Whisker fatigue causes stress and overstimulates their senses. Using a flat bowl or plate will relieve this issue and allow your cat to eat all their food without stress.
You can also search for “whisker fatigue” bowls specifically made for cats.
Not all feline vets think whisker fatigue is a real condition or cause for concern. Dr. Cathy Lund of City Kitty, a feline-only veterinary practice in Providence, R.I, questions the validity of whisker fatigue. While a cat’s whiskers do serve as very sensitive tactile sensors, she does not believe contact between whiskers and objects causes stress in cats.
Yea, me too. The article is based on inference and opinion. You actually have no idea what your cat thinks about whiskers touching the bowl.
That said, stress, for whatever reason, is a real issue of concern for cat owners and vets, Lund says.
No one is doubting this. The amount of stress this puts on that cat is what is doubted.
Not every cat responds the same, or at all, to stress on their whiskers. Just like people, cats have varrying tolerances to stimulus.
Anecdotally, my cats would not finish their food in narrow bowls but do now that they eat from flat bowls.
I can add my own anecdote to this one. One of my cat’s is fine with any bowl because he’s just very food motivated and will do anything to get to his food at feeding time. The other one, when using a more narrow bowl, would often stop eating normally and scoop out the food with a paw. Once I switched to wide flatter bowls, she scarfs it down without pause. It was clearly bothering her.
While cats vary in their preferences and tolerances, it bothers me that so many people just scoff at this idea. We’re caretakers for cats and should do our best to make their lives as reasonably comfortable and enriching as possible. And just because a cat is fine with touching things with their whiskers in some situations doesn’t mean they’re cool with it in others. Cats are often happy to have you scratch behind their ears, but only when it’s invited.
And come on, bowls are cheap. It’s not that big of an inconvenience to get them a bowl that could be more comfortable, even if they’re tolerating it now.
So far the only actual study we have on this says it’s not a real thing. Sure, some cats have different preferences but it’s not like you are torturing your cat with normal bowls and need to run out and buy special ones.
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1098612X20930190
If you’re feeding your cat an infinite supply of dry food without a feeding schedule you have bigger things to be concerned about than whisker fatigue.
As an ad libitum cat feeder, 0 issues so far. They eat when they’re hungry
It’s well documented it veterinary literature, you can believe the studies or not 🤷♀️. It’s not like it kills your cat instantly, you just deal with diabetes kidney or urinary issues in the future. Not sure why someone would not try to prevent that.
This applies to pretty much every article about animals…it’s just humans putting human stuff on animals for the sake of humans. :/
It happens often in media, but real scientists don’t rely on what they think animals think, instead using objective data like brain activity scans, heartbeat rates etc, often presenting pure data without a conclusion on what they think the animal feels. Those studies will then come to media, where the interviewed scientists will give their thoughts on how they interpret the results, even if it’s obvious that the animal likes/dislikes something. These also exist in media.
Edit: I also want to add that many things are straight up visibly harming the animal and you don’t even need any conclusions. For example if you house a hole-dwelling spider without enough substrate to dig, it will stop eating. This has been confirmed many times, by many owners. It doesn’t matter if it makes them uncomfortable or they feel pain from it, or they are cold, etc, because we know that they stop eating, and that’s a good enough signal that something’s bad.
A vet weighs in on this whole thing and goes over a study that was done on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLrI0eprVr8
TL;DW it’s mostly marketing and fear mongering. Your cat doesn’t care and even with completely natural behaviors (like oh I don’t know, squeezing into prey burrows and clamping their muzzle around mice) they get their whiskers compressed all the time. Whiskers are touch receptors so the idea that they can’t be touched is kind of silly.
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It’s funny: The linked article up top briefly brings up that some vets question it, but then immediately turns around and acts like it’s a foregone conclusion.
Yeah, cats are just assholes
That really depends on the cat. Mine don’t care whatsoever.
True; every cat is different.
They’re all cats (I like cats).
I have a whisker friendly dish and my cat still does this. My cat just likes company when he eats and he’ll meow at you to come join him. He digs in as soon as I sit down with him at his bowl. Just a little weirdo butt.
Not really weird. It’s a survival thing. He wants you to watch over him while he’s vulnerable and eating.
Yeah one of our 2 cats seems to enjoy eating more with company so most of the time I’ll stand there and be lookout for him so he’s comfortable.
My cat will come and tap me a couple of times with his paw to get my attention, then wander to his food bowl. He just wants me to pet him while he eats. It’s the cutest thing.
No, whisker fatigue is mostly a myth. Like just put some thought into it for a moment, do cats care when their whisters touch stuff when they are lying down or sleeping? Do they care when they squeeze into a tight space or lay in a tiny box? Does your cat rub its face on anythingnand everything it gets the chance to? Then why would only thr bowl cause whisker fatigue?
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My cat likes to invert her spine into a kind of gel substance and then stick her face down the side of the bed between the wall.
I am fairly sure that she is perfectly happy with having a whiskers compressed, what she’s not happy about is having less food.
My cat likes it when I cup my hand and cover the front of her face like a hand mask. Not sure why, but it definitely presses on her whiskers a bit and she doesn’t seem to mind either.
Tactile interaction is a really important part of social bonding for cats.
I think that’s it as well. My cat has never had to worry about not having any food available, but will act like she’s dying of hunger the second her bowl is less than half full. To get her to eat the last half all I have to do is shake the kibble box next to the bowl.
While whisker fatigue is in debate, it’s true some cats are weird about touching the bowl. I personally feed the cats on the same plates I eat from and they get water from a fountain. But I have known many cats who were fine with a bowl too. I think the main thing is the material of the receptacle. Some plastics can hold bacteria that makes their lil faces break out. :(
I also use the same plates we use, but they would still ask for me to throw out the food and serve a new batch everytime (I don’t actually throw out the food but ‘recycle’ it).
Hehehe this is the way
This is my experience, too. We’ve had a lot of cats (many rescues), and some really do have problems with the deeper bowls, while most others don’t. We got some shallow bowls years ago, and those work well. We tried just using small plates, but a lot of cats will push the food over the edge and make a mess, so some sort of rim is important for us.
Then there is my cat who stuffes half of his body in a 5cm diameter pudding container just so that he can reach the very last drop of it. Then wonders why he is stuck and as soon as I save him from his pudding prison he does the same again.
cats have autism don’t ask me to explain 💅
If I served food on a plate, I’d be serving food on the floor.
A small mat under their food and water (kept separate due to other instinct cats have) is an easy way to keep things cleaner.
We tried separating the food and water.
The cat just went to where the water was and howled. We’d show her the new spot, shed drink, and do the same thing in 20 minutes.
Just moved it back, less howling and she still drinks.
I put it in a very shallow dish and then put that dish inside a shallow (and heavy) old baking tray.
The lip of the tray catches the kibble from falling outside of it and the heaviness makes it hard for her to move it.
And now I don’t feel bad about getting new, lighter pans because the old one is still getting used.
I started feeding my cat out of a pie dish because I was worried about this and I think it prevents it.
And it had the added benefit of making it look like my cat just polished off an entire pie all by himself when he’s done eating.
And it had the added benefit of making it look like my cat just polished off an entire pie all by himself when he’s done eating.
This is the real life pro tip
My cat still acts like her bowl is empty even though it is flat, so I’m skeptical.
I also have a ‘flat’ bowl. My cat isn’t happy with her food until I put some of her food on the floor and watch her eat for a couple of minutes. She is the boss… apparently.
😮 So THAT’S why they will beg for food even if the bowl isn’t empty!
While true, my theory is that they might also want something else. I use a plate and sometimes she’ll just beg for more anyway even if half of what I gave her is still in the bowl, I’ll give her a tiny bit of something else and she’ll go eat that instead lol
my theory is that they might also want something else.
I keep about 4 different kinds of food around for our cats. I have three auto-feeders in different parts of the house each with a different foot and dispense schedule. That way the cat has some choice about what they are eating, and there’s a bit of environmental enrichment where they can eat in different places.
I also hide little piles of cat treats in various locations around the house. Keeps the cats curious and exploring to see if they can find something good to munch.
There are multiple reasons a cat could be begging for food while some is left, whisker fatigue is just the most common and misunderstood.
For dry food, if you put it in small (4-5cm dia.) cups they WILL reach in to grab the kibble and will eat one at a time.
This is a great way to de-chonk.
I have a cheap ‘food maze’ that is essentially this but also with some covers that slide or hinge. I started just putting food so it’s visible but after a few tries my cat figured out there are hidden treats, too. Cats are curious, so they enjoy the hunt, too!
Or, if your cat is a fat, clever little shit, she will jam her paw in deep and then yank all the kibble out so she can binge on it and then barf on the carpet.
[OT] I just googled “de-chonk” and now I with that someone named their gym “Human Dechonking Centre”.
PHYSICAL FATNESS
better to give regular feedings in measured amounts imo but that’s not possible for everyone
