And Back to Food...

While Percival begins to make himself at home, other matters continue to occupy the attention of those in the Cosy Apartment: namely, food – to be precise, eating.

I have made an adjustment in the hard-food served here. For many years, it has been principally Orijen Regional Red. The cats I formerly had liked it, and the cats I have formerly liked it. It seemed to lose its appeal, however, and it appeared to me that it was eaten largely because it was the hard-food on offer. Thus, when my current supply was exhausted, I didn’t renew it.

I have found that the cats like a brand called Acana, a supply of which I first took in as part of a donation to the rescue-group to which I belong. I have been feeding it to the outsider-cats, but then tried it with my own. As they seem to prefer it to Orijen, I am given it a trial as the primary hard-food. But I am supplementing it with a ‘dietetic’ food. (It was once called ‘diabetic’ but I think there was a legal problem in that it could not be proved that it was good specifically for diabetic cats, and so the name was altered.) It is one that Renn has long enjoyed, and I have been giving it to Neville as a treat. Now, it is a secondary hard-food, provided, with the Acana, all the time. I see my two oldsters eating from the hard-food more often. This does not, though, mean that Renn will cease receiving his buffet; for some reason he enjoys the same foods more when they are served to him especially, rather than him eating from the supply made available to all and sundry.

And then there are methods of eating.

Imogen professed a shyness of eating, and, for quite a while, would eat only in the nylon tunnel. She would slip into it, turn around within its confines and wait near its mouth for service. Now, she wants to be fed on top of the cylinder-house cat-tree.

This necessitates a certain bowl, small enough to fit there without toppling of its own weight, yet stable enough not to slide off. Fortunately, Tungsten has come to the rescue: her bowl has a rim to its base, making it less liable to slipping than a flat-bottomed dish. Imo doesn’t push the bowl while she eats, so it stays put.

For the time being, then, until she changes her mind once more, Imogen will be fed where she wants, above and beyond all the others, which may have been the original reason for the position. She is eating, and that is the important thing.