Whos Peeing and Why?

Question
This, I believe, is a bit more complicated than your usual bad cat behavior question. You see, last year I got married and around October 2003 we merged our three cats (two mine, one my wife's) and I thought things were going just about as well as could be expected. Her prized cat, a female now about 13 and in somewhat failing health, had to deal with my two cats--including a large 18-lb. 12-year-old lovable but somewhat pushy male--invading her domain (as we've temporarily merged households in my wife's condo). While there have been occasional bad incidents, mostly on the part of my male (including his initially deciding to mark his territory inside), I've tended to dismiss them as learning situations. But now, within the last few weeks, we've woken up twice to cat pee on/in/near the foot of the bed--including on the edges of the covers, sheets, cat blanket, cat mats and floor. While we haven't actually seen anyone doing it my wife's sure it's my big male possibly acting up since she's seen and I've heard him trying to rake over it with his paw. We fear it could also be that he's developing diabetes due to his weight problem. I, on the other hand, am not so sure. Could it be her female with the ailing kidneys losing control--and possibly my male then coming along and adding his wee to it as well--or...? Since our third cat, a smaller female, doesn't spend as much time in the bedroom we're fairly sure it isn't her but, on the other hand, she has had trouble peeing once or twice before to the point we feared she had systitus(sp?). In any event, how would you advise us to proceed both in figuring out what's going on with our cats and what to do with our peed on covers, sheets, cat blanket and cat mats? Also, do you have any theories on what might be causing this situation (based on what I've told you so far)? Any help would be much appreciated! Thanks!

Answer
Evan,

The roots of your problem is the fact that you have turned the household upside down and created much stress for the 3 cats.  Stress + age + other ailments which may be related to the diabetes, cystitis, kidneys, etc. have given you a real problem.

The first thing I would do is to take all 3 to the vet and have any and all physical problems ruled out.

Secondly, make sure there are sufficient litter pans in the condo to accomodate 3 cats.  One litter pan will not be enough.  The second litter pan should be somewhaere away from the first as cats can get very, very territorial about litter pans.

Is the litter you are using one that all 3 cats were already used to or did it change for one or the other two?  You might want to consider mixing the old litter with the new and gradually changing the mixture until all three cats are used to the new litter.

As to the behavioral problems in the bedroom.  To find out who may be marking, it may be necessary to cage one to see if the problem continues.  Also, you need to go to your local pet supermarket and get an enzymed based cleaner specifically for pet odors.  They make these for local problems (i.e. small areas of carpet), and as additives for laundry.  You will need this type of product to get the smell out so that the kitties will not be able to smell it.

You may also try a pheromone based product called Fel-o-way <sp?>.  In this situation it may help.

You do have a complicated problem and one possible solution (for a time) is to not allow any of the cats in the bedroom until you get to the root of the problem.

I will suggest that for a 13 year old cat to accept other cats is a pretty tough sell as cats of this age are usually set in their ways and, since she is used to living alone, she is not very happy about this turn of events.  Her one advantage is that she was there first, so she is the established cat in the household whereas the others she would consider as interlopers.

I am providing a link to an article on cat toilet problems written by a vet who is also a cat breeder:

http://www.netcat.org/housesoiling.html


Good luck and, please, keep me posted.

Best regards... Norm.


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