Most owners like to give their cats something in addition to their main meal. Scraps from the dinner table or a small piece of food fed by hand are seen by many as a way of showing affection. However, human foods are high in calories and lack many essential nutrients, so you risk overfeeding or upsetting the balance of your pet's diet.

Generally speaking, manufactured treats are a far healthier alternative. Carefully formulated to taste great and complement main meals without upsetting the nutritional balance, many even include nutritional 'extras' with benefits like improved dental or digestive health.

Remember, when you do treat, always reduce your cat's main meal by an equivalent calorific amount, and feed according to manufacturer's directions.
 
Types of treats

Hand-fed rewards
Though the need for food rewards in training does not apply to cats as it does to dogs, treats as a reward for affection help make the bond between you and your cat.  You'll find a range of soft-textured meaty treats available on the market that are specially designed to appeal to a cat's fastidious tastes - without unbalancing the diet.

Crunchy bowl-fed treats
Crunchy treats are fed as a topping to a canned or pouch meal to add texture to the food.

Crunchy treats to stimulate chewing and clean teeth
Many manufactured treats have the additional benefit of helping to clean your cat's teeth, reducing tartar and plaque build up.

Cat milk
Tradition has it that cats love milk - but in reality their digestive systems are not designed to cope with the lactose it contains. Special cat milk is low in lactose to avoid the digestive upsets cats can suffer if they drink cow's milk.