Meal cost and meal patterns in an uncaged domestic cat

Abstract

As the cost of procuring access to food increases, caged laboratory animals have been found to reduce meal frequency and compensatorily increase meal size. Meal frequency and size, however, have been shown to be influenced by the availability of alternative activities. The present experiment tested the generality of the earlier findings to uncaged animals. The relationships obtained between meal procurement cost and meal frequency and size with a freely roaming cat were the same as those obtained with caged animals. Meal size and meal duration were highly correlated but no significant correlations were found between meal size and pre- or post-meal interval. The results of this research further support the ecological validity of a cost/benefit analysis of feeding behavior.