• burntbacon@discuss.tchncs.de
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    1 day ago

    Dehydration is a common cause for cats to be ‘ill’ and brought to the vet,* so it could be that their piss reeks because they are having to concentrate it so much in the first place.

    *source: a dimly remembered conversation with a vet friend when I asked her why she was adding water to the already wet food for her cat. She said her cat could never be encouraged to drink enough, so it was her way of staving off the annoyance of giving iv fluids to her own animal someday.

    • jamesjams@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      It’s absolutely a thing, I’ve had several cats in my life look nearly on the brink of death before basically forcing them to drink or eat turned them around completely. They can be very stubborn. Fountains help a lot because in nature moving water is typically cleaner than standing water, so if your cat always refuses to drink, get a $10 cat fountain on Amazon, it works!

      • Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de
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        12 hours ago

        also stop giving them dry-ass pellets with a bunch of grains in them, nut up and live with the smell of wet food and buy some chicken innards for them every now and then.