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In reply to the discussion: I need some advice from people who are cat savvy (UPDATED WITH PICTURES) [View all]Honeycombe8
(37,648 posts)different. A cat eating only dog food will get ill eventually from vitamin deficiencies and such.
Buy the cat dry cat food. It's cheap and willl provide the nutrients she needs. It's almost impossible to overfeed a cat (although I've heard of it). They basically snack off and on all day and, unlike a dog, will stop when they've had enough.
Do not give the cat milk. I've done this in the past, until I read not to. You can Google what to feed cats. Dry kibble and water is a good cheap thing to feed her. If you want to take it up a notch, you can also give her some canned food. But canned as the only food isn't good for her teeth or for other things.
LITTER: A litter box (I recommend one with a top to it, to she doesn't scatter litter outside the box too much - but it's not necessary). A litter box with just the bottom part is just a few dollars. SCOOP - you buy a scoop that has holes in it. Fairly cheap (or you can use an old kitchen scoop spoon with holes, if you want to designate that permanently as your litter scoop). LITTER: Any kind of litter will do, for starters. BAKING SODA: If the litter doesn't contain the smell too well (some of hte really cheap brands don't), you can sprinkle a little baking soda in with the litter occasionally.
How often to change the litter: I used to scoop out the clumps daily (I bought a kind of litter where it had good clumping qualities). Put it in a plastic store bag, and into the trash. No big deal. If it clumps well, you don't have to dump out the whole litter box every time you clean it out. Every now and then I missed a day, which meant a bigger scooping job. Every time I scooped out clumps, I poured out a fresh litter layer on top.
If you are able to scoop out clumps instead of dumping out the whole litter box, you still will want to dump out the whole litter box and clean it thoroughly, for sanitary reasons, occasionally.
Even if you don't get a clumping type of litter, you still can sift out with your scoop her poop from the litter.
If you let her be combination outside and indoor cat (which I never did and don't recommend), you should be aware that she will probably get sick and die or get killed by a car or a dog or another cat. That is what happens to outside cats. Outside cats don't die of old age. You can't train a cat to stay out of the road, like you can a dog (even a stray dog will wander into the street, even if trained not to). Cats are wanderers and very independent. It's their nature. Female cats will fight to the death over territory, also. Unlike male cats. Two dogs killed a cat in my driveway. They weren't mean dogs...they were neighborhood dogs. Poor little cat.
I would never have a pet cat be an outside cat. But I would feed an outside stray cat. Two different things. My cats liked going outside, but I would take them outside in the back yard, with me, for short periods of time only. They'd lay in the sun while I worked in the yard. Then they had to come back inside after a little while.
Cats are really easy to care for, compared to dogs, IMO. You should catch on in no time. Nikita is very lucky to have found your kind heart. And you're lucky she's such a good natured, friendly, cool cat! They aren't all like that!