One good piece of advice I got before adopting was to introduce the kitten to as many different flavors and textures of food as possible.
That way you won’t have a picky cat and you won’t find yourself in a scramble if the one variety of cat food your feline master will eat is discontinued or becomes difficult to get. That became a major problem during and after the pandemic, when disrupted supply chains and shortages of packing materials meant you never knew what you’d find on store shelves.
But there’s another good reason to do it: variety keeps your cat happy.
Even if your cat has a favorite food, too much exposure to that food will have diminishing returns, a research team from Japan’s Iwate University found.
But it’s not just the type of meat, texture or brand. Smell is hugely important to cats, and the study found they have much bigger appetites when presented with a novel food odor.
This is helpful not only to help us make sure our little buddies eat, but also because most of us don’t think about olfactory stimulation with cats. We build them cat condos and catios, we provide scratchers, we rotate toys. But how often do we give our cats the opportunity to enjoy new smells?
One of Buddy’s favorite things to do is sniff around the apartment building. I wait until late at night when it’s quiet and let him walk the hallways, stopping at each door to sniff. (I always remain a few feet away because it makes him feel safe, and because I can scoop him up and bring him back if he gets frightened.)
He loves it, and I don’t do it enough. After reading this, I’ll make sure little dude gets his sniffing tour more regularly.
Pain In The Bud 
One of my friends has a cat named Myron. Myron will ONLY eat Purina meaty bits. No other food will do. No other food will he eat.
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That’s exactly the situation I hoped to avoid. I wonder what might happen if they start using a topper on the meaty bits and potentially train him to try other food.
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Ramses loves the smell of the Concrete Jungle at night – it must smell differently than during the day. Diego was a picky eater when it came to his canned food. So much so that he coud detect the differnce in LOTS of Tiki Cat tuna. Many times I had to exchange cases of food. Ramses isn’t so much picky but his digestive system cannot tolerate changes in food. From what I’ve read it’s his Siamese genes. Brandon? He loves whatever I put in front of him.
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They smell different at night to attract nocturnal pollinators like moths and bats, which is pretty cool. There’s a protein that acts as a photoreceptor to release scent molecules at night, and cats can smell the scent plumes.
People can smell some of them, but it’s a pretty short list compared to our feline overlords.
Coincidentally, I recently researched this stuff for a story I’m writing involving a jungle on another planet.
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We had a big breakthrough this week. Caramel has been visiting us for 18 months and we always treat him with kibble. We tried him on countless other possibilities, but the like of tuna, salmon, cod and chicken all failed to impress. At last, on Tuesday, we tempted him to eat some roast turkey. He was tentative at first, but once he developed a taste for it there was no stopping him. Turkey is not something we buy more than once a year, but given Caramel’s new-found interest I am currently in negotiations with Mrs P about when we can get another one. July is looking like a possibility!
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The power of turkey! As you’ve probably seen on my blog, Bud LOVES turkey, so clearly Caramel has good taste in good taste. It’s a bit odd because turkey would not be part of any cat’s natural diet.
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Snoops and Angel will eat anything. Sarge is not overly fond of seafood, but he’ll eat it. Gypsy does not like beef. Maybe I should switch up brands.
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If you use Chewy, you can just remove an item from your auto ship for one package and add something else. I’ve swapped out for Fancy Feast petites, Nutro perfect portions, etc. (Bud doesn’t really eat leftovers so I buy the perfect portions.)
With that many cats someone is always going to eat whatever the others won’t eat.
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I thought the cats were training us.
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How did i miss this article? Yes. In order for my cat to eat more, because his ailment makes him lose weight very slowly, i give him different things. Including cooked chicken beneath his cat food. It works. Or tuna juice on top of food.
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They make meal toppers now too, although Bud wasn’t thrilled with the ones I tried. I think they were Fancy Feast.
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Yes. But costs too much. Baby food is best and no preservatives. And better than Churros.
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Have you ever tested Buddy on turkey and chicken? Can he tell the difference?
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Yeah. He likes chicken but nothing compares to his beloved turkey.
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