How often should a cat use the litter box per day?

avemaria02

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Hello everyone. How often should a cat use the litter box per day? Precious is 9 lbs and is 8 years old. She is eats 5.5 oz of Friskies canned pate food per day and she also eats about 1/4 cup of dry food per day. I have never counted how many times she uses the litter box until lately. Currently she urinates 3 times per 12 hours and has a bowel movement 1 time per 12 hours. She gets fed half a can of the Friskies canned pate food every 12 hours and eats all but a bite or two of it most of the time.

The reason why I ask this question is because I have been keeping a close eye on her lately because her allergies have been bothering her a little and I'm watching her closely to make sure she isn't catching a respiratory infection. She is due to go to the veterinarian next week or the week after for her annual booster shots and I might call for an earlier appointment if she is sick.
 
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oneandahalfcats

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Sounds like everything is pretty normal with your cats elimination. Under normal circumstances a cat will pee 2-3 times per day or more, depending on their fluid intake. Peeing helps to flush out toxins so this amount is ideal. Some cats will poop a couple of times a day but once a day is good. You mentioned that she goes once a day which may be normal for her, unless something has changed and she was going more often. Hope this helps.
 

stephenq

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Hi,

I hope she's feeling better soon!  Peeing more than usual can be signs of things like kidney disease or diabetes so I would suggest blood work and your vet may need to take a urine sample.  Does she appear to be drinking more than usual as well?
 

raintyger

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On average a cat will urinate 2-3 times per day. If you're using clumping litter the clumps will be about the size of a golf ball. Excessive urination could be kidney disease or diabetes, as oneandahalfcats says.

If you want to improve her diet and decrease the chances of kidney disease or diabetes, you should move her to 100% wet.
 

tulosai

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I agree with everyone else that urinating 2-3 times per 24 hour period is  usually 'normal' in an adult cat. Most adult cats  will poop once a day, but twice is also normal.

The real question for you is did your cat used to go less.  If she has ALWAYS peed this much, and has had clean bills of health from the vet, it is all probably fine.  However, if she is peeing more than normal for her now, you definitely should go to the vet.  It could be diabetes as others have said, or it could be a UTI if each time she is peeing only a little.  it could also be stress or other things.  A vet visit would be in order.
 
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avemaria02

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Hey everyone. Thanks for the advice. I appreciate it. That said, I think she's her litter box habits are pretty normal compared to in the past. I didn't really keep a close eye on how much she was eliminating until recently.
 

oneandahalfcats

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On average a cat will urinate 2-3 times per day. If you're using clumping litter the clumps will be about the size of a golf ball. Excessive urination could be kidney disease or diabetes, as oneandahalfcats says.

If you want to improve her diet and decrease the chances of kidney disease or diabetes, you should move her to 100% wet.
It was actually Stevenq that mentioned the excessive urination associated with diabetes. A valid point if the case, but then you have to look at all of the circumstances. At one point Max had started flooding the litterbox with pee and of course my first reaction was that this was not normal, and got him into the vet for some blood work and urine test. He had  no problems with urinating in general. Thankfully both came back normal. We discussed the possibilities with the vet and arrived at the conclusion that as some cats (Max) will go only once a day, this coupled with increased water intake (Max loves to drink water), would make that much urine realistic. That said, I switched dry foods recently from the Royal Canin High Fibre to a low grain diet, and noticed that Max does not flood the box with pee as much. If there is a switch from less dry food to more wet food, which I have started working on, I suspect that he may eventually not drink as much water. 
 
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