Hi everyone.

Hope some of you have a bit of kitten experience as we are having trouble with our 4 month old male kitten, JD. For some reason he has taken to peeing in our dogs bed! He has a litter tray which I clean out everyday and he knows where it is as he uses it.
I have cleaned the dogs bed a number of times now by putting it in the washing machine, but I think he is still attracted to some hint of his smell. I cant remember if you use biological or non biological powder to get rid of the smell? Do any of you guys and gals know what might be the best thing to use?

We have been thinking of getting him neutered this week to see if that helps him stop.

Have any of you experienced this behaviour before? I would be very grateful for any feedback. :-) And Fidel will be too!

Thanks

Uh oh, the dreaded cat pee smell. We have this issue on our carpets, tried biological powder, pee remover, bicarbonate of soda, had them washed through, but no such luck!!
Hope others have an idea as i'm to the end of my tether with cat pee, we don't have the money to rip up the carpet and start again at this time either.
Maybe a new dog bed? Try putting down blankets for the dog to start with instead of the bed and see what happens. Does the kitten and your dog get on alright?

Yeh I think we may have to replace the bed. I will try with the blankets and see how that goes. At least they'll be cheap to replace if he pee's on them too.
The dog gets on great with the kitten, they play together.
We also have another cat. She's 4yrs old but doesn't really get involved with him. We have never had this problem with her, so thought it might be territorial? I'm not sure.
Thanks for your reply suejaw :-)

hello their when we had our Axel (he past away now) but he used to do same thing on the dogs bedding when he was still around 8 months and i was forever buying new quilts for my dog ,
i had him done as he had started to go wondering off and i didnt want him getting into fights with other tom cats and it all of a sudden stopped i cant say getting him done was the reason it stopped as it may not work for your cat and im not an expert but it seemed to stop from then on maybe getting him done will cure it ,

i think it better to get boy cats done anyway unless his a top pedigree of course but all my cats are just plain old moggies lol and for me they all seem better cats for getting them done even the feral female is a little bit nicer now after the op than she was before so for plain old moggies id have them done, good luck with yours hope it works out well for you,

no idea on the peeing issue but its bio washing powder and try a bit of vinegar as well. hth

dont have any real suggestions I am afraid but our kitten would use the tray or my sink ! not as bad as the dog bed I grant you but annoying all the same.
He sort of grew out of it in the end.
I have left him until last month (1 year old ) to get him neutered because I wanted him to be fully developed I am not sure if earlier neutering will stop him because my other cat used to spray indoors sometimes even though he was spayed. He did eventually stop.

ODOR KILL  from the Animal Health Co is what many cat breeders and catteries use ;)    It's very concentrated and can be used diluted in a spray, or you can put some in the washing machine :)

Personally I'd use it after the BIO washing powder and vinegar treatment ;)

> We have been thinking of getting him neutered this week to see if that helps him stop.
>

I believe vets will only neuter when they are at or above a certain weight or age ( my tom was 6 months ).

I think its 6m too , it should stop when he has been done , male cats pee up anything to mark thier territory even some females do it.
( I have a female cat (spayed) who will spray if she feels uneasy ie: when we have dogs in to stay .
A friend of mine has a cat that also sprays when she is feeling uneasy.

Are you sure its the kitten and not your older cat showing disaproval of the kitten or have you caught him at it ?

You will never completely get rid of the smell but bio washing powder and simple solution (cat) http://www.bramton.com/ can make life a little easier.

Thanks for your replies everyone.  
Its definitley the kitten, as we caught him doing it. Although I seen the older cat having a smell of it today :-(. I hope she doesn't join in.
I have sprinkled some bicarb onto it with the vinegar and will leave it over night then wash it with the biological powder tomorrow. Thanks for the links Dill and Starryeyes, will look into getting some of that.
I think I will leave the neutering until he is at least 6 months as I was worried about it affecting his growth.
Thanks again :-)

meant to add if its possible to move the bed to a different area after cleaning and if you can keep the kitten more confined to another area you make break the cycle , this is what I do if one of my cats has a naughty tinkle it breaks the habit.

I wouldn't imagine a 4 month old kitten would have 'male issues' at his age and vets will early neuter too.   A lot of pedigree breeders are now neutering to stop people buying a pedigree kitten as a pet & then thinking they can make a quick buck from it.  Vets will neuter from approx 13 weeks old.

Animals have a far stronger sense of smell than us, he could still be smelling remnants of where he has wee'd before on the bed even though you have washed it.   Have you tried Simple Solution available from Pets at Home, they do one specifically for cats.    I would move the bed & put a litter tray where the bed originally lay, even if you have to have several small trays dotted about, it's easy to clean them then having to wash the dogs bed all the time.

Kittens have to be 2kgs in weight & the toms have to have all their bits before they can be castrated, my Reg was done at 14 weeks as he was a big lad in more ways than one :-O His sister Jaq was nearly 6 months before she was spayed, but she is a lot smaller than him

I know everyone says cats are born clean but my male was just the same.  I had 2 trays in the house for him, 1 tucked away in a private spot and another in the main thoroughfare area just to catch his attention.  I used to watch him walk straight past them just to pee on the door mat or the bath mat or a magazine left on the floor.  I tried different types of litter but it made no difference. 

I have heard it said that they learn their toilet habits from the mother cat and if she is dirty then the kittens just don't learn.  My boy was neutered at 9 months and was 95% litter trained at 18 months.  He is 10 years old now and will still does the odd sneaky pee, including once on my head in the middle of the night!! The things we put up with for love.

> including once on my head in the middle of the night!

  Oh my word... Not heard a cat do that before.

My Siamese weed on my bed....as a protest to my hormones when I was pregnant, she did it on two seperate occasions on to seperate pregnancies.
I am sure you have a male cat issue though and would think he could be 'cured' by castration.

Karen :)

> Kittens have to be 2kgs in weight & the toms have to have all their bits before they can be castrated, my Reg was done at 14 weeks as he was a big lad in more ways than one

A breeder friend of mine has just had an 11 week old British Shorthair kitten castrated & I doubt he would've weighed that. She said he sailed through the op with no problems at all. 

> A breeder friend of mine has just had an 11 week old British Shorthair kitten castrated & I doubt he would've weighed that. She said he sailed through the op with no problems at all.

LOLOL as long as he had all his bits that's apparently most important

Yeh I think I will wait until he is 6 months, he looks like he's got everything though.
His mum was a stable cat so maybe she wasn't clean all the time.
Well Fidel's bed is being cleaned in the washing machine with the Bio powder. I've ordered the odor kill too. See how it goes now. :-) :-) :-)

Odor kill will olny mask the smell if it has penetrated through the carpet.

We have had a problem with one of our kittens ( well they are two years old now :-D) as she has been peeing in one of the rooms since we moved into a rented house.

I have tried everything but the under lying smell has stayed. I think we may have to get the carpet replaced.

A breeder friend of mine has just had an 11 week old British Shorthair kitten castrated & I doubt he would've weighed that. She said he sailed through the op with no problems at all.

On the other hand my big chunky Colourpoint boy neutered at 14 weeks by a vet very used to doing really neuterings , very nearly died. It was the most horrendous thing I've ever seen and I'll never do it again.