Cat Food Center Search products / Support

Kitten, adult, senior & pregnancy

Requirements are not constant across a cat's life, and two moments matter more than any other: the growth phase, and the day the cat is neutered. Getting those two right prevents most of the diet-related problems a cat will ever have.

1. The life stages

AAFCO recognises only three nutritional life stages: growth and reproduction, adult maintenance, and all life stages (which simply means the food meets the growth profile). There is no AAFCO “senior” category; senior foods are formulated to the adult maintenance profile with marketing attached.

Clinically, though, the 2021 AAFP–AAHA feline life stage guidelines use a more useful five-stage framework, because what changes with age is monitoring and disease risk more than the nutrient profile.

Clinical life stages, and what actually changes nutritionally at each.
Stage Age Nutritional priority
Kitten birth – 1 year Growth profile; energy-dense, high protein, DHA, calcium and phosphorus in a controlled ratio
Young adult 1 – 6 years Adult maintenance; the critical period for preventing obesity, which usually starts within a year of neutering
Mature adult 7 – 10 years Maintenance, but start watching weight, muscle mass, and phosphorus intake
Senior 10 – 14 years Highly digestible protein, adequate calories, monitoring for CKD, hyperthyroidism and diabetes
Geriatric 15+ years Maintaining intake and body weight becomes the priority; energy needs rise again

2. Kittens: birth to twelve months

Nought to four weeks - milk only

Queen's milk, or if orphaned, a proper kitten milk replacer. Never cow's milk: it is too low in protein and fat for a kitten and its lactose causes osmotic diarrhoea. Orphaned kittens need feeding every two to three hours around the clock at first, kept warm, a chilled neonatal kitten cannot digest: and stimulated to toilet after each feed. This is a job to do with veterinary guidance.

Four to eight weeks - weaning

Introduce wet kitten food mixed with kitten milk replacer to a gruel, thickening it over two to three weeks. Most kittens are fully weaned by seven to eight weeks. Weaning is also the window in which food preferences form, so expose kittens to several textures and protein sources now: it costs nothing and may save you enormous difficulty when the cat is twelve and needs a therapeutic diet.

Two to six months - the fast growth phase

Kitten requirements against adult, dry-matter basis.
Nutrient Kitten (growth) minimum Adult minimum Why
Crude protein 30 % 26 % Rapid tissue accretion; good kitten diets run 40–50 %
Calcium 1.0 % 0.6 % Skeletal growth
Phosphorus 0.8 % 0.5 % Must stay in a Ca:P ratio of roughly 1.1:1 to 1.5:1
Arginine 1.25 % 1.04 % Urea cycle capacity under high protein turnover
Lysine 1.20 % 0.83 % Growth-limiting amino acid
Tryptophan 0.25 % 0.16 % Growth and neurotransmitter synthesis
Vitamin A 9,000 IU/kg 5,000 IU/kg Growth and immune function
Vitamin D 750 IU/kg 500 IU/kg Calcium handling and bone mineralisation
DHA not on the AAFCO list , Strong evidence for neural and retinal development; look for it in the ingredients

Energy. A kitten needs roughly 200–250 kcal per kilogram of body weight per day at two to four months: two and a half times an adult's rate per kilo. Feed four small meals a day to twelve weeks, then three, then two by around six months. Kittens under six months should generally have food available fairly freely; they have small stomachs and enormous requirements.

Food. Use a food labelled for growth or all life stages until twelve months. Large breeds (Maine Coon, Ragdoll, Norwegian Forest) grow until eighteen months to two years and should stay on kitten food correspondingly longer.

Common mistake

Feeding adult maintenance food to a kitten. It does not meet the growth profile for protein, calcium, phosphorus, or several amino acids and vitamins, and the consequences, skeletal abnormalities, poor growth, are not always reversible. Check the AAFCO statement says growth or all life stages.

Danger

Do not supplement a complete kitten diet with calcium. Adding calcium to a balanced food distorts the calcium-to-phosphorus ratio and can cause skeletal disease in a growing kitten. The most common route to this is a well-meaning owner adding a supplement, or feeding an all-meat home-made diet that is calcium-deficient and then over-correcting.

3. The neutering cliff

The most predictable weight gain in a cat's life happens in the six to twelve months after neutering, usually between six months and two years of age. Removing the gonads reduces resting energy expenditure by roughly 20–30 % and simultaneously increases food intake. Studies consistently show free-fed cats gain substantial weight in the months following the procedure.

The fix is straightforward and almost nobody does it: recalculate the portion at the time of neutering, cutting to about 75–80 % of the previous intake, and move from free-feeding to measured meals. Weigh monthly for the next year. Preventing this weight gain is far easier than reversing it, and it is probably the single highest-leverage intervention in a young cat's life.

4. Adult maintenance: one to seven years

The steady state, and the stage where the main risk is complacency. A neutered indoor adult needs roughly RER × 1.0–1.2 (see how much to feed for) the numbers. The nutritional targets are those on the daily requirements page.

What matters at this stage is monitoring rather than formulation:

5. Pregnancy and lactation

The most nutritionally demanding period in a cat's life, and the one people most often get wrong by waiting too long to increase intake.

6. Senior and geriatric: ten years and up

The received wisdom that old cats need less protein is wrong, and it has probably harmed a great many cats. It was imported from human and canine nutrition and does not survive contact with the feline data.

What actually changes

Rule of thumb

Older cats need more highly digestible protein, not less, figures around 5–6 g of protein per kilogram of body weight per day are cited for maintaining lean mass, against roughly 4 g for a young adult. Restricting protein in a healthy senior cat accelerates muscle loss. Protein restriction is appropriate only in specific diagnosed disease, chiefly advanced chronic kidney disease, and then under veterinary direction.

Practical senior feeding

Common mistake

Assuming weight loss in an old cat is normal ageing. It is the presenting sign of hyperthyroidism, chronic kidney disease, diabetes, intestinal disease, and cancer; all of which are common in this age group and several of which are very treatable if caught early. An old cat losing weight needs bloodwork, not a bigger bowl.

Sources