At wits end, I desperately need advice about one of my cats.

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I have two cats and love them both very much. I adore cats in general. But one of my cats has me in a bind. I’ve posted about this before, but now I reallyhave to make a decision. I hope you Dopers out there can give me advice.

The Road Warrior has developed the bad habit of peeing on the carpet. Not just any place, thank heavens, but down at the end of the hallway, near the door where the catboxes are. MY other cat does all his business in the box, and RW at least defecates in the box. But I can’t get him to stop marking the carpet.

RW is a neutered male. I’ve had him since he was a young kitten. He’s had regular vet care, which I consider to be a given if one has a pet. Twice I have taken him to the vet to be sure he is healthy, and that his carpet peeing habit is not the result of infection or something.

The cats have two boxes, which I try to keep fresh. Their food or litter brand has not changed. I have had the carpet professionally cleaned, and Roadie stopped for a while, then went back to his bad ways. I have used a variety of cleaning substances and odor maskers, and have even sprinkled in the box a substance which was supposed to attract cats.

My other cat always uses the boxes, in spite of his roommates bad habits.

I’m embarassed to invite people over because no matter what I do there is always that “eau de pee” around, however I mask it. And of course the carpet down there is stained. I want to get new carpet for the apartment but I don’t dare.

So what do I do? The way I see it I have three choices. I can (#1) let things go on as they are and keep trying to clean up after him. If I do this I can’t get new carpet or invite people over with any confidence. I could (#2) give him to someone else. But he may start peeing there too. And I’d feel as if I had given away an adopted child I love. As a last resort there would be (#3) having him put down. But he’s relatively young and healthy. I love him, and so does my other cat. We would miss him very much. And pardon my French here in MPSIMS, but I would feel like an utter asshole having an animal eliminated for what could be interpreted as my personal convenience.

At this point if any Dopers can say anything to help I would be grateful. If there is a medical procedure that would give a “cure”, or a product or training method that you swear by, tell me about it. Please help me and the Road Warrior. We need it.

2

You’re going to have to remove that section of the carpet and replace it. Otherwise you will not be able to convince the cat to stop urinating in that area without a butt load of trouble and effort.

Odds are there was urine in that spot or some powerful smell that he is picking up on and trying to cover up with his own scent.

Remember this when it comes to cat urine; Simple Solution is your friend. Pick it up at your local pet store.

3

If he is only going in that one place, try covering the spot with tin foil or something to discourage peeing there.

4

Yeah, Chimera is right. If RW smells that it peed there before, it will keep on doing it. A carpet sample and Febreze (?) is the only solution.

5

Oh, Baker. This is a hard one. I also have 2 cats right now, and have had the same problem.

I solved it, and this is what I did.

(1) I soaked the affected carpet in vinegar. Cats hate vinegar, particularly white vinegar. Vinegar also neutralizes the pee.

(2) I doubled my box-maintenance routine. Now I scoop every single day, and change it twice a week.

(3) After a vet consultation, I guessed the peeing cat was bored and looking for attention. I bought many more toys, and also started collecting cardboard boxes. Every day I reconfigure the boxes, which are laid out attractively in the living room, to keep the cats’ interest. Sometimes I make a kitty-cave with boxes and blankets or sheets.

No more peeing; it’s been months, knock on wood.

Good luck!

6

My vet gave me an odor neutralizer and some syringes so that I could inject it into the carpet pad without pulling the actual carpet up. He also gave me some cat face pheremone spray to spray on something near the trouble spot at nose-rubbing level, on the theory that cats will want to rub their noses there, to cover up the pheremone, and that they won’t pee where they do that.

I’m not sure if it was this treatment, constant vigilance for weeks, extra love for the kitty (we’d just moved and he was freaked out), or a combination of things, but he finally quit peeing in “his” spot.

7

I know you said your cat was checked for infection, but has he been checked for urine crystals? How about his kidney function?If so, and he doesn’t have any medical problem, then certainly get some enzyme cleaner to clean any new spots and definitely rip that carpet and pad right out. In fact, I’d replace it with a hard surface flooring.

If getting rid of the smell and stepping up your box cleaning don’t work, you can ask your vet about drug therapy. Amitriptyline has been used successfully in some cats, as has prozac, to get them to stop marking.

If all else fails, you could do what my parents did when their cat in renal failure was unable to control her bladder–they put her bed, food, and box in their largest bathroom, and she pretty much lived in there. We would all visit with her and let her come out for short supervised jaunts around the house, but otherwise, she lived in the bathroom. Admittedly, this is drastic, but it was preferable to having her PTS while she was still relatively comfortable.

8

Baker, you need to consider removing the carpet. It is nearly impossible to get out the odor from the material. It’s not just the carpet but the pad underneath that has been soaked. No amount of spray-on carpet cleaner or powder is going to work. Beware of steam cleaning as well. The remaining moisture may just bleed the urine out into a larger patch.

You may need to seriously consider going through the hassle of tearing out the carpet and leaving it out for a few weeks while you implement your plan. The foil idea is good, and there are numerous other methods you want to look into. Leaving a lot of baking soda in the area might help suppress the existing odors and make it not so fun for kitty to hang out there.

I’ve got to wonder if crating works for cats. If it does, you may need to begin some sort of regimen. Have you tried separating the litter boxes? Maybe there is a sense of competition. Your other cat may have a stronger urine odor that is masking RW’s eau du Thomas and making him seek virgin territory.

Personally, I’d rip out the carpet and set up a small space heater to dry the area completely. You may wish to look into orange or lemon oil. These are supposed to be highly effective at combating feline urine odors. You’ll want to scrub the area using a dilute solution of chlorine bleach. Again, I’d do a triple whammy. I’d go one round with the bleach solution, repeat with white vinegar and then hit it with some ammonia as well. A light soapy rinse in between all of these would help neutralize any residual reactives.

I’d be tempted to simply lock RW in the room where the litter boxes are until he cleans up his act (as it were). Do you have a garage where he could be confined? You may also need to set up a watch on the area while he is free to roam. Have a squirt gun ready or maybe even one of those compressed air horns that run off of an aerosol propellant bottle. Catching him in the act a few times might dampen his enthusiasm (especially if you use the squirt gun). You may well need to simply terrify the bejeebers out of him concerning that location. Fear is a strong motivator. I hope this helps. I know how much you care about animals.

9

If you go Zenster’s way, make sure you thorougly scrub between the bleach and ammonia, they don’t make a good combination.

10

We had a similar problem. We keep the litter boxes in a corner of the kitchen.

Our older cat started peeing in the carpeted hallway. Finally, we pulled up the carpet, because we simply couldn’t get the smell out. We covered the area with plastic drop cloths, which we taped down.

We didn’t cover the area where she had peed, because there was still a little smell there. I blocked it with cardboard boxes, and sprayed it down now and then with enzymatic cleaner. Now, our cat is old and couldn’t get over the boxes. You might have to take more extreme measures to keep your cat away from his “spot.”

I bought a new litter box, just for her, and put it in the hall on the drop cloths. After she had used it about a month, I put it with the other boxes. She still used it, even in the new spot. Now she will even use the other boxes she had refused to use before.

We are in the process of putting new vinyl flooring in the hall. The bonus is, I really love it. I like it better than the carpet.

Our cat never pees in that area anymore.

I don’t know if any of this is an option for you, but it did work for us. It was definitely worth it. Also, it wasn’t as expensive as it sounds, since we only had to buy flooring for the small hallway area. Putting it down ourselves has turned into a surprisingly long project - it’s neatly trimmed and in place, but the baseboards aren’t back on yet - but that also saved a lot of money.

Also, if you can’t resolve the problem, see if someone else will take him in “for a while.” There’s a very good chance he won’t do this when he’s in a new home. He’s almost certainly going in that spot because of the smell, or because of some issue with the other cat. If he stays with someone else a while, you will probably find that he doesn’t have this problem all the time, and you won’t have to feel guilty about finding him a new home.

11

As someone with three current and several past kitties, there are a few things I have tried. Some worked and some didn’t, depending on the cat.

When two of my current cats were tiny, I had an awful time teaching them where to go. They would check out the litterbox, then get out and go somewhere else. I switched cat litters and they almost immediately started going in the right place. So- If you haven’t changed cat litters, it couldn’t hurt to try. He might not like the smell, the feel, or the “dust factor” of your current brand.

We also had a cat who WOULD NOT use any litterbox that another cat had used. We got him his own and he was fine. We had to teach the other cat not to use it, though. Just redirecting the other cat to her own box for a day or so got the idea across.

Everyone who has said that a cat will keep peeing in a place as long as they can still smell previous urine is right. You probably will, unfortunately, have to replace the carpet there. As a fellow apartment dweller, I know this can be a problem. Suggestion- if you go to a carpet store, you may be able to find the same type of carpet. If you cut out the affected area carefully, you might be able to replace the carpet without your landlord being any the wiser.

Cats really DO hate tin/aluminium foil. But that might just be a temporary fix. He might just find a new “potty spot.” Ditto for the water gun/air horn thing.

There is a bitter apple spray sold in many pet stores that will keep a cat off of furniture, etc. I doubt you want to spray your whole carpet though.

With a past cat who started this behavior, we kept a close eye on her for a few days. We’d wait until we saw her starting to pee in the wrong place, then grab her (at the squat, before any actual peeing had occured) and scold her, loudly and firmly. Then we immediately put her in the litterbox. If she got out, we’d follow her around and wait again. (Since she obviously had to go.) Repeat process. Eventually, she’d go in the box. Follow much praise and kitty treats. It was a LONG couple of days, but she got it in the end.

All that said, I definitely second that you must rule out all health problems. Try another vet if you have to. Even if your vet is great, she/he may be missing something. A second opinion will at least definitely rule out health-related causes.

Please don’t put your cat to sleep. There is bound to be a solution out there.

12

One of my cats started urinating in inappropriate places. There was no reason for it that I could determine and my vet gave her a clean bill of health at her check up. I did everything that’s already been mentioned here, plus I bought a Scat Mat (an electric mat that gives a teensy shock) and put it in her favorite spot. That took care of things for a couple of months, but one evening I came home from work to find all heck had broken loose.

The poor thing was wandering all over the apartment, trying to urinate and not succeeding. Obviously something was wrong and off to the vet we went. He set us up with some anti biotics for her UTI and we switched to a special urinary tract care formula food. According to the vet, she’d likely had the UT problem the whole time, but it just hadn’t been bad enough till right then. So talk to your vet and have him or her double check, just in case. Best of luck!

13

Thanks everyone for all the new ideas. Some I haven’t seen before. I am going to make a list or chart and try some of them. I was almost afraid to post about this, because I thought speaking about getting rid of the cat might not sit well with folks. Well, it wouldn’t sit well with ME! But something must be done.

I’m guessing now that ripping up the carpet is going to have to be it. For those who have done it, have your cats started peeing in another place when the first one is disturbed?

14

As far the carpet goes- If it is already ruined in that spot, you might want to try a few of the ideas people have mentioned before you replace it. That way, at least he’ll keep going in the same place if nothing works and you’ll only have to replace that area later on. If something DOES work, you can just replace that spot in the carpet without worrying about him ruining any other areas.

15

I would not use ammonia on this problem. The cat will think the ammonia is pee and the problem will probably continue.

You need Nature’s Miracle or a product called Out! which can be found at PetSmart or any other large petstore. They both break down the enzymes, which removes the odors. Do yourself a favor, buy the bigger bottle on your first trip to the store or you might have to go back. You are going to have to soak the carpet with this stuff, enough so that the padding is soaked through and even so that the flooring under the padding gets wet too.

If that doesn’t work contact your Vet about a product called Feliway (sp?) its a pheremone which is suppose to mellow the cat and stop him from marking by urination.

Good Luck.

16

What does your vet say?

17

Again, thanks to everyone for their replies. I just got home from PetsMart and I think I have a gameplan.

I bought two new litter boxes, and some more litter. It’s the same variety but is billed as “Extra Strength! With Odor Crystals.”
I also purchased a gallon bottole of and odor and stain remover.
MissSwish, it’s not the one you mentioned, but it has the same directions as to soaking the carpet.

  1. I am going to vacuum thoroughly the area where the boxes are, then install the new boxes with totally fresh litter. On top of the litter I will sprinkle the last of the cat attracting substance I once bought from the vet.
  2. Then I am going to use the cleanser/stain remover as directed, soaking and then blotting up the excess.
  3. When the carpet is dry I will cover it with plastic or foil, as another poster to this thread recommended.
  4. Then I will place one of the boxes over the place where the cat has made most of his recent markings. Got that idea from a poster here too. Someone else said to then gradually move the box over to where it is supposed to be.
  5. On Thursday the Road Warrior has his semi-annual checkup at the vet, and I will once again mention the continuing problem.

After all this I will sit back and pray that the effort works. And I’m only halfway joking about the praying part. It sounds silly but at this point I would do anything that works, lol.

Forgot to mention, masonite, while at PetsMart I followed your suggestion and bought a couple more kitty toys. I will also make an effort to set aside play time that is just for him.

hyperjes, you mentioned that ripping up the carpet might cause problems in the apartment, well, I do own the apartment(it’s part of my house), so at least I don’t have to worry if I finally go that route.

If the current campaign doesn’t work, then the next step would be ripping up the carpet. But only in that area. As I said, I don’t dare get all new carpet until the problem is solved.

If anyone has any other ideas or success stories let me know. In a couple of weeks I might bump this thread for an update.

18

Isabelle, the Road Warrior’s appointment with the vet is on Thursday afternoon.

19

Thanks! I would have called my vet and told him it was an emergency. You pay an arm and a leg at a vet. You think they could have squeezed in an appointment before Thursday!

20

Well, the time had already been scheduled from last week, as part of his regular healthcare. The vet’s office sends reminder cards. So I figured I wouldn’t try to change the time, since the cat looks healthy, and this problem wasn’t a sudden occurence. It it had been the latter I would have tried to move up the time. Thanks for your concern though Isabelle.