I keep reading on these sites that Feliway may take several days before it works with a cat. I find that very counter productive as my carpet slowly gets ruined and causes me work every day to clean up urine spots on the carpet until this stuff decides to work!
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About Feliway
- Thread starter mycatzack
- Start Date
hi and welcome to TCS!
aside from dealing with effectively removing the urine spots from your home, it's very important to figure out the reason why your cat(s) are urinating outside their litter box(es). this is so you'll be able to avoid having this happen again (for the same reason).
have you had your cat(s) vet checked, to rule out possible medical reasons for your cat(s) urinating/defecating outside their litter box(es)? is it urinating, or urinating and defecating outside the litter box? it's always best to rule out possible medical reasons before assuming the reason to be behavioral.
how many cats do you have and how many litter boxes? are the litter boxes scooped daily, kept clean?
with the urine spots, what are you using to clean them? an enzymatic cleaner, used exactly as instructed on the bottle, is the most effective cleaner. nature's miracle is one enzymatic cleaner. after you've carefully cleaned the urine spots, do you check with a black light (used when it's very dark in the room, like in the evening or at night), to make sure the urine spots have truly been removed? i've found that using the black light to scan my rugs shows me where exactly any accidents have occurred. it's possible that you may be missing some urine spots.
feliway spray and diffusers are designed to be used for certain specific things. they need to be carefully used per their instructions, and it can take anywhere from 30-60 days before you start seeing results -- though i started seeing results (ie, reduced stress from apartment building noises, in my case) in about one week.
in my experience, if the surface which has had the accident on it (urinating or defecating) is absorbent enough or is such that the urine can be saturated into it deeply enough, then the most careful and thorough cleaning with the proper enzymatic cleaner and checked with a black light and then followed by spraying feliway on that surface can still not thoroughly remove the urine. this happened with one of my cats cat trees 2-3 months ago or so. i did everything exactly as needed to be done to remove the urine spots (in fact, several times), but i believe the urine had been absorbed down through the carpet of the cat tree and into the particle board underneath. the only solution in this case, and what i did, was to totally remove the cat tree from my home. and that fixed everything in my home, because my senior cat who has medical issues had had an accident on that cat tree.
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- #3
Thanks for that mickNsnicks2mom
I kept my post real short due purely to my frustration level. So here's the story and what exactly has happened. About two months ago we got a new puppy. The new puppy is also confined to the kitchen and living room so as to not terrorize the 3 cats we have throughout the house. Right around this same time my cat Zack had blood work done because he had lost an extreme amount of weight. He also had xrays and the two of these results pointed toward Kidney disease. Now I understand about if something major in the household changes that urinating can happen as well as the medical issues but Zack seems like himself running around and getting attention when needed. So let me answer a few of your questions. Firstly, he is only urinating on the carpet and not dedicating. He is doing this in almost the exact same spot. This spot is on very low grade wall to wall carpeting at the bottom of my stairs in the basement. Underneath this carpet would be the concrete floor. 20 feet away within the recreation room of the basement is a door with a cat door installed that leads to the furnace room where the other cats food sits on one side and the litter 3 litter boxes(which are cleaned on a daily basis) on the other side. (we have two other cats that he gets along with just fine) We feed Zack in an upstairs bathroom since he is on a special diet food as per the results of the blood tests.
As far as preventative measures go for the urinating......I first moved one of the litter boxes to the area he was urinating in. that did not help so I put down a plastic tarp(did not help) so I bought thick plastic carpet runners but that didn't help, so I turned the carpet runners upside down so he would not walk on the small sharp nubbies on the underside but again this did not help. to clean the spots I first used a bottle of liquid that specifically said Urine and Deodorizer on it. I then tried Frabreeze. I then tried all purpose pine cleaner for carpets. I then tried Vinegar. Two days ago I rented a carpet cleaner and passed over this area 3 times. I then plugged in a Feliway comfort Zone Defuser about a foot beside where he is urinating but he has urinated twice again since then. I like most people do not have a black light to detect reminense of things, and I have not as of yet found in any stores a enzymatic cleaner. So nothing has worked. So either 1. the Feliway has not taken effect yet, or two this is not going to stop anyways because of his medical prognosis. But most of the time he goes in the litter box so how could the medical thing be the issue? So what am i to do? Should I take the carpeting up and leave concrete floor exposed? Should I lock him up for a period of time to see if this passes cause I've already tried that for a few days. Should I put him down cause of the medical thing and his age? should I take a chance and wait to see if the Feliway ever takes effect? I love Zack but I can't keep spending money and time on this every single day now!!!
I kept my post real short due purely to my frustration level. So here's the story and what exactly has happened. About two months ago we got a new puppy. The new puppy is also confined to the kitchen and living room so as to not terrorize the 3 cats we have throughout the house. Right around this same time my cat Zack had blood work done because he had lost an extreme amount of weight. He also had xrays and the two of these results pointed toward Kidney disease. Now I understand about if something major in the household changes that urinating can happen as well as the medical issues but Zack seems like himself running around and getting attention when needed. So let me answer a few of your questions. Firstly, he is only urinating on the carpet and not dedicating. He is doing this in almost the exact same spot. This spot is on very low grade wall to wall carpeting at the bottom of my stairs in the basement. Underneath this carpet would be the concrete floor. 20 feet away within the recreation room of the basement is a door with a cat door installed that leads to the furnace room where the other cats food sits on one side and the litter 3 litter boxes(which are cleaned on a daily basis) on the other side. (we have two other cats that he gets along with just fine) We feed Zack in an upstairs bathroom since he is on a special diet food as per the results of the blood tests.
As far as preventative measures go for the urinating......I first moved one of the litter boxes to the area he was urinating in. that did not help so I put down a plastic tarp(did not help) so I bought thick plastic carpet runners but that didn't help, so I turned the carpet runners upside down so he would not walk on the small sharp nubbies on the underside but again this did not help. to clean the spots I first used a bottle of liquid that specifically said Urine and Deodorizer on it. I then tried Frabreeze. I then tried all purpose pine cleaner for carpets. I then tried Vinegar. Two days ago I rented a carpet cleaner and passed over this area 3 times. I then plugged in a Feliway comfort Zone Defuser about a foot beside where he is urinating but he has urinated twice again since then. I like most people do not have a black light to detect reminense of things, and I have not as of yet found in any stores a enzymatic cleaner. So nothing has worked. So either 1. the Feliway has not taken effect yet, or two this is not going to stop anyways because of his medical prognosis. But most of the time he goes in the litter box so how could the medical thing be the issue? So what am i to do? Should I take the carpeting up and leave concrete floor exposed? Should I lock him up for a period of time to see if this passes cause I've already tried that for a few days. Should I put him down cause of the medical thing and his age? should I take a chance and wait to see if the Feliway ever takes effect? I love Zack but I can't keep spending money and time on this every single day now!!!
@mycatzack -- first, i truly can understand your frustration. you've tried quite a few things to try to fix this problem.
this may take a bit of detective work, figuring out the reason your boy urinated/is urinating outside the litter box. you have two things that may be related to the cause, but it could be some other reason. there's zack's CKD, and there's the relatively new puppy. i'm sure other members with experience and ideas will be replying too.
my cat, snick (who is 14 years old now), has chronic kidney disease. snick was diagnosed in late 2011 i believe. so this is an area i have experience with. may i ask what your vet has recommended for treating zack's CKD? is he being given subcutaneous (sub-q) fluids? it's very important to give CKD cats sub-q's, which help flush out the toxins that their very low functioning kidneys aren't able to on their own and also can slow down the progression of the chronic kidney disease. but a side effect of those same sub-q fluids is that their urine is quite dilute, which leaves them more prone to developing urinary tract infections (UTI's). my girl has had UTI's several times, and the first symptom my girl generally has experienced is dribbling of urine and/or little accidents of small amounts of urine -- outside the litter box, she's not even aware she's had an accident right away. so this is one possible reason for your boy to have urinated outside the litter box the first time. zack may not have even realized he'd dribbled urine or such at the time.
some things to understand -- that cats have something like 17 times more acute sense of smell than us humans; and if a cat smells (cat) urine somewhere (anywhere, including outside the litter box) then they tend to think, "it smells like pee......so this must be an okay place to go pee"; and cats are extremely good at hiding illness. these are very important parts of figuring out what is going on for you. because if that first urine spot wasn't actually thoroughly removed (definitely not for lack of your working quite hard to remove it), zack will go back to it again and again, until it's completely removed. and since zack is peeing in 'almost the exact same spot', i would say it's a very good possibility that the urine smell is still in that spot.
enzymatic cleaners can be bought in pet supply stores, and at online retailers such as amazon and pet supply websites. this is the UV (black light) that i bought and use -- , not particularly expensive at $14.97 but worth it's weight in gold to me. i didn't have a black light on hand either, so i understand that you wouldn't have one either.
my suggestions will be based on how i would approach this if it were me. first, i'd have zack checked by the vet for a possible urinary tract infection -- i'd have the vet do a spin test (more accurate, thorough), not just a dip stick/test strip test. if your zack is being given sub-q's, this would point to more of a possibility of a UTI. even with no sub-q's being given, there's the possibility of a UTI caused by stress -- in zack's case, the new puppy (just the change in the home or just because it's a dog -- some cats simply don't like dogs at all, like my snick) or even stress from not feeling well (from the CKD). if zack does indeed have a UTI, then have that treated. i'd also deal with the spot(s) on the carpet. i would really hate to remove wall-to-wall carpeting, and since the urinating seems to be in one specific (and relatively small?) area you may not need to remove all the carpeting. i'd first obtain a UV light and see exactly where the urine spots are on the carpeting, so you're sure the urinating is only in that specific area on the carpet. then (painful though it would be for me) i'd cut out the area that has the urine spot(s) on it. it might be possible to have a carpet professional remove just a marked off area and then 'patch' it with a fresh piece -- i don't know about this, but i'd sure check into it if it were me.
as far as zack and his chronic kidney disease. i'd do some reading online about CKD and treating it. here's a link to a very good website that has excellent info about CKD and treating it -- http://www.felinecrf.org/index.htm. that website is my go-to website for anything related to CKD. cats who develop chronic kidney disease can live years with a good quality of life, with treatment under the supervision of a vet. i've found it best to learn about the disease and it's treatment, and be very proactive. i work closely with my vet in my snick's care, and ask my vet any questions i have. my vet has taken a very proactive approach in my snick's CKD treatment from the beginning, which is why snick is doing quite well now after close to 4 years from being diagnosed with 'the beginnings of kidney issues'. snick is currently in stage 2 CKD, and is on at-home/hospice care because she no longer tolerates vet appointments (specifically, having blood draws).
this may take a bit of detective work, figuring out the reason your boy urinated/is urinating outside the litter box. you have two things that may be related to the cause, but it could be some other reason. there's zack's CKD, and there's the relatively new puppy. i'm sure other members with experience and ideas will be replying too.
my cat, snick (who is 14 years old now), has chronic kidney disease. snick was diagnosed in late 2011 i believe. so this is an area i have experience with. may i ask what your vet has recommended for treating zack's CKD? is he being given subcutaneous (sub-q) fluids? it's very important to give CKD cats sub-q's, which help flush out the toxins that their very low functioning kidneys aren't able to on their own and also can slow down the progression of the chronic kidney disease. but a side effect of those same sub-q fluids is that their urine is quite dilute, which leaves them more prone to developing urinary tract infections (UTI's). my girl has had UTI's several times, and the first symptom my girl generally has experienced is dribbling of urine and/or little accidents of small amounts of urine -- outside the litter box, she's not even aware she's had an accident right away. so this is one possible reason for your boy to have urinated outside the litter box the first time. zack may not have even realized he'd dribbled urine or such at the time.
some things to understand -- that cats have something like 17 times more acute sense of smell than us humans; and if a cat smells (cat) urine somewhere (anywhere, including outside the litter box) then they tend to think, "it smells like pee......so this must be an okay place to go pee"; and cats are extremely good at hiding illness. these are very important parts of figuring out what is going on for you. because if that first urine spot wasn't actually thoroughly removed (definitely not for lack of your working quite hard to remove it), zack will go back to it again and again, until it's completely removed. and since zack is peeing in 'almost the exact same spot', i would say it's a very good possibility that the urine smell is still in that spot.
enzymatic cleaners can be bought in pet supply stores, and at online retailers such as amazon and pet supply websites. this is the UV (black light) that i bought and use -- , not particularly expensive at $14.97 but worth it's weight in gold to me. i didn't have a black light on hand either, so i understand that you wouldn't have one either.
my suggestions will be based on how i would approach this if it were me. first, i'd have zack checked by the vet for a possible urinary tract infection -- i'd have the vet do a spin test (more accurate, thorough), not just a dip stick/test strip test. if your zack is being given sub-q's, this would point to more of a possibility of a UTI. even with no sub-q's being given, there's the possibility of a UTI caused by stress -- in zack's case, the new puppy (just the change in the home or just because it's a dog -- some cats simply don't like dogs at all, like my snick) or even stress from not feeling well (from the CKD). if zack does indeed have a UTI, then have that treated. i'd also deal with the spot(s) on the carpet. i would really hate to remove wall-to-wall carpeting, and since the urinating seems to be in one specific (and relatively small?) area you may not need to remove all the carpeting. i'd first obtain a UV light and see exactly where the urine spots are on the carpeting, so you're sure the urinating is only in that specific area on the carpet. then (painful though it would be for me) i'd cut out the area that has the urine spot(s) on it. it might be possible to have a carpet professional remove just a marked off area and then 'patch' it with a fresh piece -- i don't know about this, but i'd sure check into it if it were me.
as far as zack and his chronic kidney disease. i'd do some reading online about CKD and treating it. here's a link to a very good website that has excellent info about CKD and treating it -- http://www.felinecrf.org/index.htm. that website is my go-to website for anything related to CKD. cats who develop chronic kidney disease can live years with a good quality of life, with treatment under the supervision of a vet. i've found it best to learn about the disease and it's treatment, and be very proactive. i work closely with my vet in my snick's care, and ask my vet any questions i have. my vet has taken a very proactive approach in my snick's CKD treatment from the beginning, which is why snick is doing quite well now after close to 4 years from being diagnosed with 'the beginnings of kidney issues'. snick is currently in stage 2 CKD, and is on at-home/hospice care because she no longer tolerates vet appointments (specifically, having blood draws).
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- #5
mickNsnicks2mom We did have Zacks pee tested for potential infection and as a result he was given an antibiotic injection called Convenia.
I forgot to mention in the last post that I also tried putting moth balls down in that area. I also failed to mention that once I put one of the litter boxes in that area and that did not help, I took it away upon putting the carpet runners down. when I had tried the Vinegar it was for the plastic runners....NOT the urine spots on carpet. Tonight I am going to buy the Feliway spray and Natures Miracle which has the enzymes in it. I am debating on buying a second defuser and put that one on the top floor of the house.
When I mentioned I locked him up, I meant in a storage room the size of a very small bedroom. He has his litter and food in there and has had no issues in there.
He had always got along with my two previous dogs(one a shepard/Wolf Hound and the other a Golden Retriever) The new puppy is a retriever/border collie and Zack seems okay with him around.
So I will keep you updated on progress unless there are any other thoughts/ideas!
I forgot to mention in the last post that I also tried putting moth balls down in that area. I also failed to mention that once I put one of the litter boxes in that area and that did not help, I took it away upon putting the carpet runners down. when I had tried the Vinegar it was for the plastic runners....NOT the urine spots on carpet. Tonight I am going to buy the Feliway spray and Natures Miracle which has the enzymes in it. I am debating on buying a second defuser and put that one on the top floor of the house.
When I mentioned I locked him up, I meant in a storage room the size of a very small bedroom. He has his litter and food in there and has had no issues in there.
He had always got along with my two previous dogs(one a shepard/Wolf Hound and the other a Golden Retriever) The new puppy is a retriever/border collie and Zack seems okay with him around.
So I will keep you updated on progress unless there are any other thoughts/ideas!
Honestly, Feliway was a complete life changer for me and my cat, and it worked almost immediately with her. She hasn't peed once outside of her litterbox since I started using it.
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- #7
I have put the litter box back in the effected area where the Feliway is. Should I leave it there or does that defeat the Feliway???
No, it will affect the whole room as long as it is not unusually large! It reduces stress and most likely your cat will hang out nearby because the pheromones are attractive
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- #9
What about other elements in a room? How effective or ineffective is a defuser if there is a ceiling fan, an air purifier or even an open window within the room the defuser is in??
you may be better off talking to customer service about that, as I can only attest to my own experience. However, I think it will still work fine In that environment. You may just have to use the spray a bit along with it
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- #11
ok so as promised here is an update on the situation I had with my cat Zack peeing on the basement carpet. I am happy to say after plugging in Feliway, putting the litter box back in the effected area, and using the spray Feliway on the carpet every couple of days, I have only seen one accident there in the last 9 days! I hope I haven't just jinked myself by posting this.
i'm so glad you're seeing positive results! i can understand that thought, not wanting to jinx yourself by posting that. keep doing like you're doing, and hopefully you've got this problem under control.
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- #14
Yep I jinked myself cause there was another accident on the carpet this evening!
