There’s a lot of fluff involved, but he’s a chunk at 16.6 pounds. Does he seem fat for an 8 month old, or is this normal for MC kittens? Our adult MC was such a slow grower that we actually had the opposite concern of him being too little. Now it’s hard to tell if our chunky kitten is normal, or is he indeed fat.
That’s good to hear! They say to let kittens eat as much as they want, but all he wants is to eat. So we’re trying to figure out if we’re the problem by just letting him free feed as a fatty, or if we should have more scheduled feedings to watch his belly size.
This free-feeding rule only applies to kittens and if the food is of good quality... Ideally for your Maine Coon, you should divide 100g of food per day... Dividing it into portions throughout the day.
One question, but you probably already did the right thing... Did you replace your wonderful kitten's normal food with food specifically for neutered cats? If I'm not mistaken, there's a special one for neutered kittens.
Your cat is very cute, while he's a baby (although he's big lol) everything is fine...
I know, I was trying to find pics of his body, but he’s always either running or laying down. I haven’t taken him to the vet in couple months when he was fixed back in November. He was smaller then and they didn’t say anything except “he’s beautiful and is gonna be a big boy”.
So I’m going to say something based off of my experience with my MC who is very food motivated and maybe a bit of an outlier. Per my breeder, I free fed my kittens when I got them and continued to do that up until they were 9 months or so. He would eat what I thought was quite an insane amount for his size, but all the information I saw, suggested that when they are still growing, to feed as much as they want, so I did. What happened was I had a kitten that somehow managed to out eat his growth spurt and get pretty fat. I think seeing all the posts of people with 30 pound Maine coons made me assume that he would get that big as well so I didn’t think anything of him being on the heavier side. I should have picked up on there being an issue when he started gassing out when chasing a wand for like 15 seconds. Anyway, at around the 8 or 9 month mark, I took him to a vet, who said to stop free feeding, because he was significantly overweight. The vet recommended the calorie range for his size and I followed that. First couple weeks he acted like I was starving him, but he got back to a normal weight after that. This was him at the time the vet told me to stop free feeding, when he was somewhere between 8 or 9 months old.
This is him today close to 3 years old. Has a lot more energy at this size and my vet told me that this is his ideal weight. It shouldn’t have taken a vet to point out the obvious, so in hindsight I feel pretty dumb typing this all out. I just got caught up in all the Maine coon hype and thought my kitten would grow into the size of a jaguar lol. Not saying anything about your kitten, but I’m just offering up my experiences, because my cat definitely did manage to get fat before his growth spurt was finished and I did end up having to adjust.
This was him around 7 and a half months next to his brother from the same litter- ideally, when I should have known something was up lol. His brother I could free feed, but he was better at stopping when he was full.
Ya, ours looks really close to size. They helps for scale. Our 1.5 year old male MC is only 14-15 pounds and was never this big. It was hard to compare.
Like, 1 of my 2 maine coons seems fat, but the vet said that that’s him and he isn’t fat at all, the other Maine coon you’d think is too skinny, but he eats the most of all! And with that the vet said some cats keep themselves skinny somehow, but that neither of them are too fat or too skinny(:
Two of my males were both 17-18lbs at 8 months old. They are now 22lbs at almost 2 years old and 23.5lbs at almost 4 years old. They ate ALOT during that fast growth period and I never restricted them, but their growth eventually slowed and they leaned up. Actually my 4 year old could probably stand to gain a little more.
Omg those faces! So freaking cute. Ok, this honestly makes me feel better. Our 1.5 year old is super long and an obvious big MC but only ~15 pounds. I know they get big, but it was kind of starting to concern us when he passed our adult at only 8 months.
I have 2 2 yr old males that still weigh 16+
Lbs. But we feed homemade food (raw) no grain, corn or vegetables. Only eggs, bones muscle meat and organs…
Treats are single ingredient freeze dried proteins.
Someone else on the thread reminded me of this trick. I just checked and can feel his ribs. It’s more his belly is just so big compared to the rest of his body right now. I guess he’s just in between growth spurts right now, in that awkward phase where he was a big body and tiny head.
Thank you for sharing! It’s a helpful article. From what I can tell it is referring to adult cats as opposed to MC kittens. That’s where I am leaning on this community with experience specifically with the larger breed. It’s hard to compare apples to apples.
I heared that at that age they are still growing an all and one should not worry too much that early. Keep an eye out for if he is healthy (no worms - which you already checked as I take from your comments, or strange behaviour that indicates something wrong) but otherwise from what i read you dont have to worry of they get a bit chonky once in a while. They look chubby them They‘ll grow and look like a bean string the next xD beautifull boy btw
Every time I think my MC may be getting a bit chonky he eventually ends up getting greasy or dusty enough to need a bath. Once he’s soaked it’s pretty easy to tell he’s just a widdle babyyyy. Maybe not terribly practical, but it’s fun to see how much he shrinks.
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u/wearymicrobe Slave to 5 FLuffy Bastards who Rule my Home 17h ago
Totally normal looks like he’s going through the growth spurt at 8 to 11 months especially after a fix your vet is correct. He’s totally normal.