Logie’s in need of a good dusting.
“Spanky left his box and now it’s MY box! MINE! Bwahahahahahaha!”
“What you MEAN I gotta give it back?”
Newbery, mid-bath.
Logie (still in need of a good dusting), had just been sniffing her brother’s hindquarters, and we got the Flehmen Response as a result. Always cracks me UP.
Wee Darwin, always juuuuust out of reach.
I wish Razzie could find a way to relax.
Stinkerbelle on the mantel in the dining room, keeping an eye on those kittens.
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Previously
2011: No entry.
2010: No entry.
2009: “Pardon me, ma’am, may I have an ear scratch?”
2008: No entry.
2007: No entry.
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry.
Ass face! That’s what we call it at our house lol
LOL!
We always called it the pee face.
Ha! Ha! Kiss the… Stinkerbelle! And she’ll claw your face off!
I think the Flehmen response is pretty funny. Interestingly, only one of my cats does it.
Of course the kittens are cute as buttons. They are getting so lanky! Maybe that is why Razzie is so tense and stressed out – he doesn’t know what to do with all his length!!
We call the Flehman response “stink face” at our house. Thanks for the link on that!
And they so often do it after sniffing each other’s hineys. I just want to say, “What did you expect?”
Also, I just realized the “f” should be lowercase because of COURSE the Germans have a verb that means “to curl the upper lip.”
Stinkerbelle is perfect where she is sitting. Kiss The CAT!!!
caught my eye too…but is Stinkerbelle kissable??
also love the “squashed frog in the road” effect of the totally relaxed kitten.
and that Flehman response always cracks me up!
Stinkerbelle will take your lips off if you try to kiss her. Don’t fall for it, it’s a trick!
Nobody knows how to relax like a cat!
Yeah, my Lola will sleep HARD…but look incredibly adorable doing it. You can’t help but molest them and kiss them whilst doing it. Of course it wakes them up and they complain…but you just can’t resist!
It’s not easy being cute!
It looks like Logie has been DOING the dusting. Shame on you for making the babies do housework!;)
SOMEone’s gotta do it! 🙂
Kiss the Stinkerbelle? That is clearly a message meant for Fred and not for the rest of us. Now if it were Miz Poo…. 😉
Looks like Logie has been exploring the undusted parts of the house again. Dusting needs to go on her adoption “resume”. Razzie can run the printer. Logie can do the dusting. See?? Kittens are not just cute… they’re useful too! Now we just need to find out what Newbery and Darwin can do.
Judging by the way Darwin flew across the room to land on top of Newbery this morning, “Ninja kitty” might be on her resume! 🙂
🙂
But aren’t they all ninja kitties?
🙂
yep – black kittens (and cats) – the world’s best lint collectors. 🙂
Oh yes! I have kitten pictures of my late cat Guenevere with a face full of dust that are adorable.
One of my kitties does the flehman response pretty regularly, but I have not yet been able to get a good picture of it. It’s hard to plan for!
I’m up for a game of kiss the Stinkerbelle too 🙂
I mean really, who needs lips 😉
LOL…so true!
Robyn, I am having a problem and am at my wits end. I have two tortie sisters, age 13 this year, and two male cats, age 8 this year. Dunkin (male) occasionally pees on the beds the females sleep in. Now he has started peeing on the toys in the toy baskets. Any idea why? Any idea on how to stop him other than taking away the toys?
Thanks for any help you can give me on this matter!
Trudy, I’m going to post your question in tomorrow’s entry so that others can jump in with some ideas and thoughts on the topic, but I would say first off that if you haven’t already, Dunkin probably needs a trip to the vet. Is Dunkin only peeing on the toys in the toy basket and not any that are laying around on the floor? Because if so, and if you can stand the idea, you might want to stop putting them in a basket, it’s possible that something about the basket is tempting him to use it as a litter box. Are any of the toys catnip toys? I don’t know why, but there’s something about catnip toys that entices Sugarbutt to occasionally (but not always and not often) pee on them.
You *may* want to give the Feli-Way spray a try. I don’t find that the Feli-Way plugins make much difference in my house, but the spray will very often keep them from coming back and peeing in the same spot.
I’m sure there are other things that aren’t coming to me, hopefully there’ll be some good suggestions/ thoughts when I post it tomorrow.
Definitely a trip to the vet first!
If it’s behavioral and not medical, one trick I found to help break the habit – after you give the area a thorough cleaning and smell removal – is to put a food bowl in the spot. Cats won’t pee where they eat, so if he ha been thinking it’s OK to pee in that spot, that will help redirect him.
Thanks, Robyn. He has been to the vet. He had a bad urinary tract infection some years ago, and I am afraid that is when the behavior started. Usually it is just the beds the girls lay in, but he does occasionally pee elsewhere. He is on Amitriptaline (sp) for this issue. If he gets really bad, the vet gives him steroid pills. I hate to have him take them too often, I am afraid the steroids are not good for him.
Good for you to have taken him to the vet already! Robyn has a point in that the toy basket might remind him of a litter box. Some cat beds might also be mistaken for litter boxes. Changing the beds to flat ones and the toy basket to something else (or move it off the ground) might help.
He might be peeing on his sisters’ beds and in the toy basket as a way for him to assert dominance, claim territory or express anxiety. Has there been tension between the three cats? Any changes in the house or home? Moving furniture? Additional family members (including new pets)? Family members gone? More visitors? Fewer visitors? Home improvement projects? Even small changes which effect cats’ territories may make them spray. Remember the sprayfest which happened when Robyn moved a couch!
My Fuzz is a sometimes sprayer but is much better than when he was young. This is what I did which worked:
– First, I put litter boxes where he’s sprayed (after cleaning and odor neutralization). I left them there for a couple of weeks until he got into the habit of peeing in them, then I moved them an inch or so every day or so over to the nearest litter box. After having them side-by-side for a couple of weeks, I removed one of them.
– I added more litter boxes. The rule of thumb is 1 box per cat + 1. What worked for my two is four litter boxes.
– I taped aluminum foil where he sprayed on walls. That made them much easier to clean since the foil isn’t absorbent. The foil also seemed to discourage him — maybe the sound of the pee hitting it bothered him? At any rate, it made cleanup easier!
– I gave him a territory which was unequivocally his. That was relatively easy since he’s a climber and my other cat is a ground dweller. So, he has trees and high perches in each room.
– I gave him extra attention and made time for solo playtime with him at least once a day. I had to go with him to a separate room for solo playtime since my other cat is a big attention hog!
– I desensitized him to my leaving because he had separation anxiety and would spray the inside of the front door when I was gone. His anxiety has been recurrent, so this is something I have to re-do from time to time.
– I got a black light and did regular pee patrols. I cleaned up whatever pee I found as soon as I found it.
It’s funny, but I had to fight the temptation to type, “Yep, it was a pain” after each of the above items. It is a pain, but if you keep up with his spraying and find ways to prevent it, you can actually go for long periods of time without the stink!
I’d also try the food bowl trick with your guy, although if he is spraying to assert dominance, he might just spray around the food bowl to claim it!
I’m sure other readers will have other suggestions (and I’m eager to read them!)
Good luck!!
Robyn, add me to the list of people who liked the “Kiss the….Stinkerbelle” picture. 😀
My Taco (black cat) always has dust on him, too..
Ok
#1) CLEARLY you are doing something to be raising such highly stressed kittehs, I mean every time I turn around there’s another picture of a clearly strung out stress ball of a kitten or cat. 😉 WHAT KIND OF MONSTER ARE YOU???? Oh wait, I just looked at the picture again, oops my bad, it’s ME that ends up stressed out from trying to climb through my computer to join the Olympic Level Relaxin’ at Crooked Acres. Sorry ’bout that. 🙂
and…
#2) I (insert whatever # we’re up to) the love of Stinkerbelle’s posing with the “Kiss the” plaque. I hereby motion this be somehow cropped and made into Valentine’s Day cards and other whatnot that I will promptly buy and hoard and totally NOT kiss in private, what? WHAT? Why are you all looking at me like that??? 🙂
Kiss the Stinkerbelle. Hee.
Our newbie kitten has done some dusting for me already, too. I keep finding big clumps of fuzzy tumbleweeds in random spots on the floor. When I go to look at her, she has spiderwebs weaved between her eyebrows. Looks a lot like Logie in those pics 😀
Oh and I want to add, that Stinkerbelle by the signage is the very definition of Love and Hisses no?
When my son and his family stayed to long with me, my very upstanding female cat peed on my son’s levi’s. They went home that day. I was so embarrassed but after doing some research I found out that she (my cat) was sending a message. Time to go home, please!
Maybe the ladies are getting to much attention and the boys are jealous?