I own two male cats that are brothers, around 5 y/o.
I usually just feed them normal dry food and water, and canned once or twice a week as treat.
My one cat though has recently been vomiting around once a week on average, it's usually just one big clop of digested dry food.
I think this may be attributed to the fact I bought a larger cat bowl within the last year that I fill once a day and basically let them free feed, never knew until now this is a bad idea as they always stayed at normal weight, and my other cat hasn't had any issues at all.
The cat that has been vomiting weekly has also been meowing a lot more then average lately, for now I'm going to stop free feeding him and twice a day instead as I learned this can be very bad
The problem with free feeding, explains Dr. Thomas Morganti, DVM, of the Avon Veterinary Clinic in Connecticut, is that every time your cat goes for that kibble, there’s an insulin spike. The pancreas can’t handle the long-term overload, and eventually you’re looking at a cat with diabetes.
Dr. Debora Lichtenberg, VMD, has explained here at Petful that offering all-day dry food is especially problematic: “Cats conditioned to the never-ending dry buffet are at risk for developing obesity, urinary problems and kidney failure, to name just a few of the top feline health risks of a dry food diet. It would be like a human moving his recliner to a Las Vegas buffet.”
Would appreciate any thoughts on this, and whether a trip to the Vet is necessary at this moment or just stopping the free feeding should fix him up?
Thanks