Where is that cat pee smell coming from?
So, you know your cat peed outside the litter box, but where is it? Cats can pee in the most unlikely places. Find cat pee in your home with these top tips.
Let’s face it, we LOVE our felines but they can leave some pretty foul odors around our homes. From leaky glands to smelly drool and yes, even the mysterious cat pee smell that you just can’t find. They leave no surface left untouched. On hot and humid days the cat urine smell can become overwhelming, so what can you do to find it? Kit Arbuckle tells us how to find cat pee in your house.
According to the Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine, there are varied reasons why your cat might be peeing outside the litterbox. Sometimes cats (especially ones who aren’t spayed or neutered) will spray in the house, or have the occasional accident due to sickness, like a urinary tract infection. Your cat might have a problem sharing a litter box with other cats or not like the litter you use. Maybe — just because she is a cat, and cats do weird things — she prefers hanging out in the litter box to actually using it.
Whatever the reason your cat has been peeing outside the litterbox, you’ll need to find where your cat is peeing to get rid of the cat urine odor. If you’ve already found the cat pee, go read this article now where we tell you exactly how to get rid of the cat pee smell forever!
The First Step To Find Cat Pee is Sniff It Out
If you can still smell cat urine after cleaning the litter box, it’s likely your cat peed somewhere else. Sometimes finding where your cat peed is as easy — and gross — as sniffing it out. To find cat pee, you need to identify the room the smell is coming from and check in the most likely places first.
Planters are a favorite for cats to pee in because of the soil. A cat might also pee in corners, on carpets, on a sofa, or on beds. It’s harder to find places where a cat sprays, however, since it can be a small amount and on vertical surfaces like walls and the backs of furniture. If you can pin the odor down to a rug or sofa cushion, that should be enough. You’ll probably want to clean the whole thing anyway, just to be safe.
To Find Cat Pee, Look for Stains
This will be more effective if your furniture and carpeting are made of lighter, absorbent materials, but you should check for discoloration where it smells. Don’t forget to check behind and under furniture and on walls. Puddles are obvious signs a cat is peeing in a certain area, and there might be some older stains there.
Use a Pet Urine Detector and a UV Black Light Flashlight.
Turn off the lights and make sure the room is fairly dark for the best results. Walk around the room sweeping the light over all surfaces the cat can reach (and since we can never fully demystify our feline friends or the limits of their powers, check some places you assume they can’t). Go slowly and be thorough. If you see any glowing spots, it might be the source of the smell. The lights only work on dried pee, and other stains will show, too.
That’s it! Use these tips to find cat pee in your home but if you’re ready to start cleaning the cat pee smell, go read this article now!
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Kit Arbuckle works as a freelance writer covering parenting, education, health, and pet care topics.
