Cat eats toilet paper and licks paper grocery bags

Question

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The text above is a follow-up to ...cats licking brown paper grocery bags. Hello, Our cats do not lick the plastic bags as you replied your Maine Coon cats prefer. Our one cat licks the brown paper Kraft grocery type bags. And sometimes bites pieces of the brown paper out of the bag.

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We have two sister Siamese five year old cats. They have all their claws and were neutered. One licks Kraft paper grocery shopping bags and eats toilet tissue. What is the reason for this behavior?
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They do this to drive us crazy.

Well, at least that's the reason two of my cats do that. I can barely begin to unload groceries before I have my two (mother and son, who otherwise can't tolerate each other) swarming the bags, licking the bags. You'd think they never get enough food.

As I understand it, a lot of these bags are coated with some type of vegetable oil to prevent them from sticking to each other which the cat's nose picks up as being delicious.

I know; I don't get it, either. To be frank, this is a habit I have not been able to break either cat from for almost 10 years. It's reached the point that as long as they don't bite off pieces of plastic and eat them, I can deal with what I have come to see as an idiosyncrasy.

The toilet paper munching is a new thing. Perhaps it's a Siamese 'thing', like dragging the water bowl all over the kitchen floor and leaving a water trail is a Maine Coon thing. The only thing I can think of is to try to keep the TP away from the cats, either by closing the bathroom door (unless the litterboxes are in the bathroom), or trying out one of those decorative 'shields' for the roll of toilet paper.

I know this isn't the best advice, but maybe it might help a bit.

Good luck.

Answer
Sorry about that; I've gotten used to those flimsy plastic bags at my grocery that I've forgotten about the good sturdy ones.

I am, though, stumped as to why your cats prefer these bags to chew on, rather than play in and out of (but then again, I am going on my guys' behavior, which apparently isn't too typical of the species.

I checked a few sites online (as I'm sure you have, too), and came up blank as to why cats chew on paper. It's thought, though not scientifically proven, that an adult cat who persists on chewing and eating a non-food item may be lacking certain nutrients in the diet. Chronic intestinal problems and liver and kidney disease will sometimes cause a cat to eat non-food items. In all these situations, see your veterinarian immediately - though I doubt that this is the case since you never mentioned that they look ill.

Some cats chew and eat non-food objects because they are just simply bored and need something to do. Some Siamese are known to suck on wool, and perhaps your cats are doing a variation...like I said, I'm stumped, I really wish I could help with a better answer.