name a few.