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Conference misery::feline_v1

Title:	Meower Power is Valuing Differences
Notice:	FELINE_V1 is moving 1/11/94 5pm PST to MISERY
Moderator:	MISERY::VANZUYLEN_RO

Created:	Sun Feb 09 1986
Last Modified:	Tue Jan 11 1994
Last Successful Update:	Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:	5089
Total number of notes:	60366

1200.0. "HELP! Spraying female!" by CHEFS::GOUGH () Fri Mar 18 1988 10:17

    My cat Pandora sprays in the house (and in the garden, but I don't
    care about that!).
    
    She is spayed, and will be six years old in June.  She has done
    this, off and on, for probably round about three years.
    
    To cut a (very) long story short, I am at my wits end as to how
    to stop her.  We have tried everything; shouting at her and squirting
    her with water when we see her doing it, which is not very often,
    feeding her in places where she sprays, washing the area with bleach,
    vinegar, disinfectant, you name it ....  She has been on hormone
    tablets.  She loved the taste, and grew a beautiful coat, but carried
    on spraying.  Moving house seemed to stop her for a while, but moving
    house every year is not a very practical long term solution!  My
    vet has no idea why she does it.  She appears perfectly healthy.
    
    This must be basically territorial behaviour, but I cannot work
    out what sets her off.  Obvious things, such as when we got a new
    cat (Hector), have no effect at all.
    
    We have two other cats, Oliver and Hector, both neutered males,
    neither of whom spray.  Dora has lived with Oliver all her life,
    (well, since we got her at eight weeks old), and has never been
    an "only cat", so that is not the cause.
    
    She is an indoor/outdoor cat, with a cat door.  I am 99% sure that
    there is no strange cat coming into the house, which would make
    her spray.
    
    Has anyone got any bright ideas??  Any suggestions are welcome.
    
    
    
    By the way, she once sprayed a visitor, and once sprayed me.  She
    is Keith's (my husband's) cat, and tolerates me in "their" house.
    
    Helen.

T.R	Title	User	Personal Name	Date	Lines
1200.1		CIRCUS::KOLLING	Karen, Sweetie, Holly; in Calif.	`Fri Mar 18 1988 12:20`	6
	Rubbing alcohol seems to neutralize the smell. Pussycat sprayed when I changed my working habits (I was working a lot later in the evening) and he felt neglected . The spraying stopped when I went back to a normal schedule; could it be attention getting behavior?
1200.2	Pill to control it??	FSHQOA::RWAXMAN		`Fri Mar 18 1988 15:32`	13
	My mom's cat, T.J., was spraying all over the house. Thinking he had a bladder infection of some sort, she took him to the vet only to find out that nothing was physically wrong. The vet gave her some pills to control it. I don't know what they are called but they start out the dosage high and gradually lower it until he is weaned off the pills altogether. She caught him spraying only once during the first week of pill giving, scolded him, and he hasn't done it since. Maybe you want to speak with your vet about this. As Karen mentioned in .1, it could be an emotional problem.
1200.3	it could be a mild bladder infection	VAXWRK::SKALTSIS	Deb	`Fri Mar 18 1988 16:01`	9
	Pip recently started doing this. Turned out she had a mild bladder infection. Two weeks (and twice daily anti-biotic & acidifiers) later, she is back to normal. As for the hormone stuff, were you giving the cat Ovaban? Argus started spraying after being on it for about a week. There have been other reports (in this file) of similar experiences. Deb
1200.4	Thanks for the replies	CHEFS::GOUGH		`Mon Mar 21 1988 04:25`	19
	Thank you for your replies. I think it probably is attention-getting behaviour; the problem is working out what sets her off. Dora is Keith's cat, and she gets a great deal of attention from him; she would get attention from me, only she won't accept it! She is jealous; doesn't like me to sit next to her person, etc. However, I think leaving home to encourage Pandora to stop spraying is definitely taking things too far! The hormone tablets she had were either Ovaban, or something with a similar name; but they were prescribed to stop her spraying! They tasted of Marmite, and she thought they were sweets. I will take her to the vet's again, and make doubly sure that there is nothing physically wrong with her. Otherwise, it's back to cleaning up - oh well, at least it doesn't smell ....