I have a cat, a persian. His name is Lord Beezly (i know very nerdy). My family has had him for about 5 or 6 years and for a while now he's been urinating on clothes and other things that are left on the floor. Obviously, this habit is very annoying. I'm not sure how to steer him from this. The only thing I've really tried is using cat attracting litter, but it doesn't seem to work. It also seems to be getting more frequent as time goes on. I really don't know what to do and I'm afraid we might have to get rid of him if we can't figure out anything to do. Please help! Thank You!
Inappropriate urination
We had this same problem with our cat. I can't say that is 100% over. Vet visit ruled out medical problems. Cats get stressed for reasons we can't always understand or determine. They can hear and smell things we can't even imagine.
If they have urinated on a bed or other piece of furniture, it is best to isolate the cat from that room, or preventing the cat from gaining access to the furniture. Once a cat has marked something, it will just repeat what it did before. Enzyme sprays and cleaners are marginal at removing cat urine oders, at least to a cat.
Your cat may be picking up residual urine smells on your laundry in spite of numerous washings. It is not being deliberately bad. Something set it off and a cycle has started.
The best success we have had is with Feliway. It is available as spray, which you can spray over your laundry or as a plug in room mister. We use both. It is available from your vet and in pet stores and from on line pet supply houses.
Also, it helps to keep kitty busy and occupied. I do clicker training with my cat and she loves it. I usually do the training around 8:00PM, but she starts begging and doing her tricks around 7:00.
Don't get mad at your kitty or think it is being bad. When you get stressed out, the cat gets stressed out and that makes it worse. With cats it is Patience, politeness and perserverance.
Good luck
yes
BlazerL mention some very important things that I forgot to include, thanks.
:)
re: three cats in the house, then I would recommend at least 4 litterboxes, as the kitten grows this will become increasingly important;)
re: the moving: that might have something to do with it. Cats are very sensitive to stress, and a move will be a definite stressor...and one way that stress in cats often show itself is by housesoiling. If that is the case putting up feliway adapters (a pheromone that has the effect of increasing the cats feeling of security) in the house might help (but not alone, you still need to take the other steps mentioned, and BlaxerL's suggestion of containing him in a room with no fabric on teh floor and a litterbox is very sound indeed)
The fact that it seems to mostly involve (dirty?) clothing might hint at a stress related issue. If that is the case then he is peeing on something that smells of you, because your smell makes him feel safe, and he likes to feel safe when he does his eliminating.
best wishes
Christina
Also...
All very good suggestions...especially the trip to the vet.
Maybe try containing him in part of the house for a while so he litter box habits can be re-established. Maybe a bathroom, bedroom, laundry room or the such.
Does the items tend to be in one location in the house? Are there other animals in the household? Could there be animals outside that are causing stress?
Thanks
Thank you. To answer your questions, no the clothes he pees on are just on the floor. Their are other animals in the house though they tend to leave him alone. I have 2 dogs and 2 other cats. One of the cats is a kitten but hes been doing this longer then that. I don't think there are other animals, though we did just move about 3 months ago.
Hi
First of all you need to take him to a vet. Various urinary tract diseases can result in the cat beginning to soil the house (he might associate pain while peeing with the box, and therefore avoid the box)
If he gets a clean bill of health from the vet, I would suggest doing all (!) of the following:
1) management, stop leaving clothes on the floor, every time he pees on clothing the habits is getting stronger
2) give him at least one extra litterbox. The rule of thumbs is that you need a number of litter boxes that = number of cats+1
3) this might be a case of substrate preference, very common in cats as an adjunct to the original problem, he has simply learned to prefer peeing on clothes. This is solved by giving him a litterbox with clothes in it, and when he uses that instead of the floor, start adding a very small amount of littersand, slowly increase the amount over several weeks.
4) placement of litterbox, and type of littersand is important, as is the type of box (size, depth, hooded or not) give him some choice, all cats have different tastes in this area.
4-b) make sure the litterbox is not next to his food and water, and not in an area of the house where there is a lot of traffic. He need privacy when going in the box.
5) in some cases older cats start to have difficulties getting into a box (arthritis), build a step for him, and make sure the box is in an easy to reach location not downstairs in the basement)
6) do not under any circumstances try to punish him for soiling, not ever by any means. Even a loud yell can make things worse, if he start associating peeing with having bad things happening, he will start hiding to pee. And if he feels scared of you he will also start hiding to pee.
7) try to reward him for going in the box, mark the behaviour of peeing in the box and follow with a treat when he is done.
8) patience, patience, patience - often these problems takes a long time to solve.
Thank you!
Thank you so much for your advice. I will do my very best to make sure it is followed. Thank you again.