Too young for cat food?

[Uabassoon]

Tibby is 6 months now and I'm thinking about taking her off kitten food and onto cat food but I worry that she might be too young for kitten food. It's hard to keep her and Corkscrew from eating each others food. I thought about just feeding them small portions twice a day but with school and work I never have the same times avaliable every day to feed them and I know cats like to be on a scheudal. I also figure it won't work because my roommate free feeds her cats. So if Corky and Tibby don't have food in their dishes they will just go over to Marrions room and eat her cats Senior formula food. Corky pigs out on the kitten food then when she wants to eat and Corky is at her bowl she just goes over to Corkys bowl and eat the adult food. Any suggestions? I've tried spraying Corkscrew with the water bottle when he's at her dish, but he could care less that he is being spayed.

[Glacier]

I took Onyx off kitten food at about six months. It was impossible to keep him out of the other cats' food and they were gaining weight eating his!! I did keep giving him kitten formula canned food for a few more months. Doesn't seem to have hurt him at all or slowed his growth--he weighs 17 pounds now and is very long!

[toughCookie]

Charlie and Patches are also 6 months old, and on cat food now, they are practically full grown. the vet said for another cat, Cookie, that she could eat regular cat food when she was their size and age, so I think it is ok for them... it was hard here too, to feed them separately. now they all eat the same food:D so much easier. but if you are not sure, you could call the vet.

[Chinadoll]

I would think it's ok. I believe I read somewhere that it's ok for a kitten to eat cat food, but because they're still growing, they may eat more of the cat food to get the same amount of nutrients that they need that may be in a smaller portion of kitten food(because kitten food has more protein and other nutrients than cat food). Did that make sense? Of course, your vet could confirm this. But I really don't see a problem of switching at 6 months.

[jenluckenbach]

My best suggestion would be to only leave down the adult food, and give the young one some kitten food at some point during the day when you are there to supervise him eating. That way he can eat any time (the adult food) the older cat can't get into the kitten food, but at the same time the younger one has the benefit of a small daily portion of the kitten food.

Now, if all that is impossible, he is old enough for adult food. (I just think they SHOULD have it a little longer)

I don't think this is a problem . Be sure of course that you give them a good quality of food then , well balanced , containing enough vitamins , etc. ! Hill's cat-food is perfect ; they only difficulty you can have with "adult"-food , is that the pieces are to big for kittens' teeth ... ; but 6 months , that should be okay !
My little Inka also often eats from Maya's bowl ...;)
Whenever I wanna give Maya something that is not yet suited for little Inka , I take maya into the kitchen , ON a cupboard where she's allowed to jump on . Of course the lil critter is meowing my ears off then ... LOL ! :D http://pages.prodigy.net/rogerlori1/emoticons/cat15.gif http://pages.prodigy.net/rogerlori1/emoticons/cat67.gif

[catland]

I had the same problem, how to keep the cats out of the kitten food and the kittens out of the cat food. I got the vet's ok to switch them over to cat food when they were about 6 months old.

[NoahsMommy]

We have the same problem too, I've just been mixing the cat and kitten food. Noah and Noel want the kitten food, Basil wants the cat food. So, they all get both. :rolleyes: