Why your cat won't drink from the bowl

You fill the bowl every morning. It is still full every evening. Then you walk into the bathroom and find the cat drinking out of the tap like it is the finest water in Coventry.

This is not your cat being difficult. Nearly all of it traces back to how cats got water long before any of them lived in a kitchen.

Cats have a weak thirst drive

The domestic cat descends from a small desert-dwelling wildcat, and it shows. Cats evolved taking most of their water from what they caught — a mouse is roughly three-quarters water — so they never developed the strong "I am thirsty, go and drink" instinct that dogs and humans have.

For a cat eating wet food, this barely matters; the food does most of the work. For a cat on mostly dry food, it matters a great deal, because the difference has to come from a bowl she is not strongly motivated to visit.

Where the bowl is matters more than what's in it

Three placement mistakes account for an enormous amount of ignored water:

Next to the food. In the wild, water near a kill is water near bacteria. Cats have a real instinct to keep drinking separate from eating, and a bowl parked beside the food dish gets used less than the same bowl across the room.

Anywhere near the litter tray. For obvious reasons, and cats feel strongly about it.

In a corner, or anywhere with its back to the room. Drinking leaves an animal's head down and attention elsewhere. Cats prefer to do it somewhere they can see what is approaching. A bowl out from the wall, with sightlines, gets used more than one tucked behind a bin.

The easy fix is quantity. Put out three or four water stations around the house rather than one perfect one. Cats drink opportunistically — more chances means more drinking, and it costs nothing to try.

The bowl itself

Wide and shallow beats narrow and deep. A cat lowering her head into a tall bowl loses her view of the room and presses her whiskers against the sides, and plenty of cats clearly dislike that. You can often spot it: a cat who paws water out onto the floor and licks it off her foot is telling you something about the bowl's shape.

(The popular name for this is "whisker fatigue". Worth being honest — it is widely talked about and the behaviour is real and easy to observe, but it is not something with a deep body of research behind it. Either way, swapping to a wide shallow dish costs very little and often works.)

On material: ceramic, glass or stainless steel over plastic. Plastic scratches, and the scratches hold smells and bacteria that a cat's nose notices long before yours does. Some cats also develop chin acne from plastic dishes.

Why the tap wins

Standing water, in the world a cat is built for, is water that may have been sitting a while. Moving water is water arriving from somewhere — fresher, safer, more interesting. That instinct is very likely why a dripping tap outcompetes a bowl filled ten minutes ago.

There is a practical element too. Still water in a kitchen collects dust and goes tepid by the afternoon. Moving, filtered water stays cooler and tastes of less.

This is the entire case for a circulating fountain, and it is a strong one for the specific cat who ignores bowls and loves taps. Some honest caveats:

• There is a pump, and pumps make noise. Most are very quiet, but a nervous cat may take a week to approach one. Run it near her for a few days before expecting her to drink from it.
• It needs cleaning. Weekly, properly, with the pump taken apart. A neglected fountain is worse than a bowl, not better.
• Filters are a running cost. Small, but not nothing — factor it in.
• Keep a bowl as well, at least at first. Never make a new thing the only option.

The change that means ring the vet

Everything above is about a cat who drinks too little. The opposite is more important.

If a cat who never seemed interested in water suddenly starts drinking noticeably more — emptying bowls, hanging around taps, needing the litter tray more — that is worth a vet appointment rather than a new bowl. Increased thirst is one of the more common early signals of several conditions that are much easier to manage when caught early, particularly in older cats.

The same goes for a cat who stops drinking, or who stops eating, for more than a day.

None of this is veterinary advice, and your vet knows your cat. But "she's been drinking a lot more lately" is one of the most useful sentences you can say to them, and it is easy to miss when you are only half-watching a bowl.

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The Veylo Fresh Flow Pet Fountain is a stainless steel circulating fountain, which covers both the moving-water preference and the not-plastic point above. Free delivery on every order, 30 days to send it back if your cat has opinions.