It’s normal for cats to get excited about a meal or their favorite treats. However, some cats can become downright violent when food is around. If you’re concerned about food aggression in your cat, here’s what to look for.
What Is Food Aggression In Cats?
Food aggression in cats is aggression surrounding food. I know, I know. That’s pretty obvious, but it’s a bit more complicated than that.
Food aggression can include any sort of aggressive behavior toward other cats, humans, other animals in the home, or even toward food storage containers. The aggressive behavior could include actual harm or the cat displaying behaviors indicating they may aggress in some way.
Indirect Food Aggression
We can also lump behaviors into the food aggression in cats umbrella that involve things associated with food when food isn’t actually present. Your cat may display territorial behaviors around the kitchen, feeding station, or wherever you store your cat’s food. Your cat may be more like to become aggressive right before it’s time for a meal even if food hasn’t appeared yet.
What Causes Food Aggression In Cats?
Cats can become territorial surrounding food for a few reasons. Illnesses can cause an increase in appetite so take your cat to a veterinarian to have them evaluated if their behavior changes. Your cat may not be getting enough food so your veterinarian can also evaluate what you’re feeding your cat and if they’re getting enough food.
Alternatively, your cat could be getting enough food but not being fed frequently enough. Cats don’t eat one or two larger meals in nature. Instead, they’ll hunt multiple small prey and take an approach to eating that’s closer to grazing. If your cat’s food aggression is mostly right before they’re due for another meal, this may be the problem.
If you have multiple cats or other animals in the home, your cat may feel their food source is threatened (which is part of why you shouldn’t feed cats near each other including when you are introducing them). Your cat could have a poor relationship with other cats in the home not directly related to food.
Things You Can’t Control
There are a few things that are out of your control (or at least can’t alter now) the could explain a cat’s seeming insatiable hunger. These include:
- Your cat’s personality
- Your cat’s early life and life prior to their arrival in your life
- Genetics
- Epigenetics. If your cat’s mother, especially while she was pregnant with your cat, didn’t have a reliable food source or was very stressed, your cat will be more likely to have behavior problems
What Are Signs A Cat Has Food Aggression?
If you have a food aggressive cat, you may notice some or all of the following:
- A cat frantically eating their food once it is available (which may result in regurgitation)
- Biting, scratching, or climbing your leg whenever food appears
- Aggression toward other cats during meal time
- Chewing on non-food items
- Attempts to eat your food, get into cabinets with food, or chewing through food containers
- Guarding doorways, food bowls, automatic feeders, or other food related parts of the environment
- Excessive vocalization, aggression toward other cats, or destructive behaviors right before a meal
- Eating out of another cat’s bowl when they have food available to them
- While this can look adorable, it actually may be an attempt to hoard resources
Behaviors That Aren’t Food Aggression
Some behaviors can be associated with food related stress or food insecurity in cats, but they aren’t aggressive behaviors. Specifically, a cat urinating or defecating outside the litter box is not an aggressive behavior. Your cat isn’t peeing on the floor to be mean because cats don’t think of urinating as being a “bad” thing. A better explanation is that your cat is experiencing stress. Food may be the cause of the stress.
What To Do If You Have A Food Aggressive Cat
If your cat is aggressive around food, what you’re experiencing isn’t an uncommon challenge. I see it a lot with clients! Set up an appointment with your veterinarian to get advice on where to start and to make sure your cat is being fed enough. If you need some additional tips, you can check out my guide on stopping food aggression in cats or set up a consultation if you’d like personalized advice on the behavior component.
