Strange Poop..

Okay Sassy is recovering from the urinary tract infection wonderfully. She now sits down to pee. But I've been letting her out during the day from the room we had her in to observe her. I thought since it's been since last Saturday and during the day she's fine I could let her out tonight. This morning I woke up to Smokie wanting to be fed, so I fed him. Then I smelled in the office a pungent smell of cat poop. I looked all over first didn't see it. But after a second time around I found it. Must have blended in with the wood floors or something. Same place as before, behind the treadmill. So I picked it up and looked at it again. There was a tiny amount of blood and a little mucus. They were not terribly hard I could mush them with my fingers flat, but they did look bulky. When I opened one up it was dry inside kind of grainy powdery with hair. The inside looked like I could see granules of cat food. I couldn't tell the color of the hair as it was the same color of the poop so I'm going to assume that it was white fur. There is really only one cat with a white hind end which is Sassy.

But it doesn't make sense when she's in the room we have her in she doesn't poop outside the box , but the one day I let her out she does.

Is this some sort of behavior thing or is she just having a hard time with hairballs? She does groom herself a lot. I counted about 3-4 times a day. And being that I can't comb her, that could be why. I've been giving her olive oil and hairball remedy when she decides she wants it.

So now I'm not sure what's up. Anyone have any ideas? She seems fine otherwise. Still trying to find things I can sell so I can take her in for a blood test.

There's not really any blood test for hairballs. You should however discuss this with your vet. Is she on a script food for urinary issues? If not, you could talk to your vet about a hairball formula food. Otherwise adding some plain canned pumpkin to her wet food could give her the fiber to clear that hair out.
The blood and mucus, if just limited to stools like this, are just from it being a harder to pass stool. As long as you do not see this on another stool it's not a cause for immediate worry.

If she was on an antibiotic for UTI, that can also mess up intestinal flora for a bit and could result in odd poops - though usually diarrhea is more common.

What's the issue with not being able to brush her? Does she let you handle her at all or is it just her not allowing brushing? If the latter, a zoom groom often works for more touchy cats as it feels good to them.

She was having the poop issue before being put on the antibiotics. She is on dry food only because I've tried to get her to eat wet food and she refuses. Even if it's heated up a bit. I've tired giving her canned pumpkin but she turns her nose up at it.

She's part feral so she does not allow brushing of any kind. I even got a glove that was supposed to help get rid of hair that way. NOPE nothing can be on my hand, just my hand can pet her and only for so long. So when I pet her I try to pet off as much fur as I can to help her.

I did switch the cats to a grain free diet. I did notice it didn't have as much fiber as the prior food Eukanuba for indoor cats & hairballs. There's a 4% difference. The vet said to give her hairball remedy twice a week until tames down and if it doesn't just do it twice a week. Problem is she sometimes wants the hairball stuff and sometimes she doesn't. She does lick freely though olive oil. The vet said it was okay and that would work too. But I've also heard about butter as well. Just a teaspoon of butter.

She seems to not be upchucking the hairballs as much since I've put her on this food. She's passing them more which I guess is good, but making it harder for her to poop.

What I don't get is when I put her in the room in the basement which is the size of our living room which is a long rectangle and a nice size, she'll poop in the litter box, but if she's up here at night, she'll poop outside the litter box. I'm hoping that's behavioral.

Add another box up there in the room she likes to use. Have you ever had to go in a hurry? Stairs are no fun in emergency situations!

They make some cat furniture..things that have brushes attached. I think the results are mixed on that - some cats rub themselves on them and some cats don't.

Don't give up on trying to brush her. I have a semi feral outside that I have to catch to brush. He isn't fond of it, but he lets me do it. With grooming tools like the zoom groom or a furminator I've found the best way to use them in to take one swipe at the fur then pet with the other hand (collects loose fur). That extra petting seems to sooth most kitties.
If you don't have a zoom groom, try one out. It fits in your hand so it may be small enough as to not spook her. You may have to work up from a couple swipes with it a day until she lets you do more.

Does she specifically need a grain free? The food may simply not suit her being low fiber. I had all of my adults on grain free and one did start to have hairball problems, it became kind of moot point for that cat, though, since he had to go on C/D (which settled the fiber issue).
You may have to do what some here do - mix a hairball formula food in with the other dry.

If blood in the stool is an on going issue that does need to be worked out with the vet.

We'll I'm not so sure anymore that it's Sassy. I talked to the vet and he said that since she's been put in a seperate room for monitoring and she didn't have any incidences then, but as soon as she was let out, it was behavioral. Which isn't Sassy. I told the vet that even with a UTI she was peeing inside the box. He said then he's about 98% sure it's not Sassy. I tried to think which cat has a tendancy when she had her URI to pee outside the box and had behavioral peeing outside the box too. Then I remembered Faith. Her poop was very smelly all the time. She is always the one with smelly poop. Sassy's never was. Plus she has been shedding like crazy the past couple of weeks. I've been coming her and today I got two softball size wads of fur. She's a big cat though she weighs about 17lbs and she has a lot of fur on her. She is short hair though. So I'm thinking it was her. The vet said to put some Vaseline on her paws if she won't take the regular hairball Remmedy or to put it in baby food which I might try.

It's usually happens about once a week or so. Sassy is just never been one to go outside the box. Never had trouble with her before.

I would love to put the litter box there, but I can't. My brother in law is moving in with us because he broke up with his girlfriend. They have a daughter together and that is going to be her room. So unfortunately the only place for the litter boxes is downstairs. The bathroom is too small, and the other bedroom is going to be used by my brother in law.

Since they'll be new and bringing new smells in, you may want to have them keep their doors shut if there's any chance of a cat going in there and pooping or peeing. I suggest you get some feliway diffusers in advance, especially if Sassy is skittish of people.

Could you work a litter box into the living room and your bedroom? As long as they're scooped daily it won't cause odor issues.

If Faith's stools are normally very smelly something isn't right and it might be good to get her in for a vet check up. Especially if there is now blood. Alone it wouldn't be too alarming on a hard stool, but ongoing issues like stinky stools could point towards a long term food issue, bacteria problem, parasites, IBD, etc.

I can usually tell who does what around here because I have so many litter boxes. Some of them will only poop in certain boxes so I can often recognize who's poop I'm seeing. For example - the other day someone had a cling on that fell off in the living room. Color, size, and location says it was Blaan's. I wish I knew how he got it to perfectly stand up on end, though.

We can't have it in the living room because of my niece and with the child custody proceedings, that would be frowned upon since she is only 4. My fiance does not want it in the bed room.

Faith's poop has always been stinky. Ever since a kitten. It used to be runny but then the vet said to put her on Eukanuba and that took it away. But the smelly part has always been there. You can start going into the basement and start to smell it, when you go into the cat room it's even stronger. Because when it's stinks she doesn't want to cover it up. I was thinking about getting cat food for sensitive stomachs and see if that works. I wonder if they make a sensitive stomach/hairball dry cat food. That's what I really need. But I'll try to start giving her some Vaseline though.

On a side note I think smokie's poop is runny now from being on the moist cat food. It should firm up because I've been slowly switching him to dry and so far no throwing up! YAY.

Ah, you have a houseful!

If you can get Faith on a food that agrees with her better and has higher fiber, that may be enough without needing a hairball formula. But the best bet would be to discuss this at length with the vet.

I hope you can get everyone straightened out. Do try working on brushing Sassy even if you think she's not the one with hair issues - you don't want hairballs in more than one cat.
Maybe all the cats would benefit from some probiotics?

I can understand your fiance not wanting Faith using a bedroom box right now, maybe if you can get the stinky stools dealt with more boxes can be added. You may also need to experiment with a few litters - if you have room down there try two or three boxes with different litters and see which works best for odor and gets Faith to cover.

As for the niece, she's a lucky girl.
When I turned four I wanted a kitten that a family friend's cat had. They said no, but the friend brought her over anyways and they couldn't say no to him! Part of the deal for me keeping it was that I had to help scoop and change the litter box... at age four. I was already feeding and watering the dog and cats by then so I guess it wasn't something crazy for them to expect out of me.

I hope everything, from stool, to food issues, to the custody proceedings goes well.

Butter and olive oil pass through the digestive tract too quickly to be much help with hairballs.

Hairball remedy should be given on an empty stomach, at least an hour before a meal, so it gloms to the hair, not any food.

Based on my own experience with several "$400 hairballs" and my own vets advice, I would dose for several days in a row, then drop it to every other day, then go to twice a week.

I am not a vet, but I have two cats who have had some serious hairball problems, one who gets daily grooming, and one who does not allow grooming at all.

Most of them take it willingly. Some I have to put it on a spoon before they'll take it. Others I'm going to have to give it to them in a syringe. Tubby my fat cat I have a hard time giving it to her. I can't grab her around the neck because there's too much fat there. Yesterday I had to put her between my legs and face her head up to put it into her throat. However today I did give her some in baby food which went MUCH better. So the two who do not want it, it looks like I'll probably have to mix it into baby food so that they get some. I have such a hard time giving them the syringes of hairball remedy.

The vet also recommended Vasaline. Does anyone have any experience with that?

There are some here who have used it for years.

I have some that don't like the hairball remedy, too. And there's no way I'm going to smear it on their paws - that's always went badly..
What I do for the fussy cats is just squirt some of if onto my finger, scuff and lift the front of the cat up, and when their mouths open I smear it right on their tongue. My hands wash and I know I'm not sticking anything in their mouths that could hurt them.