Moving on to adult food!

At what age do you move onto adult dry food??

Jiminy is nearly 1 year old now and most dry foods say to move on to adult at 12 months but I've read a few bits online saying that they keep coons on kitten until 18months old due to them taking so long to mature.

So I'm pretty unsure as to when to change him over, hes right lazy lump (he has mad half hours running up and down the stairs but snoozes most of the time!) so I really don't want him getting fat on kitten food, when I do change over it'll be to RC MC as I like the sound of the larger kibble, if he drops a bit of the kitten food on the floor he can't pick it back up as its too small for his big mouth!

Not sure there's a hard and fast rule on it, but I think many of us move them onto adult biscuits fairly early on. I moved Freyja onto adult when she was around 6 months old, and when Wicca moved in 3 months later I went back to kitten for a couple of months and then integrated adult gradually back into the biscuit dish. They both seemed to prefer the bigger adult stuff. More to crunch I guess!

Tango is eating the RC food now, much to Louie's disgust :LOL: but they also have wet :nod:

I'm due to order some more food soon so I'll get him some of the mc biscuits, he has a pouch of wet food everyday as well as I don't like the idea of having to eat the same thing all day every day. Hes had 1 pouch of adult felix as good as it looks every day since we've had him, the breeder gave them adult as she said the kitten dry food was giving them all they needed to grow it was just more of a treat. I've tried loads of better food like the 70% meat ones but he turns his nose up at them and just licks off the gravy/jelly.

I kept Dexter on RC kitten 36 until he was 12 months. He is now on the RC main coon formula. He loves I.and makes less of a mess when eating.

We didn't pay much attention to kitten vs. adult food because the differences in nutrition are generally small to nonexistent. Kitten food seems a bit of a gimmick (other than the few foods intended for very young kittens). When we had puppies, on the other hand, there seemed to be quite significant differences between puppy and adult food. As long as you use a high quality, high protein adult food with meat as primary ingredients, I doubt there will be any issues. We certainly have not had any with multiple MCs.

Our lot turn there noses up at the higher meat content food to :suprised: they do like the Hi-Life Essentials chicken which is 50% meat & raw turkey mince a couple of times a week :nod:

He refuses any form of "human food" like mince meat, chicken, ham etc. the look on his face when I tried to give him some raw mince was amazing :LOL:
He does love his biscuits though, just wish James Wellbeloved made a larger biscuit like RC as he seems to like it more but he really needs the larger biscuits, the kitten food kinda falls out the side of his mounth and he just shovels it in :rofl:

I got that face, too. Freyja actually managed to look offended at the offering. Wicca's far braver so she gave it a go, but even she decided after a few licks that she didn't like raw, and that cat doesn't turn ANYTHING down usually....

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Originally Posted by candes

Likely best to base it on what your vet says. And on your kitty. Teddy Bearz was quite large (size, not weight wise) at 9 months, so the vet said I could switch him over earlier than previously discussed. I did it gradually. I would imagine that if your kitty is on the small side, It would be best to keep them on the kitten food longer.

But like the others said, there is not a whole lot of difference between the kitten and adult food. Or is that just for the premuim foods? Hmmm... Has anyone compared cat vs kitten for the lower priced brands?

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Hes 7kg and chuffing huge at 10 months old, defo not on the small side :rofl:
Here he is at around 9 months old! Need to get some updated pics of him, hes really started to mature now.
http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c3...y/ad247077.jpg

Well I tried my best to measure him but he just wanted to eat my tape measure :rofl:

I'd say he was around 43inches but that was measuring tail, back then head and adding the guesses together haha

I did manage to get lots of pics though! I'll upload them when I'm back home later, he's just lost all of his long winter fluff and looks like a giant kitten again :LOL:

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Originally Posted by candes

What is funny, is that when I started that thread, I had no clue my baby would be heading anywhere near the world record. Although I still think he has at least 1 1/2 inches till he reaches it. Mine started off long at a young age. But I don't think his has changed a whole lot. Dunno... We will soon see.

http://www.maine-coon-forum.info/mai...ghlight=length

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1 1/2 inches to go? That'll be a week or two at this rate!!:smile:

I did get the boyfriend to try and help me measure him (he thinks I'm going crazy measuring cats lol) and it was around 43inches again but my tape measure is only 40 inches long and he kept scrunching him self up trying to get at the tape measure, maybe it'll be a bit easier when hes older and more obedient ( I can dream right?? :rofl:)

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Originally Posted by Louie-Louie

Our lot turn there noses up at the higher meat content food to :suprised: they do like the Hi-Life Essentials chicken which is 50% meat & raw turkey mince a couple of times a week :nod:

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I'm glad we don't have the only MC's who turn their noses up at the 'quality' stuff - we've tried it all but still end up back at Whiskas, Felix or whatever else is on offer!

Our two (just under a year and 10 months) have now moved on to RC Maine Coon although we do mix it with RC Exigent for fussy eaters - which Gracie most definitely is!!! :(

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Originally Posted by Rachel-C

I'm glad we don't have the only MC's who turn their noses up at the 'quality' stuff - we've tried it all but still end up back at Whiskas, Felix or whatever else is on offer!

Our two (just under a year and 10 months) have now moved on to RC Maine Coon although we do mix it with RC Exigent for fussy eaters - which Gracie most definitely is!!! :(

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It's the same with ours. They'll eat the odd can of Cat Deli Chicken from Pets At Home, but not consistently. And I'm not brave enough to feed them that three days on the trot any way as they end up WITH the trots!