Dear Most Esteemed and Knowledgeable Kitties:
My 8-month-old neutered male, Gus, has some seriously stinky silent poots. It seems he farts when startled, gets picked up, or jumps somewhere. He eats the same food as his 2-year-old neutered male buddy. Is there a product I can use to help with this? Or is the same food to both cats to blame? His poo is almost never lightweight and hard as its supposed to be. The older cat’s poo is like it should be. Thanks a bunch.
~ kb1
Siouxsie: The most common reason cats get gas is because something in the food they’re eating disagrees with them. If a cat regularly has gas, especially when it’s accompanied by soft stools, the problem could be related to food intolerances — sometimes known incorrectly as food allergies.
Thomas: Have you changed cat foods lately? Did Gus’s gas start after the change? If so, there may be something in the new food that’s hard for his body to digest.
Siouxsie: It’s entirely possible for one cat to handle a food just fine and the other to suffer like crazy.
Thomas: That happened to me. Siouxsie and Dahlia never had any trouble with whatever food Mama gave us, but no matter what she did, I always had a stomachache and the runs. When Mama switched to grain-free foods and changed our cat litter to a product that wasn’t grain-based, my tummy got better within a day!
Siouxsie: According to the authors of the Cat Owner’s Home Veterinary Handbook, gas is caused by eating highly fermentable foods like beans, cauliflower, cabbage and soybeans; drinking large amounts of milk; and swallowing a lot of air while eating (for example, if your cat gulps his food). They also say that diets high in carbohydrates and fiber contribute to gas.
Thomas: The first thing we’d recommend is a trip to the vet. Bring a fresh stool sample with you so your vet can see what Gus’s poo looks like and test it for worms or other parasites.
Siouxsie: In some cases, gas can be related to malabsorption syndrome, which is actually a symptom of other illnesses. This is another reason why it’s important to take Gus in for a checkup.
Thomas: If you did change foods recently, switch back to your old brand and see if that takes care of Gus’s gas.
Siouxsie: If you’ve been feeding the same stuff all along, particularly if it’s dry food, think about switching to canned food to see if eating fewer carbohydrates helps Gus’s guts to calm down.
Thomas: There is an anti-gas medication for humans containing simethicone and activated charcoal which, although it’s not made for cats, can be used on cats under a veterinarian’s guidance.
Siouxsie: But keep in mind that giving your cat an anti-gas medication is only treating the symptom, and the best thing you can do is find out what’s at the root of Gus’s flatulence problem and treat that.
Thomas: Good luck, kb1. Please let us know how things turn out.
Our two youngest kitties had some issues with being very stinky when we first got them. The vet prescribed kitty probiotics. After a round or two of those the kitties weren’t having the issues they were before. Might also be worth looking into.
My neutered male, domestic shorthair cat started at around one year old, with the EXTREMELY stinky poops and then soft stool, then diarrrhea….we did the metronidazole, many fecal tests, no parasites, changed food several times, including natural, holistic, several prescription foods…..
it turned out that he has a type of irritable bowel syndrome ( or IBS ) which, now that I have read up extensively, is common in many cats.
The medication didn’t help with this, because it is not an infection, but its more of an intestinal inflammation, like people get, sometimes its genetic, sometimes stress, and sometimes it what they call ‘idiopathic” or no real known cause.
We ended up with him on Hill’s prescription dry food, and eventually had to add Vetasyl
( psyllium ) caps to the food for more fiber…and had to make sure that his diet was no more than 7% fat….and in our case, canned food was out completely, becuase it would make it all worse.
Normally I prefer the holistic foods and the high end natural brands rather than the prescripton diets but nothing else worked…now his poops are pretty solid most of the time, and no smell, no flatulence, either.
Our cat specialist worked at length with all of this and stuck by us, through all the food trials, etc. Unfortunately, although the kitty is ok, now, its a condition that will always require this special prescription diet, with more fiber.
Hope this might help someone. I am not saying that this is what is going on with your cat, but if its not a food-related, situational diarrhea that is cured quickly with different food, I would have your vet look into what I said above.
P.S. to add to the above, The Hills Prescription Diet was DRY WD for cats. Sorry forgot to mention which diet we used.