Lora Lee 
If you have a dog or have been around dogs, you may have noticed that they love to drink water. They will drink water all throughout the day. Especially after they have been active or playing. Cats, however, do not drink water throughout the day. My cats will drink water occasionally throughout the day. A few laps here, a few laps there. This is because cats gained the moisture that they need through their diet. That is why your cats need a moisture rich diet.
No Moisture in Dry Food
Feeding your cat a moisture rich diet is essential to their health. A cat that is feed a dry food diet only is more prone to sickness and disease. Conditions like kidney disease, urinary tract infections and diabetes are common in cats that are fed a strictly dry food diet. Without receiving the moisture needed from their food, most cats are dehydrated. Just by adding some wet food to their diet will help to provided them with some moisture.
Before Monti passed, I didn’t know about the importance of moisture in my cat’s diet. I fed them a high-quality dry food that I left out as an all-day buffet for them. I would, occasionally, give them some wet food as a “treat”. I didn’t make the connection between illnesses and their diet. Not until Monti passed from stage 5 kidney disease at age 4. I then made the connection between the two and started transitioning my cats to a moisture rich diet.
Easy Ways to Add Moisture
The best way to ensure that your cats are receiving the needed moisture in their diet is to transition them to a species appropriate raw food diet. If you are able to do that, increasing the amount of wet food is the next option. Decreasing, or stopping altogether, the amount of dry food is important. If you need to still feed dry food, you can add moisture to it either by adding water or pet appropriate bone broth. Bone broth is an excellent way to not only add moisture to your cat’s food but will give them some added nutrients to help keep them healthy.
You should always have fresh water out for your cats to drink. Even though they may not drink as much as dogs, they still do drink. Keeping the water fresh for them is important. Because cats don’t drink as much, you may not need to refill their bowl, but you should change it out with fresh water. If you added any kind of supplements or hydrosols to their water, you should always provide them with a separate water bowl without anything in it.
Providing your cats with the needed moisture will go a long way to keep them happy and healthy. Water is essential to all that is living. Because our cats don not drink as much water they need on their own, we must ensure that we are providing them with the adequate amount of water. Paying attention to their water intact can also help us notice if there are any health issue we may need to address.
Cats are inquisitive, but hate to admit it. – Mason Cooley
