Most adult cats cannot digest milk, and more than just a little give
them the runs.  However, I have found that Half and Half (milk and
cream) seems to be tolerated fairly well by most of my cats.

That lead to a disaster of sorts today though.  I put my supper on the
grill outside and came back in to start the timer - on the way to the
table, I kicked the milk bowl.  It was nearly full and put a huge
puddle between me and the table.  I had to clean it up before I could
get to the table, or for that matter the bowl.  The first efforts to
clean it up resulted in hitting the bowl with the mop and making the
mess even bigger.  To make things worse, it ran under the plastic
floor pad under my chair (one of those mats placed under office chairs
to protect the floor).  By the time I got the mess under control, I
had completely lost track of the timing for my pork chop.  I use a
smoker and real charcoal with the air stopped way down for slow
cooking, but if I don't remove the cover and let it breathe every ten
minutes or so, the fire dies out.  It died mostly out so the chop
wasn't burned, but it wasn't cooked either.  I finished cleanup the
mess and took the mat outside to hose it down, then I had to more or
less start supper over.

T.E.D. (tdavis@gearbox.maem.umr.edu - e-mail must contain "T.E.D." or my .sig in the body)

Same as people, if it's been awhile the bacteria that breaks down the
milk-solids isn't present in the stomach anymore and it just runs on
through. A couple days in a row of drinking milk and the bacteria builds
up again and no problems.

pat

No. (Only if watered down, but a lot of cats can't take it well.)

Carola

David,

All I can tell you is some cats can tolerate it, others can't.  The
late/great Z ALWAYS drank milk (ok, this cat would eat anything, and even
had a fondness for fruit smoothies - w/out dairy products), and he never had
any problems with it.  Stumbles, when he was a kitten would vomit
immediately after having some - now he drinks it without problems (I did not
force it on him, he'd sneak a drink, apparently he became tolerant).

Both of these cats had such a fondness for milk - if I would have a bowl of
Cheerios they would both sit in front of me waiting for me to finish so they
could share the milk.

Unfortunately since I have lost Z, I don't enjoy the Cheerios as much since
he's not there to share. :(  But I still give them and the others a little
milk on occassion.

JoJo

probably not as they are not lactose tolerant, mix it with water 1/2 and 1/2

It is not good to give cats alot of milk - water is best. There should
always be fresh water available - I think it is okay to give cats a little
bit of milk occasionally, but I tend to just keep to water with occasional
milky treats around christmas etc..