How can I stop cats from pissing on the outside of my house?

February 19, 2007 11:43 AM

How can I stop cats from pissing on the outside of my house?

My bedroom is a poorly built extension to an old house. Four single pane windows, no insulation, a drafty door to the backyard, all that. A week ago, two neighbourhood cats started having a pissing contest on the side of the house directly underneath two of my windows, making my room reek of cat urine. The smell goes away when it rains (which is often at this time of year, thankfully), but when it isn't raining, it's just about unbearable. Scented candles don't seem to fight it off, nor does circulating the air. There's only concrete surrounding the house, so they aren't using dirt as a litterbox, and that also means that I can't use plants as a deterrent.

I know about using Feliway to get cats to stop marking interiors of houses, but is there anything I do to stop them from doing it outside? I'm dreading a summer full of the odor of roasting cat urine wafting in through my drafty windows.

posted by cmonkey to pets & animals (15 comments total)

Cut and spread a few citrus fruit outside your windows, maybe even spray the concrete with one of those strong orange spray cleaners. It is said that most cats dislike the scent of citrus enough to avoid the area. Hopefully, you're lucky enough to have cats in this "most" category so that will do the trick nicely.
posted by dness2 at 11:48 AM on February 19, 2007

I'm sorry, I didn't mean that seriously. I love cats. What about Cayenne?

Trapping them isn't a totally bad idea though. Animal Control will drop off free traps and then pick up the cats; if they're local, the owners will come to get them, and if they're feral, potentially they might get adopted.
posted by exlotuseater at 11:53 AM on February 19, 2007

You can buy some Critter Ridder at Home Depot. It's just hot pepper. You sprinkle that around the area where they hang out. Alternatively, you can try moth balls (they hate them -- who doesn't?) but be careful that children can't get to them.
posted by Lockjaw at 11:53 AM on February 19, 2007

Get a dog.

Worked for me!
posted by kika at 12:32 PM on February 19, 2007

second the dog.
posted by krautland at 12:37 PM on February 19, 2007

Sonic Gun

It even has a laser sight. Problem solved, and fun!
posted by cardamine at 12:50 PM on February 19, 2007

To get rid of the smell from the building I would suggest Nature's Miracle Oxy Orange spray which has done wonders on cat problems for me. But after you get rid of the smell you HAVE TO USE the other suggestions of getting the cats to stop peeing. The Nature's Miracle gets rid of the smell and indoors the orange is strong enough to ward off cats but outside for the long term does not work.
posted by jadepearl at 12:58 PM on February 19, 2007

I asked a question some time ago about obnoxious cats. Fortunately for me, the neighbor whose cats started the problems moved away.

I think trapping is going to be your best bet. I think any kind of chemical will get washed away by the rain as well, requiring frequent application.

One thought I had, though didn't implement, was using a motion sensitive light to activate a sprinkler. Motion lights are pretty cheap, and they sell sprinklers or sprinkler controls that are electrically actuated, for timing circuits. I don't think cobbling together a setup would take too much work and I bet it'd be pretty damn effective at keeping cats away if they got sprayed every time they came near your window.
posted by 6550 at 1:35 PM on February 19, 2007

I've had some success with crystals like these - they last longer than a citrus/chemical spray.

On the same page is a motion-sensing device that does pretty much what 6550 suggests - it's not cheap though (but I agree that it would probably be very effective - cats hate water even more than they hate citrus).
posted by boosh at 1:57 PM on February 19, 2007

Ah, I recommend against the sonic gun. I have great hearing. A friend of mine got an ultrasonic dog trainer. "It's great," he said, pressing the button and pointing it right at his head, "I can't hear anything, but it drives the dogs nuts. See?" Then he pointed it at me, pressed the button, and it was like someone jammed an icepick in my ear.

Most people have hearing that falls in the 20 Hz to 20 kHz range, but folks have been recorded going up to 80 kHz. In any case, it's really painful, bordering on kinda cruel. I might use that sort of thing on a charging, slavering Rottweiler whose fangs are dripping blood from previous victims, but short of that ...
posted by adipocere at 2:57 PM on February 19, 2007

Since there is concrete underneath your windows, could you put a few shallow pans of water under your windows for a week or so? I'm thinking plastic dishpans. Just something with a few inches of water in it- most cats don't care to step into water. I wouldn't suggest it in the summertime, because it's a mosquito-breeding paradise in warmer weather. But it might help discourage the cats from visiting the area, enough for them to go set a new pattern of pissing on something else.

That might not work with regards to your setup (if there is a lot of human foot traffic in front of those windows, for example) but it would be a simpler and cheap way to add a water feature to your kitty-discouragement project.
posted by ambrosia at 3:14 PM on February 19, 2007

We have a motion activated sprinkler to keep cats out of the garden. They're not cheap, but they are highly effective.
posted by oneirodynia at 7:52 PM on February 19, 2007

There's also this motion-activated sonic repeller.
posted by Aquaman at 8:00 PM on February 19, 2007

In Amalfi (Southern Italy) they have thousands of wild cats. They put old plastic water bottles full of water on their doorsteps to keep them from pissing there. Don't know why or how well it works, but they swear by it. Definitely worth a try.
posted by aquanaut at 4:45 PM on February 20, 2007

Bi-carb and vinegar are good for eliminating funk. Afterwards coat the area with whatever bi-carb you have leftover. Do your room too, it just vacuums up (tremendous stuff!) Deffinitely good advice above, but perhaps you are dealing with a hairy bastard/s like mine who loves mucking around in water and due to hand soap thinks citus is great as it is part of my scent. I've lived in a fine shanty myself so the idea of setting up anything flash for stinking cats has struck a personal chord... So my suggestion is something they will not like to walk on, effectively a cattle grid. Mr. Schmickles does not like sticky tape on his feet or maybe some plastic sheet with vaseline smeared over and add a little vicks for good measure? But trust me on the bi-carb and good luck!
posted by mu~ha~ha~ha~har at 12:35 PM on March 1, 2007