Question from 4cats

lotsocats

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There is some great advice/hints here, but does anyone have experience of 'inappropriate' peeing in a multi-cat household? I have four cats - George and Loulou are 9 and I've had them for seven years, Mini Me is 18 months and I've had her since she was a kitten, and Jeffrey is four months, had him since he was about eight weeks. Although George and Loulou have always been nervous cats, they have taken reasonably well to the newcomers.

However, about two weeks ago Loulou started getting very aggressive towards Mini Me and started attacking her at every available opportunity. At the same time she started urinating on the carpets, curtains and furniture. Mini Me is turning into a nervous wreck and spends a lot of time hiding in a box, while Loulou is v sweet most of the time, but just has these moments when she's a bully. I guess this is behavioural, although I will get her checked at the vet for FLUTD just to be sure.

I would understand if she was attacking Jeffrey, the latest arrival, but she has been getting on pretty well with Mini Me for the last 18 months. So why has she suddenly changed like this? Could Mini Me have become more of a threat as she's got older/bigger? I will take the advice about using citrus and tin foil to try and stop the peeing, but can anyone advise on how to stop the aggression? They used to be friends (well almost!) so it is v strange that Loulou is now being like this. I can't pinpoint any major changes in the household that might have upset her so much, except for the introduction of Jeffrey, and that was a couple of months ago now.
 

hissy

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I would make an educated guess that there are just to many cats for this household, and some are reacting to the stress of not having their own space. Somewhere around here, I have the actual stats about how much space each cat needs to have and if they don't they start territory wars and begin to spray and act out.
 
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lotsocats

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4cats, I moved your post to its own thread so we could focus more on the aggression problems you are having with your cats. I am glad that you read through the thread in which we discussed inappropriate urination. I am also glad that you will take LouLou to the vet to be checked for URIs. Often a sick kitty will act out aggressively against the other cats in the house and the violence ends once the cat is healthy again.

I am not surprised that LouLou would chose to attach an old buddy instead of the new guy. She knows that Mini Me won't hurt her in response to her aggression whereas she probably is not so sure she is safe with Jeffrey. Overall, LouLou has had a stressful few months with the introduction of a new cat into the household. You might try getting a plug-in Feliway dispenser. The Feliway tends to calm cats and is helpful in reducing inappropriate spraying. If that does not reduce the aggression, you might need to do what we recommended in the attached thread.

click here
 
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