Help me Marianne...female cat spraying.
Foxy is a shelter rescue. I have had her for 2 1/2 years. I had noticed the peeing on the garage floor started when I lost Winston (my last OES) a year ago. We lost my Standard Poodle, Cassie, in October of last year. Then Foxy started pooping on the garage floor. We have Bella and Nigel now and Foxy loves the dogs, and is fine with the other girl kitty that was here when she got here. We recently changed a bonus room in the house into a bedroom. That was when I realised she had "sprayed" every corner in that room. She had also been spraying the front door on the inside. She pees next to or "sprays" every thing that touches the ground in the garage. I am trying to get as much off the floor as possible...but I can't move the freezers. The cat box is clean, and she was spayed when I got her. She is 3 1/2 and a sweet cat, but I don't know how much longer I can take this behavior. She is a beautiful Calico. I am pretty sure it isn't a UTI because she is actually spraying up against things. If it was after a year there would be worse symptoms. I am starting to consider putting her in rescue, which is tearing me up because I love this cat. Right now they have to sleep in the garage at night because of her behavior. This cat does not appear stressed and loves to be with us...she even teases the dogs to chase her. She did not do this peeing/pooping for the first year as far as I can tell. If you have ideas...let me know. I haven't asked my vet yet because I have been busy with getting Bella healed and her allergies. |
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| Hi Wendy,
Oh I feel for you! Nothing worse that cat pee smell. The first thing that always has to be ruled out is any medical problems that may be causing this. Cats are also known to do this when stressed or upset about something. Sometimes it's not that apparent to us and you have to observe for a while and see if there is anything amiss. Spraying is territorial and while unusual for spayed females - not considered the norm, so something is up causing her to do this. Changes in the household have been known to cause this. Also experiment with the litter you are using. Most cat shelters now use wood stove pellets instead of the clay litter which causes respitory problems in animals. Some cats dislike it on their paws. The wood stove pellets are environmentally friendly and super cheap..a forty pound bag cost 10 dollars. Perhaps experiment with various brands of litter and see if that helps. Pic of wood stove pellets is shown in the photo below. A few weeks ago even my own vet called asking if I'd help out with a kitty that wasn't using his litter box. It appeared that kitty was unhappy about sharing a box with the other cats in the household. Unfortunately I couldn't help out as I have a multi-cat household at the moment. 9 in total. I have my previous foster kitties upstairs (5) and my own that hang around downstairs - 4 of them. The downstairs cats have access to the outdoors via catdoors, the upstairs cats use litter boxes. Sometimes I get fosters that temporarily have this problem. The last one was a beautiful gorgeous kitten that was returned at 12 wks as he refused to use litter box. The trick was to contain him in a small room - aka bathroom with another cat that used the box. Within 3 days kitty learned how to use it. However, that doesn't seem to be the problem in your household. Even when some cats show no sign of stress they become territorial in a multi-pet household. Once again the solution I found that works is to place them in a small area with litter box and see if that works. Another solution is to place them in a pen/crate with litter box. Cat will not be happy at all but cats are notoriously clean and fastidigeous about their space and will not poop/pee where they sleep so crating may force them to relearn not to spray or pee elsewhere. It could also be done temporarily in order to give you a chance to clean the areas in which she previously sprayed and may cause her to avoid those areas when she's released. You may also have to experiment and try kitty by it'self contained in small room or with another that does use the box. You could try to be creative but this is also difficult is to build an outdoor cat room and limit access to areas where she's spraying the most frequently. That's easier said than done in a multi-pet household. Cats and dogs have incredible noses and will go in an area where they smell others have gone. Same as dogs peeing over areas where others have peed on walks. I realize you can't move the freezer but if you try to wash the areas as much as possible with either bleach/water or vinegar/water or seal the area with a Primer paint - good quality ones such as KILZ (horrible name) is effective against molds or in this case cat pee. Getting rid of the smell helps big time so once you solve the problem , cat won't repeat the behavior in those areas. Lastly, the saddest solution and difficult one is to rehome the cat. For some reason some cats don't do well living with others and need to be in a cat only home even if they have shown no sign of stress. That's a last resort however. Even a spec of cat urine can be smelled by others and so it's important to scrub the area thoroughly with vinegar and water. Cats dislike that smell and it will discourage them from using their favorite spot. Below is a photo of the type of crate I'm talking about. The kitty in this one was recovering from a broken pelvis and needed to prevent jumping for 6 wks. It was roomy and she was able to interact with the others in the room so as not to get lonely. 
Hope that helps a bit and keep me posted. Between all the knowlegable people on this board - one of us may come up with a solution that works for you. Good luck! Marianne |
| I thought about crating her in the garage at night. I don't let them in at night because of her behavior. They used to sleep on my bed, but she would get up and do her thing at night.
I also have dog doors which I have to close up at night. I have a large dog travel crate I can put her into at night, with food and a litter box. My cats are indoor/outdoor cats. They only seem to go in my back yard or the neighbors...so the world is also their litter box. I will still leave her in the garage until we get a hot spell. I will try that as the garage is covered in urine. I love this kitty. Do you think that will stress her more, or get her used to a box all the time? She started this after losing her buddy Winston, my OES, and the second behavior after losing Cassie, her Std Poodle buddy. I think it is all mental issues do to grieving...but for how long. She still has her kitty friend/nemesis and 2 more sheepies that she loves.  |
| Don´t you think she might be marking her territory like male cats do? maybe now that Winston and Cassie are not there, she wants to make sure that is HER territory, and not the new dog´s...
If it were a male cat, I would tell you to castrate him hahahaha but I guess thats not biologically possible in your case |
| She is just neurotic...I tried crating her...it wasn't a good thing. I just scout out the garage in the morning before letting the dogs out. Ugh! |
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