Back in January I adopted two small 12 week old kittens, Smokey and Bandit.
Back then Smokey was very very very tiny and insecure and it was a lot of work socializing him and getting him a bit more outgoing, unfortunately he seems to have a lot of food insecurity.
They are just over 6 months old now both of them and I've been free-feeding them in between meals at 7:30am and 10pm unfortunately Smokey has become extremely food insecure.
If I give them snacks, he'll hide some away and even growl at Bandit to ensure he stays away from his snacks (I have a tote bag in the kitchen I use for groceries and I found 3 half-eaten dried fish there that he was stashing for later eating, as well as another stash in my office).
Now to my actual problem, Smokey will eat all the kibble I put out for free feeding and he'll even scare Bandit away from the bowls to not allow him access to the food, when I give them breakfast and dinner I have to sit with them to ensure Smokey doesn't steal Bandit's food since he knows if he starts eating from both bowls then Bandit will just go away and not even try to eat anymore.
It all came to a bit of a head today when, after eating breakfast and two full bowls of kibble I had to lock him in the office just to allow Bandit to eat a little bit of lunch but he was meowing and crying from the office and as soon as I opened the door he ran out to eat more.
He's not overweight, but he's very large and muscular for a 6-month old kitten... what do I do? It's such a battle making sure one is allowed to eat, but all I can think of is feeding them separately in their own rooms and literally closing the doors between them.
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from Pets https://www.reddit.com/r/Pets/comments/fzy6h5/extremely_food_insecure_kitten/
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