When a kitten in the house life changes. After all, this is a new family member, for which you need to care. This is a great responsibility. Each owner begins to worry a lot of questions: how to take care of the baby so that he grows up healthy, how to accustom him to the tray and claw, well and the main thing - how to choose feed for kittens up to one year old.
Selection features
As for a small child, the very first year of life is very important for a kitten, when bones and muscles are formed, the future health is laid. If you feed a small pet correctly, he will grow up healthy, he will develop immunity to various diseases. It will develop properly, it will become strong, its wool will be beautiful and shiny. If it is a bald cat, it will have healthy skin.
Food for kittens up to a year is divided into several groups: from birth to four months, from four to eight, and from eight to twelve months.
Veterinarians recommend feeding the kitten specially selected feeds, with high quality, it is believed that this is how the baby will receive everything necessary for its proper development. In the future, this kitten will go to feed for adult cats.
Despite this, some owners believe that it is wiser to accustom the baby to human food. And then the cat will eat everything, and there will be no problems with food.
But if we feed the kitten with normal food, the diet should be formulated so that the animal receives all the necessary substances that will ensure proper development.
Varieties of ready meals
Especially for the kittens developed several lines of feed. There are good dry, wet food, special canned food.
- Dry food is given to kittens that are older, at least they should be six months old.. By this time, their teeth will get stronger, they will gnaw dry lumps, sharpening and cleaning their teeth. It is necessary to give with such feeding a sufficient amount of water. For kittens, dry food has pellets of a small size, and it is easy for kittens to eat it. It is recommended to choose top quality feed such as Royal Canin and Pro Plan.
There are a lot of chemical additives in cheap feeds, and they will not benefit the children's stomach.
- For kittens 1-5 months provided wet food. The bag always contains information that this type of food is intended for kittens, in addition, they can be classified depending on the breeds of cats. Some owners prefer to buy food that is suitable for the breed of his pet. Here, too, should be guided by the price. Food is more expensive is higher quality, there are more natural supplements that are useful for a growing body. Wet food for kittens are composed of soft little pieces in a jelly or broth, in the form of a soft paste, which a small pet can easily cope with.
Among the liquid feed premium include Royal Canin, Sheba. Economy class feeds, but which are popular - Felix, Friskies, Whiskas, Kitekat.
- Canned food - This is the most expensive type of feed, and not every owner can afford to feed the animal every day. Most likely, it will be a good complementary food, a treat for the baby, which he can receive on certain days. For the most part canned food consists of natural products - fish or meat with the addition of healthy vegetables.
Natural food
If the owner of the pet has decided to feed the kitten with homemade food, this does not mean that it can be fed with what people eat.He needs special food, and therefore will have to devote a certain time to cooking. His diet must include meat and fish, vegetables, healthy grains, dairy products. Pieces of food intended for a kitten should be small and soft so that the baby can chew them easily and has no problems with digestion. The first time, fish and meat need to grind.
You can not give a kitten raw fish, it must necessarily be subjected to heat treatment, remove all bones from there. The same can be said about meat. Preference should be given to lean meat - chicken, turkey, duck, beef.
Separately, the kitten is unlikely to eat vegetables, so you can add them to meat or fish, these include carrots, zucchini, greens.
On the milk in its pure form, many kittens react indigestion. Therefore, do not give milk. You can cook porridge with the addition of a small amount of milk. In porridge, you can add a small piece of butter. And more benefits will bring dairy products, ryazhenka, cottage cheese with sour cream.
Feeding nuances
Whatever food is chosen for the baby, you need to take into account certain nuances of feeding. The number of meals for babies is different from the nutrition of an adult cat. If a cat after a year should be fed twice a day - in the morning and in the evening, then the baby is fed 4-5 times a day in small portions. The older he is, the less food intake. After 6 months, the kitten can be fed 3 times a day. And when he turns one, he switches to adult nutrition.
It is always necessary to feed the kitten in the same place and at a certain time, to keep the dishes clean. After eating the leftovers should be thrown away, wash the bowl. A kitten should be accustomed from childhood to the fact that feeding occurs at certain hours, and not at any time when it pleases. Clean water in the bowl must be constantly, it must be changed every day to clean.
When a kitten grows up, you can not only give him wet food and canned food, but also add dry food to the diet, preferably premium class, since it is the most useful. But veterinarians recommend do not mix different lines, and feed your pet with one type of feed.
In addition, you should always pay attention to the health of the kitten. It may be that one type of food does not suit him, and the other will have a beneficial effect on the body. Therefore, you need to ensure that the kitten is moving, playful, cheerful, that he had healthy eyes, fluffy, shiny hair, a normal chair. If there is excessive hair falling out, watery eyes, diarrhea or constipation, this indicates that there is something wrong with nutrition.
In order not to experiment with the health of the animal, It is wiser to contact the veterinarian, who will promptly tell you what to change in the diet, and what kind of food to choose. It also happens that it is necessary to feed the kitten with a special medical food that helps to cope with various problems.
Despite all the existing ratings, each owner himself determines how to feed his pet. The main thing is that everything goes to his advantage, and he grew up healthy, cheerful and beautiful.
About the correct feeding of kittens up to a year, see below.
