Tips To Improve Your Cat's Quality Of Life
Isabel Ling 
Feb 20, 2013 
Highlight, Welfare 
1 comment
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So you are a better than average owner and you are wondering what you can do to help make your cats life better. Here are a few things to consider for further reading.
Diet
Stop feeding your cat dry food exclusively. It can lead to early kidney disease and other health problems. Consider adding a premium brand of wet can foods. Ideally feed them a raw food diet
Safe outdoor access
Cats love to roll around in the dirt, climb up a tree and sit in a sunny patch of grass. If this is at all possible for you, consider getting your cat an enclosed cat run.
Photo courtesy of wvcats.com/enclosures.htm
Check their teeth
Due to the diet we feed them, cats nowadays often get dental diseases such as gingivitis and tartar at a young age. Ask your vet to teach you how to check your cats teeth. If you have a kitten, consider learning how to brush its teeth. Also, consider giving your cats a chicken neck or chicken wing tips to chew or tough pieces of meat from leftover dinners.
Change their litter and have extra litter boxes
You should have 1 extra litter tray than the number of cats you have. So if you have 3 cats you should have 4 litter trays. Use different types of litter for litter tray so your cat can have a choice. Also, non-clumping litter is better because it doesnt stick to the cat.
Allow them to be cats
All indoor cats need to be stimulated mentally and physically using toys, high places to jump onto and exercise to maintain a stress free life. My personal favorite cat toys are the Da Bird and Kong Kickaroo.
- http://indoorpet.osu.edu/cats/basicneeds/index.cfm
- http://www.catvets.com/healthtopics/wellness/?Id=213
- http://www.fabcats.org/behaviour/cat_friendly_home/info.html
Companions
Most cats love to have companions on their terms. If you have space for another cat, adopt one today because you will be saving two lives; the cat you adopted and the cat you allowed to be rescued by freeing up a space in a shelter.
Photo courtesy of PetEpicure
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Hi Isabel, those are great tips so thank you. I have a few questions for you.
1. My girlfriend and I currently have 2 persian cats who share one litter tray. After I read your article, maybe I should have 3. However, before we resorted to just one, we initially had 2 trays. So before we got our second cat, our first cat, Pickles, never peed outside the tray. After getting our second one, Barley, Pickles started peeing outside the tray after awhile. At first we thought it was UTI, and it turns out it was UTI after all. So we started feeding the cats a diet catered for UTI as well as giving meds. And after some time, he didn’t pee outside. Yet, after each time we change the litter, Pickles would pee outside the tray within a week or so. After going through so many litters, we deduced that it is a behavioural thing more than an infection. Because he would pee in the tray up until the litters were soiled a fair bit, then he would pee outside. Then when we changed the litter, he would pee in the tray again and the cycle repeats itself. This cycle usually happens within 1 week or 1.5 weeks at most. Is this time frame normal? Will having 3 trays stop him from peeing outside? Or would the same thing happen again?
Would appreciate your input as having to buy so much kitty litter is kind of taxing on our finances.
2. I really have no clue about which brand of kitty litter to use. They all say the same thing so since you are in KL, which brand (and type) would you recommend?
3. Where’s your clinic?