Urinating in the house

[Emmalou22]

Hi everyone
I am in need of a bit of advice. I have had my kittens for about 10 months now and moved house with them a month ago. They settled in really well and seem very happy however this last week they have weed in the house twice. The other day they had soiled and weed on the bed...ALOT!!! So much so that it went through the duvet and through the mattress too!! Last night they weed on the bed again! But they use the litter tray fine?
Does anyone have my advice for me please??

[KittyWitty]

Has anything else changed in their life apart from moving home? By settling well what do you mean?

Sounds like it is very much stress induced!!

[Emmalou22]

By settling well, I mean they have settled down a lot more than they did in our old house, we lived in our old house 4 months and they were very skitty but since moving here they seem to sleep better, calmed down a lot and become a lot more lovable.
Nothing else has changed. Me and my bf still work the same shift patterns so nothing major, bit worried really

[Willowgill]

Maybe they're a bit stressed with the move and missing you while you're out so marking your bed - could you keep the bedroom door shut for a couple of weeks till they get used to everything new? If not then a sheet of something crinkly like tin foil or plastic might deter them. They might also have a urine infection so a visit to the vets might not be a bad idea.

[lilynmitz]

It's sometimes hard to get inside a cat's head to work out what's troubling them, but something obviously is. Until you can work out what's upset them, I would suggest you keep them out of your bedroom so that they get back into the habit of using their litter tray again. Make sure you keep the tray clean at all times, and get a second tray, as some cats don't like using a soiled tray.

Are they indoor only, or have they started going outside yet? If the latter, then it may be that something outside has upset them and they'e soiling inside as a result.

Are they neutered/spayed yet? If not, please get them done, to prevent yet another litter of unwanted kittens to home, and for a whole host of other reasons. If they've not been done, they will be getting hormonal at this age, and this may be contributing to their behaviour.

Have a look at the link below and see if it offers any other suggestions as to how to deal with this.

http://www.catchat.org/urination.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Emmalou22]

We clean the trays out every couple of days so it's always clean and we now keep the bedroom shut in the day aswell. We now have a tray upstairs too. They are indoors cats and have both been done at the vet as they are both girls.

[lilynmitz]

They've been through lot of upheaval in their lives, and they're still very young. Sometimes we underestimate the effect this has on them. Have you been decorating/moving furniture etc? Little things like this can set them off, specially if it brings new smells and new noises to the house.

It might be that the local cats are coming to check them out. This happened when I brought Lily and Mitz home, who were housecats for the first few months. But within days of them arriving, every cat in the neighbourhood turned up outside the french windows and completely freaked them out. One even broke in through the locked cat flap, nicked their food, spent the night on their sofa, (as he couldn't get out the way he came in) and then calmly walked out through the front door when I came down for breakfast!

How have they been getting on since you barred them from the bedroom?

[brigidrynne]

I seem to remember reading somewhere (here, probably ) that a lot of cats don't like the smell of new carpets - presumably because of something they're treated with. Does the new house have any recently fitted carpets?

On that note, it could be new furniture, decorating smells or, as Lilynmitz pointed out, some of the neighbouring cats stopping by to say hello. All in all, the most likely thing is that the new environment is stressing them out a bit, so I'd be inclined to try a Feliway diffuser.