It's a misnomer that cats don't drink water. If you provide fresh, clean, cool water cats will drink. Cats that eat wet (tinned or fresh) food will usually drink less water than cats that eat dry or semi-moist foods. In summer, try putting ice cubes into your cat's water to encourage drinking. Change the water every day and clean the bowl carefully.
Milk
You should not give milk to your cat. Milk contains a sugar called lactose and the majority of cats are lactose intolerant. This means they can't digest the milk and this can cause diarrhoea. Small amounts of cheese are usually tolerated, but be aware that too much can cause constipation. Other dairy products such as yoghurt are fine in tiny amounts ocassionally, but to be honest it's best if they don't acquire a taste for them at all. There are now available some specially designed cat milks that are lactose free and available from the supermarket (in the pet food aisle) or the Vet. If your cat already has the taste for milk and won't drink water, then feeding them this special milk is fine. I would recommend however that you water it down slowly over time and you will usually find that they come to drink water alone eventually.
Food
Cats are carnivorous - which means meat eaters. They cannot be vegetarians, although they will happily eat some vegetable material. They cannot survive without about 90% of their diet being meat.
The best cat diets give varying quantities of all of the four types of foods available for cats:
Moist: Moist food is the tinned food most often associated with cat food. There are many, many choices available, and it would be foolish of me to make suggestions re brands. Just watch out for high filler content - ie rice or other carbohydrates or gravies. They may make the food slightly cheaper (or more palatable) but the cat won't be getting all the nutrients it needs. The very high quality foods available from the Vet are usually also the best quality but are often very expensive. You can usually find similar foods in your supermarket for a much more reasonable price. Also, the more expensive the food isn't necessarily the best. Often some canned foods contain shrimp or salmon and while they are nice as treats for the cat aren't any better nutritionally than beef or chicken.
Semi-moist: These semi-moist foods are becoming more popular but are reasonably rare here in Australia. They are soft to the touch, but still firm. The same rules apply as for moist foods when choosing a brand.
Fresh: It is advisable that at least some of a cat's diet comes from fresh food. In some areas this isn't practicable because of problems with feeding raw foods (ie parasites). In that case feeding all of the other kinds of foods is acceptable. There is some contention about feeding cats chicken wings or necks (raw) to assist with their tooth and gum health. In Australia it is a recognised practice and is recommended by Vets. However in Europe and the USA it's actively campaigned against due to the possibility of diseases such as salmonela. You need to go here by what your Vet recommends. Feeding a small amount of offal once a week is also a good thing. In a natural diet cats would be eating entire animals, including the liver, kidneys etc. But be aware that an excess of such food (especially liver) can cause major problems. Cats do tend to love offal, so don't let them fool you into giving them more!
Dry: Dry food is exactly that - hard and dry. Some people say that it can be a complete diet, but like all creatures, cats like a little variety and if you had to sit down to the same meal over and over then you would soon tire of it wouldn't you? There is also the school of thought that dry food assists with keeping tartar on teeth under control. But if anyone has ever had a cat puke (and haven't we all) then you'll notice the dry food is usually almost whole - just swollen from absorbing water. So if they aren't chewing it it can't be helping their teeth too much. I'm not saying dry food can't be a part of a cat's diet, just that it should be supplemental to all the other foods available. It should also be noted that water is absolutely essential to be provided when feeding dry food (water is always absolutely essential, but even more so with dry food :).
Treats: It is fine to give treats ocassionally to your cat, including things like cheese and yoghurt (as mentioned above), raw egg (with the same conditions as for the chicken as mentioned above) and bought treats such as Pounces. But it's always best to stick with cat food, rather than human food. Most cats like to take a little food from their owner's plate, but this can be very dangerous to the cat. Cats have often very bad reactions to onions and there can be trace amounts of onion in many pre-processed human foods. Chocolate should never be fed to cats - although cats are unlikely to eat enough chocolate to cause any harm, it's best for them not to get a taste for it just in case they do. Chocolate can kill cats! The very best treats to buy are either fresh fish (minus any bones) or seafood, gourmet brand cat foods, or things like proper cat treats. It's always best not to feed your cat human food.
Feeding your cat is a personal thing. I happen to feed mine a small amount of moist or fresh food twice a day and have some dry food out for them to graze on. If your cat is overweight, then you will have to restrict their diet in some way - please talk to your Vet about this. Never put a cat on a "diet" without a Veterinary consultation.
The two most prevalent types of parasites (animals that feed off other animals) on cats are fleas and worms. Both are usually easily treated.
Fleas: Fleas are an ongoing problem with any animals, but particularly cats and dogs. They are more noticeable in the spring and summer months, but can be seen at any time of year. You need to treat both the animal and the environment if you are to successfully rid yourself of fleas. Cats are most commonly now treated with "spot on" flea treatments that are dabbed onto the back of the neck. They usually last for about a month (although sometimes significantly longer) and often treat ticks as well. As for the environment you can treat bedding by washing in a flea shampoo or using flea powder on the area. Vacuuming and then emptying the bag regularly assists with keeping fleas out of carpets, as does regular carpet shampooing. Sometimes you may need to "bomb" the house with flea "bombs". You rid the house of all people and pets (including fish) and then let these "bombs" off - they take about two hours then it's safe for you to return. You need to vacuum immediately afterwards.
Worms: There are many different forms of worms, which I won't go into here. Worming preparations vary greatly in their effectiveness and I can only recommend that you only purchase worming products from your Vet. And you need to make sure that it is an all wormer - some worm treatments only treat a couple or even one type of worm at a time. The main thing you need to know is that you need to worm your cat regularly. Now this is disputed in the USA where worming is only done if there is evidence of worms being present. In Australia, the recommended schedule for worming is:
Please check with your Vet if you have any questions regarding this.
Other parasites such as ear mites and ringworm (not a worm at all but a fungus) are best treated under advice from your Veterinarian.
Desexing (Spaying and Neutering)
Desexing (spaying for females, neutering for males, desexing or "spuetering" for either) is vitally important if you are not a registered breeder. Millions of cats are euthanaised (put to sleep) every year because of some people's lazy attitude to preventing their cats from breeding.
The most common reasons given for not desexing an animal are:
"I wouldn't want her to miss out on having kittens": (Usually said by a woman) Cats don't go around "pining" to be mothers like some human women do. When they fall pregnant, they run completely on instinct and often with first pregnancies they are very lost as they truly don't understand what is happening to them.
"I wouldn't want him to miss out on having sex": (Usually said by a man) Male (or female cats for that matter) once again go on instinct when it comes to sex. They don't spend their entire lives wishing they had had sex if they never did - they have no idea what they are "missing". Even male cats that are neutered at a later age don't "miss" the sex. This is entirely a myth based on the feelings a man is sure he would have if he weren't able to have sex.
"I want my children to experience the miracle of birth": This is fine and dandy as long as you also show them the "miracle of death" that is occuring every day in shelters all across the world. Every kitten you allow to be brought into the world is another kitten dead somewhere else.
"But I have homes for all these kittens": Say your cat has four kittens and you do have homes for them all. That's four kittens at a shelter - perhaps strays - that now don't get homes because your four are taking them up. That means your four kittens born mean four more kittens have died.
"Female cats need to have at least one litter before being spayed": There is no medical reason that requires female cats to bred prior to desexing. In fact females that have never bred are much less likely to develop mammary (breast) cancers and cannot develop ovarian and uterine cancers because they have been completely removed.
"I can't afford the desexing": Well if you can't afford desexing you sure aren't going to be able to afford the associated possible problems of breeding. For females this includes complications during pregnancy or birth. If your cat goes into labour in the middle of the night and you can't move her, calling the Vet out to your home at 3 am is going to cost a lot more than spaying. Males that are unneutered will often get into fights with other males and females during mating and end up with absesses that sometimes need surgery to fix. These cost a lot more to repair than neutering.
"Cats can't get sexually transmitted diseases so what does it matter?": Cats certainly can and do get sexually transmitted diseases. The two most common are Feline Immunodeficiency Virus (FIV) and Feline Leukaemia Virus (FeLV). FIV is related to HIV in humans (but cannot be transmitted to humans) and causes similar effects in cats - a suppressed immune system which leaves them open to disease more easily. Although most FIV positive kitties live reasonably long lives some die horrible deaths and it's easily trasmissable via mating. FeLV on the other hand is an always fatal disease that often means cats have to be euthanaised. It's not actually transmitted via the mating, but through the biting that always occurs during the mating. Cats who test positive often only live for a short time and cannot usually be housed with FeLV negative cats because it can also be contracted by even eating out of the same food bowls.
If all of these reasons aren't enough to convince you to get your pet desexed then you should at least do so responsibly. This means only breeding females once a year, containing breeding males so that they only mate when you want them to, ensuring that your cats are mated with only with disease free cats and making sure that all of your cats have good homes to go to.
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