# Cat urinating on brand new carpets, need help!



## naf (Jan 29, 2014)

Sorry in advance for this long winded post, I just want to give as much history as possible so that I can solve this problem.

I've had my female cat for 7 years now. We've been through 3 moves together, 2 apartments and now a house that I bought. While in my 2nd apartment, she did pee on my couch cushion once, but I noticed at that time that her litter box was very dirty, as I had been busy and did not change the litter that week. I chalked it up to her being mad about the dirty litter. I cleaned the cushion, flipped it over so that the soiled side was face down, and she hasn't done it since.

I moved into my current home 4 years ago. The home has hardwoods on the main floor, carpets in the upstairs, and carpet in the finished basement. The cat never urinated on any of the existing carpets in the house. She's also stayed at my parents home for weeks at a time when we go on trips. They have their own female cat, and carpet throughout the house, and she's never urinated on any of their carpets either. About a year after I moved in, I decided to take in another rescue cat. Thinking back, this was probably a big mistake because I didn't have the time to properly introduce this new cat, but what was done is done. The new cat is a male, and it took a very long time for the cats to even be in the same room together. They eventually started tolerating one another, but I could tell that they were never going to fully get along. The male kept trying to dominate the female by swiping at her, laying on top of her, biting her, etc. During this time, the laundry room where their litter boxes are located had carpet in it. I noticed that my female cat began going outside the litter box, but she kept it to the area just next to the boxes. It was so close to the box that I figured she just missed, like she had her back end hanging out the box and it was an accident. I ended up getting rid of all the carpet in that room, and installing tile and she never urinated in that area gain (other than in the box).

A short time later, I bought a new oriental wool rug for the living room to put over my hardwood. One day the while watching TV, the female cat just squated right in front of me and peed in the middle of the carpet. I removed the carpet, cleaned it thoroughly with an enzyme cleaner, and put it back on the floor. A few weeks later, she did it again in the same spot. I figured at this point the rug was a lost cause and threw it out.

Last summer, I had the upstairs carpet replaced. Two weeks after installation, I stepped in a wet spot and the smell told me it was cat urine. At this point, I had become extremely anal about cleaning the litter box. I scoop it once a day, and replace the litter every Sunday night. I heard that litter box avoidance can be a sign of a UTI, so I took her to the vet who said that there was no infection. I cleaned the spot thoroughly with Urine-Off enzyme cleaner, using 2 applications and letting it soak for 24 hours each time before drying, and then using a Bissell Green Machine to do a final cleaning. We now keep the door to the stairs closed to prevent the cat from going up there for fear that she'll remark the spot. At this point, I figured that the female was just extremely stressed by the male cat, so I found the male a new home with a friend.

Three weeks ago I replaced all of the carpets in my finished basement. I was a little nervous because of the above incident, so I paid extra careful attention to the cat's behavior, and how the cat reacted to the new carpet. I went to changing the litter twice a week to make sure that there would be absolutely no reason for her to not use the litter box. A week after the carpet installation, I was reading a book down there with the cat in my lap. She jumped off my lap, went to the exact middle of the room, squated down and peed on the new carpet!!! Of course I was livid, but did not punish or yell at the cat, as I didn't want to make the problem worse. I soaked up as much urine as I could with paper towel, used my bissell with plain water to suction more up, and soaked with urine off for 24 hours. After the urine-off dried, I shampooed the carpet and used the bissell again. After it was all said and done, I couldn't smell any cat urine, even with my nose right down into the carpet. Last night, two weeks after that incident, I stepped in another urine spot, right next to the spot she originally soiled. This was exactly adjacent to the original spot, as it was still faintly visible under a black light. It is currently being treated with the urine-off, but I'm at my wits end. Not only is this destroying my new carpet, but this area is supposed to be a play area for my kids, so I want it to be clean and safe for them.

At this point, I feel like even if I can't smell the odor, the cat can still detect that urine was in that spot, and will continue to mark it. It's right in the middle of the room, so we can't simply put a couch over that spot. Anyone have any clue what I should do short of finding my poor cat a new home?

I know that cats can become stressed with changes in the home, and that may be what is causing it? I guess it's possible that the male cat stressed her out so much that she's doing this even though he's been gone for months now. Maybe his smell lingered? The new carpet was installed after he left, so I don't know what else there could be. The is neutered and never sprayed anything. I just find it odd that she never did this with the old carpet (besides that spots right next to the litter), only with the new oriental rug, and the new wall to wall carpet I had installed. I have read that new carpet can have an odor that is offensive to cats, and some may feel the need to mark it? Does anyone know if this is true? Would having the entire carpet professionally cleaned fix this? I've also experimented with Feliway. I sprayed the entire area with the Comfort Zone Feliway spray after she peed the first time in the basement, but that didn't seem to deter her from doing it the second time. I also have the Comfort Zone Feliway plugin in the room. Anyone have success with these products? I read that it could take up to a month to see a change in behavior, and I've only been using them a couple of weeks.

Some people have advised that I keep her out of the basement for a month or two to allow the carpet to lose its "new carpet smell" that might be provoking the cat to pee on it. This isn't really an option, as there are no doors to the basement. The only thing I could do is keep her in the laundry room. Her food and water are down there, and her litter is in the utility room next to this, so she'd have all of her daily needs there. This might stress her out even more though? She loves being around the family, so could being confined to a room for a long time make things worse?


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## Marcia (Dec 26, 2010)

I am assuming that you have a litter box down there, too?? If not, you should with some Cat Attract litter in it. The advice about letting the carpet lose it's odor is good, but I would have at least one box on every level of the house. If you are able to keep her out of that room, I would do that. This is probably one of the worst pet problems out there because it's so hard to figure out what is going on and fix it. The smell has to be completely removed - do the black light at night and make sure there is no tell tale lingering overspray and put your nose into the carpet. If you are not a smoker (sense of smell is compromised with smoking), the carpet should smell neutral. Any teeny tiny detection of odor is magnified 10X for a cat's nose so start scrubbing again. I found that SCOE X10 and Natural's Miracle for Cat urine is probably the two best odor. Remember you need to get down into the padding, too. Turkey injector or carpet injector (a giant needle) will do that.


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## naf (Jan 29, 2014)

The basement is one giant room, and that's where the carpet is. The laundry room is a separate smaller room at the back of the basement, and has a door that we keep open all the time. Her food and water are in this room. There is another room connected to this laundry room that has the furnace, utility sink, etc, and that is where her litter is kept. There really isn't any spot we could place a litter box on the main floor, and she hasn't urinated on any of the hard surfaces up there. She always goes on carpet, and seemingly only new carpet. She never went on the old carpets, other than the spots around the litter box mentioned above. There was old carpet in the main basement and upstairs for 3 years and she never peed on any of it. Just the new rug and the new installed carpet.

I poured literally a half a gallon of undiluted urine-off on the two spots, completely soaking the spots plus about 5 inches in each direction in case it spread underneath the carpet. Would this be enough to get down into the pad, or do I really need to use one of those injector needles? Will steam cleaning help after these treatments? I test the areas with a black light, and there is still a faint outline that glows where the spots are, does this ever really go away?

I might try the nature's miracle if this doesn't work. However, I"m afraid that I'm going to permanently damage the carpet by putting so many chemicals on the same spot in a short amount of time.

What is the general concensus on these enzyme cleaners, like urine-off and nature's miracle? Do they really work as well as they advertise? I'm really scared to death that the cat will continue marking this spot, and I'm very attached to the cat. I can't imagine having to give her up because of this problem.

If I keep her confined to the laundry room for a while, are there any tips to make her more comfortable in there? I don't want to stress her out even more, and make the problem worse.


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## naf (Jan 29, 2014)

As I mentioned above, we keep the cat's litter box close to the laundry. Could the sound of the laundry cause the cat to not want to use the box when it's running? She doesn't seem afraid of the noise, and she goes in there to lay on towels while the laundry is running, but maybe she's being picky and it's too noisy for her to do her business while we have a load going?


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## Marcia (Dec 26, 2010)

My 2 laundry room boxes are next to the washer. The noise does not bother them at all at this point, but it does make my new girl nervous. We have boxes upstairs in that case. I just don't know about the cleaner's effect on the carpeting or if you are reaching the padding or not.


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## AutumnRose74 (Oct 10, 2013)

naf said:


> As I mentioned above, we keep the cat's litter box close to the laundry. Could the sound of the laundry cause the cat to not want to use the box when it's running?


I'm adopting in a few weeks, and I've been wrestling with this, too. The best room for the box *to start* is my 2nd bedroom, which also houses the washer/dryer. Eventually, I want to move the box to a corner by the back door (or put a 2nd box there if the cat is cool with going in the laundry room), but that has to wait until the cat has the run of the apartment (and I'll be taking that slowly simply because I'm a first-time owner and I live in an apartment, and I don't want any problems that will cause me to lose that privilege!).


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## naf (Jan 29, 2014)

At this point, I assume that since the urine wasn't injected into the carpet, and just "poured" on, that simply pouring the cleaner onto the spot will reach all the urine. I'm hoping this 2nd attempt does the trick. It's all dry right now, and all I can smell is the cleaner, no urine at all. I'm going to steam clean this weekend and hopefully that will end the issue in that spot.


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## Heather72754 (Nov 1, 2013)

naf said:


> all I can smell is the cleaner, no urine at all.


Unfortunately it's far less important what you can smell than what your cats can smell. The urine was not injected, but likely had time to soak in before you were able to clean it up. Hopefully you are right and it will be gone.


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## naf (Jan 29, 2014)

Heather72754 said:


> Unfortunately it's far less important what you can smell than what your cats can smell. The urine was not injected, but likely had time to soak in before you were able to clean it up. Hopefully you are right and it will be gone.


That's the problem, we can never tell if odor is truly gone from a cats perspective. I'm just crossing my fingers that the problem won't continue.


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## naf (Jan 29, 2014)

I noticed that Petsmart carries a few different kinds of anti-marking sprays. Have any of you tried them, and have you been successful with them?

(Whisker City No-Mark spray)
Whisker City™ No Mark!&#0153 for Cats - Sale - Cat - PetSmart

I also considered spraying a cat deterrent spray on the spot she peed on, like what you would spray to get a cat to stop scratching at furniture. Do you think this would help at all? I really don't want want to cat to feel unwelcome in the room, since we use it as a family living space, but I can't deal with her urinating on the new carpet we paid a lot of money for.

(Whisker City no scratch spray)
Whisker City™ No Scratch&#0153 - Sale - Cat - PetSmart


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## naf (Jan 29, 2014)

An update... been using several methods to get my cat to stop urinating on the carpet. As I stated above, she peed twice on the new carpet, the spots being right next to each other. I used 2 separate applications of urine-off on both spots, letting them dry completely between applications. After letting it dry for a week, I used a bissel to deep clean the carpet with a formula made for pet stains. I then went over the spots a couple times with plain cool water to rinse everything out. I put laundry baskets over the spots until they completely dried.

In the meantime, I installed a comfort zone feliway diffuser in the room, which has been going for a little over 2 weeks now. I also used the feliway spray to spray the area of the carpet where she peed at. On top of this, I moved her food bowl to the middle of the carpet, right where she originally peed at. I did this for 2 reasons, I figured she wouldn't pee there since cats won't pee where they eat. I also wanted to associate the carpet with something happy, so all feedings have moved from the tile floor to the carpet.

So far, so good. I can't smell any of the urine in the carpet, even if I get my nose right down into it. I'm pretty sure the cat can still smell it, because she noses around there sometimes, but I think the food is preventing her from remarking, and I'm hoping that in time even she won't be able to detect that she went there.


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