Investigation of the effect of water temperature on water consumption of cats

Abstract

Cats can naturally obtain their water requirements on the water content of their food. The wild cats usually do not need to drink water, because their prey (e.g., birds, small rodents, insects) contains about 70-75% body water. The same situation is applied for domestic cats too, which eat canned wet food that contains high level of water. However, if the water level of the diet is less than 60%, cats need additional drinking water. A mature cat must consume 60ml/kg/day water to maintain its body functions without any problem. Otherwise cats will be easily dehydrated and chronic dehydration can lead some health problems such as bladder and renal diseases and circulatory problems. Any practical method that could increase cats water consumption, would have a reducing effect on the before mentioned diseases. Regarding the water consumption, the taste of water has been found as effective as the other physiological stimulants such as mouth dryness, plasma osmolality and blood volume. Temperature is considered to be very important for the taste perception of animals. The preference for the water temperature varies among the animal species. So we hypothesized that, cooling the drinking water can encourage cats to drink more water and we aimed to investigate the effect of the water temperature on water consumption of cats. This research has conducted with 8 domestic, mature and healthy pet cats (Felis domesticus) that live indoor. We measured the water consumption of cats for two weeks. During the first week, temperature of water has not been intervened, and the cats' normal water consumption were measured. On the 1st day, 500 ml water, measured with graduated cylinder, was provided in a standard water bowl. After 24 hours, the remained water has been measured and noted. After each measurement, cat owners refreshed the drinking water. In the 2nd week, we started to add four ice cubes to the water bowl, three times in a day. First week, cat’s average normal water consumption has found 142,26±8,09 ml/kg/day. (p