Cat spraying in house, why and how to stop

All cats, male or female, neutered or not, will mark out their territory with urine spraying. Normally this is rare and discrete. But when this natural behaviour happens in your house, it can be very frustrating. When this happens, it can be because your cat is stressed or anxious. Which can be a reaction to:

• Recent changes at home – Such as moving home, new furniture, a new pet or family member. 
• Conflict with other cats – competition for resources, like access to the litter box.
• Medical issues – if your cat starts peeing outside the litter box, please consult your vet as there could be a medical reason behind this change in behaviour.

Using FELIWAY Optimum Diffuser continuously can help stop and prevent cat spraying, especially if your cat seems emotional and sensitive to any change at home.

There are steps you can take to stop your cat from spraying, such as: 

1. Identify and address any factors that may be causing your cat to feel insecure in certain areas. This could be conflict with other pets, changes in the household, or outdoor cats near your home. It can be helpful to keep a record of when and where your cat sprays to see if there’s a pattern that can help you identify why your cat is spraying in the house. 

2. Aim to provide a stable environment with regular playtime, attention, and enough resources, including litter boxes and spots to eat and drink. The general rule for resources is to have one more than the number of cats, and to ensure they are spread out around your home. 

3. Use FELIWAY Optimum to help calm your cat and reduce the urge to mark their territory. If your cat’s spraying behaviour continues, consult a vet or a feline behaviourist for further support.

However, it’s important to remember that spraying is a natural behaviour for cats. 

You can discourage a cat from peeing in undesired areas by keeping litter trays clean, providing enough trays for all cats (and in different parts of the house), cleaning accidents properly and reducing stress - the calming messages of FELIWAY Optimum are helpful to maintain your cat’s serenity.

Yes, neutered cats can still spray. Neutering will reduce spraying behaviour related to sharing reproductive information with other cats, but both neutered males and spayed females may also spray for other reasons. 

For example, this can include stress and/or feeling insecure in their environment. If you want to understand why a cat is spraying, it’s important to look for underlying issues. FELIWAY Optimum is an effective solution for providing social and environmental support and for enhancing your cat’s serenity, helping them to feel more comfortable and secure in the home.

Cat spray can be quite hard to spot as cats tend to only spray a very small amount. It is essentially a concentrated amount of urine (with a complex pheromone added in).

Rather than identifying what cat spray smells like, it can be more helpful to recognise your cat’s behaviour when they’re spraying. Cats will often sniff an area first, then back up to it with their tail erect and quivering before spraying a small amount of urine on the surface. Their back legs may also ‘tread’ as this happens.

Yes, FELIWAY Optimum has been shown to reduce urine spraying frequency by 77%* by releasing “serenity messages”. These messages promote a sense of security and well-being in the environment for single or multi-cat households, making cats less likely to spray as a territorial or stress-related behaviour.

* De Jaeger et al (2021)

When cats spray, they are releasing urine that contains additional pheromones and chemicals that carry specific messages. This behaviour is different to normal peeing. 

Urine spraying indoors is most often done against vertical objects and is used to leave a future message for themselves (and others), marking that they feel insecure or are unsure about their safety in this area.

Learn more about how to stop a cat from peeing in the house here.

The smell of cat pee can be very unpleasant, but it is possible to remove it with the right approach. To clean an area a cat has sprayed with pee, first remove as much of the urine as possible by blotting with paper towels if the area is still wet. Then, use warm, soapy water or a mixture of alcohol and water to eliminate both the stain and the odour.

Alternatively, you can also try baking soda or commercial enzymatic cleaners designed specifically for cat pee. After applying an enzymatic cleaner, follow the product instructions for the best results, usually letting it sit before blotting dry.

It can be difficult to get rid of cat spray smell. If your cat has recently targeted your sofa, bed, or furniture with urine spraying, to stop the smell from persisting and avoid your cat spraying in the same places, start by removing anything that attracts them. This can be done by carefully cleaning up urine traces to remove odour and visual marks. You may need to clean a larger area to ensure complete removal. 

To prevent the situation from continuing read our article on how to get rid of a cat spraying smell.