Sensible cheap ideas for dealing with cat who sprays in the house?

ajb69

mk_wotsit wrote: »

I have a cat who hasn't come in the house since we got a dog. It's his choice to stay outside. He sleeps in the summerhouse or greenhouse and only raises his head to miaow for his dinner...i want to come back as a cat!
He hasn't left home so how can it be cruel? Maybe OP should shut the cat out for the summer at least, just to break the cycle?

I agree I'd love to come back as a cat..they really do have life sewn up :rolleyes:.

All I'm saying is that I think there's a difference between a cat who chooses to sleep outside and one who is forced to. One of my six (who was semi-feral & scavenging for most of his life before he was rescued) loves the outside - rain, snow, wind, whatever - and would probably never come in, if we didn't insist on it for dinner...but another one (who's a bit of a wimp, to be quite honest) would be incredibly distraught. And it was the latter one who sprayed inside our house...

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Gingham_Ribbon

Thanks for the tips.

We don't have litter trays - they use the garden. I have seen him spraying outside a LOT. He always used to squat down like the others but never does this any more. There is no blood in it. (My other cat is prone to stress cystitis but hasn't had it for a couple of years.)

It's 4 and a half years since the change of top cat and the behaviour is relatively new.

They have lots of height perches - i've even left some of the shelves bare because they like to lie on them. But there aren't any places to lie like that in the kitchen. And no way of organising that in there because of the lack of space.

I've been letting the others in and he came in with them a few times so I have made sure I've given him lots of cuddles and attention but then yesterday he came down off my knee after about half an hour of petting and purring and he sprayed all over the children's toy box. I smacked his bum. I know this doesn't help. In 10 years of keeping cats I've never done that before.

He's not forced to sleep outside. He has a nice warm kitchen to sleep in. He chooses to sleep outside. The other tom is sleeping inside now. The feral one seems fine - no real change for her.

I'm beginning to think it could be a health problem. Maybe another trip to the vets is called for.

Thanks very much. x

ajb69

GinghamRibbon - it sounds like you're doing everything you can and that you are an experienced and caring owner. I hadn't picked up on the change of top cat being so long ago; sorry for offering so much irrelevant advice.

I honestly don't know the answer, and think you may be right going back to the vet...I can only go on my experiences, but it doesn't sound behavioural to me?

Out of interest, and I'm asking in case anything rings a bell - but is the cat spraying (in the territorial sense), or could it maybe be that it has just lost bladder control? It just sounds really weird for the poor soul to have a half-hour hug and then pee everywhere simply out of stress alone. One of our elderly ladies was incontinent; she was always straining in the litter (she was stone-deaf - couldn't go outside), but many many times just couldn't make it so just rushed to the nearest corner / box, or even just urinated where she was sitting. And yes, I yelled at her sometimes (too many times)....they may not understand, but we are only human I guess.

Did the vet, when you took the cat the first time, ever test for blood in the urine - they told us that someimes it can be there but invisible to the human eye. I think our vet also found bladder wall cells in the urine - which again are invisible to us. The vet told us that both of these can help with a diagnosis, witout being massively expensive (for a vet, that is...).

I hope everything works out for you

Gingham_Ribbon

Thank you for taking time to reply again.

I don't know if he's losing bladder control. He's shaking his tail when he does it like he's marking his territory, but like I say, I just haven't seen him doing it normally for a while now.

He's forgiven me for the smack on the bum. He still walks with me to the end of the road and waits until I return. And he had a good cuddle on my knee today without incident. But I'm carrying him back outside when we're done for obvious reasons.

The vet is probably the only thing I can try now. I'll let you know. Thanks again.

Edit: no, his urine hasn't been tested. The vet did blood tests before his dental treatment recently and he tested for some things he thought might be causing it but nothing came up.