Hard swallowing / gulping

Hello, my cat who is a 6 year old neutered male domestic short hair (indoor cat) has started swallowing hard / gulping with no sound, but as if it’s maybe difficult or uncomfortable to swallow. He swallows and leans his head very slightly forward, like he is gulping. It started about two weeks ago, and at first it was just when he was purring, so I put it down to maybe just swallowing saliva, but for the past two days I have noticed he sometimes does it when he’s not purring and just at seemingly random times. He doesn’t seem to do it when eating or after eating, and his appetite is fine and he seems otherwise well. The only thing that has changed is that I started giving him one small salmon or tuna sachet of cat food a day, along with his usual chicken sachets. It started happening around this time. However, he ate fish flavoured cat food before I got him, but it was a different brand, and I don’t know whether he had any problems with it before I got him a few months ago. Thank you.

Sorry. I forgot to add, it doesn’t happen often. When he was doing it when purring it was just happening when he was sitting on my lap purring, a couple of times a day. The last two days when he has done it seemingly at random, it has happened once or twice.

Hello - there are many possibilities for this, but none I can think of that are normal.   Cats can get infection or inflammation at the back of their throats;  foreign bodies can become lodged across the rooves of their mouths or lower down the gullet.  Sometimes, the skin of the throat can appear to pouch out to make a lump on a stalk in the passageway, and as the stalk enlongates, it can travel a long way down.  These lumps are called polyps and can originate within the nose or ear.  Other lumps such as enlarged lymph-nodes or tumours (malignant or otherwise), for instance at the base of the tongue, may be possibilities.  Commonly, such a sign can also turn out to be a manifestation of nausea / sickness.  Nothing in the diet needs to have changed for this;  the internal medical causes of sickness eg kidney, acid reflux, pancreatitis are all possible.  I also wondered about a blockage or swelling in the respiratory (breathing) tract.    Depending on the cause, such a mystery may take bloods or endoscopy to solve, but a good way to start is with examination by the vet.  It sounds like a good idea to get this case triaged as regards the urgency.