Family is dead set on "getting rid of" my best friend. I could use some advice, please.

[BearBear]

Hi Cam, welcome to the forum. Please do not apologize for a lengthy post asking for advise - that is what we are here for! Bear is magnificent, BTW.

As Cary pointed out, poor Bear is probably now reacting to the negativity directed towards him. Many cats do not like children - especially if the children have not been taught how to properly treat animals. Savannahs are no exception. The only difference is that the high percentage SVs make peculiar noises (they often hiss as a communication, not just to say Back Off) and can be much more intimidating.

Now a series of questions:

Is he peeing and pooping on the carpet? How long has this been going on? What has been tried? Have you used something like Anti-Icky-Poo to remove the smell so that he doesn't keep returning to the same spot? How many litter boxes do you have?

Does he have any other behavioral issues other than not liking small children and inappropriate elimination?

Have you reached out to Savannah Cat Rescue? They deal with SVs that need new homes and may be able to talk you thru some options. I understand that you want to keep Bear (Hurray!) and not give him up. They might be able to find him a temporary foster home until you are on your own. Or, they might be better equipped to let you know the pros and cons of various options you might consider.

Thanks in advance for reading and I appreciate your helping me as a new member. And wow, you've really hit the nail on the head assuming Bear is reacting to the negativity around him. It is having a profound effect on him. I'm also really glad that you mentioned that SVs also hiss as a form of communication and that hissing isn't always a "back off" statement. I've been trying to preach that in my house for a while now. Bear definitely has a very wide range of noises ranging from adorable to intimidating, its very interesting. I could literally feel stress floating away reading your comment and realizing, "There are other people who understand!!!". Which of course I knew, but reading it makes me feel better. Now for your questions...

"Is he peeing and pooping on the carpet?"

- Yes. He has a spot which we have tried to gate off that is downstairs that he has become notorious for using. If he gets past the gate, we all know where he is going and what he plans to do. If rugs or specific door mats are out, they are definitely a target for him. The parents and I were made aware that when SVs feel certain materials below their feet, they just HAVE to pee on it. At least, thats what my dad has explained to me.

"How long has this been going on?"

- Several years. I've tried to think of any specific moment that may have caused him stress or a similar situation. But there really isn't anything significant that I can think of. I've also asked my parents and they believe its just due to the way SVs are. Which is based on the peeing info I described above that the breeder gave them.

"What has been tried? Have you used something like Anti-Icky-Poo to remove the smell so that he doesn't keep returning to the same spot?"

- While we haven't used Anti-Icky-Poo, we have used several Feliway/Comfort Zone products. Including the diffuser AND the spray (not at the same time). We have tried to use discipline. For example, right after catching him in the act (and this has happened several times), we put him in the "cat room" which is roughly the size of your average bedroom for the rest of the day. I actually brought this strategy to the table after reading advice from the breeder's website (Select Exotics). But I think they advise a cage instead of a room as a timeout spot.
We've tried several different types of litter with no noticeable changes in behavior as well. I'm sure we've tried more but I'm about to leave for work and I'm running behind, but I still want to get to your questions.

"How many litter boxes do you have?"

- We have two, and they are both side by side within the cat room that I mentioned earlier. They are in a neat spot underneath an opening in a counter, which he have put a curtain in front of for their privacy. The other cat has never had an issue peeing outside of the litter box. I would say they are a bit larger than your average litter box. I do my best to keep them as clean as possible. And we use unscented litter. Ill be able to tell you the exact brand once I'm home from work tonight.

"Does he have any other behavioral issues...?"

- In short, yes. Once I'm home from work tonight around 9:30/10pm (eastern) I will go into greater detail. But to sum it up very quickly it all revolves around being unfriendly towards the mother of the house, but in Bear's defense she isn't friendly towards him at all. This includes him hissing if she walks in his direction the majority of the time.

"Have you reached out to SC Rescue?"

I did research their website the first time I visited these forums. I don't want to permanetely relocate Bear unless I'm absolutely out of any other option. I didn't see a temporary housing possibility, but it is definitely possible I may have overlooked something like that on their website.

Thanks again for taking in interest in my problem. I can't tell you how grateful I am for it. I'll be leaving for work now but tonight I'll come back and go in depth with his behavioral issues and what the breeder said about his temperament issues.

Thanks again.

 

[BearBear]

Hi Cam, as Rafiki right says, no apologies for a long post. It helps to have as much detail as possible if we are to offer advice or help.

I get your parents' issue, a cat pooping all over the place is VERY hard to tolerate. And when they aren't emotionally attached to the cat, that of course makes it harder to tolerate. But also the resentment towards him communicates to Bear so makes the situation worse! Ugh!

{BTW, it's not that relevant, but there is no such thing as an "award winning F1", they are not a showable generation of Savannah. Unless it was an award such as "world's tallest cat" but that is an F2 Savannah neutered male. You have an F2 that apparently your father paid too much for if he came with temperament issues :-( }

It seems to me that you have a month to work on Bear's litterbox usage to hope to convince your parents to keep Bear for that additional month so that you take him away when you move out. I think that if you can demonstrate that the problem is resolvable AND you are only asking for a temporary stay for him... it should work out?

It is hard to know how to advise you to work on the issue though when all the detail we are given is that you have "tried every possible solution known to mankind". Rarely has this been true, there is almost always something else that might be tried. I know because of my years spent advising owners via my work with Savannah Rescue.

I am going to list a set of questions that will start to help us see if we can offer you any help:
What is "everything" you have tried?
Is Bear declawed?
How many litterboxes in your house?
How many litterbox locations and where are they?
Is there a dog in the mix also?
Is there just the one other cat?
How large is the litterbox?
Is the litterbox covered?
Is the litterbox automated?
How often is the litterbox scooped?
How often is the litter completely changed and the box scrubbed clean?
If confined to a bathroom or one room, does he use the box faithfully?
Is he peeing or pooping or both outside the box?
Is there a specific location for this or all over the house with no pattern?
What kind of litter is being used?
Have you tried Cat Attract litter?
What are you using to clean up with?
Are any bleach products being used?
how long has this behavior gone on? Since he arrived? Did Bear ever use a litterbox faithfully?

You do mention the carpet... one thing that is important to note is that often our cleaning of the carpet is too surface limited... things seep down into the underlay padding under the carpet and our cleaning processes usually don't reach them. www.antiickypoo.com has a carpet injector available that helps inject their wonderful enzyme product down into that underlay so that the enzymes can break up the odor causing molecules effectively. It is worth considering this.

That's a lot of questions, but to pinpoint what is going on with Bear takes a lot of questions. It is very very rare that an issue like this cannot be resolved...it just takes work. I suspect that it may also take a new home with you and away from negative people, but if we can work on the issue to get your parents to agree to let him stay until you move out, that would be great!

Wow these are a great set of questions, and I did go into much further detail in another comment just now. I have to leave for work, but I promise once I get home in 6 hours I will spend time answering your questions. I really appreciate you typing all that out and I will get to it first thing when I am home. Thank you so much.

 

[Carykd7kau]

I just want to throw this out there so others can comment.
I believe Bear is seeing the mom as the alpha and is trying to become HER alpha. All his behavior tends to bring to my mind posturing. And it is obvious there is "bad blood" between mom and Bear. Her reaction to his peeing and/or pooping on the carpet, gives him the re-enforcement that what he is doing is capturing her attention. My Regie went through a time of pooping in the living room. I did not make a big deal out of it...I just cleaned it up and anti-icky pooed it and he gave up. No problems since. (a year ago.)
Just some food for thought.

 

[tdbradin]

Well I hope you get everything figured out so you don't lose your best friend and Bear doesn't lose someone who cares about him so deeply.
You will find a ton of good advice from experienced owners here. I hope for you and Bears sake it helps make your parents and him get past this hardship and become good friends.
Now, with that being said, I agree that a kennel would not be a healthy place for Bear. I am a couple hours away from you in Indiana and if it comes down to a kennel situation or worse, please contact me and we can discuss a temporary housing situation.
Best of luck at keeping your best friend with YOU though.

 

[BearBear]

I just want to throw this out there so others can comment.
I believe Bear is seeing the mom as the alpha and is trying to become HER alpha. All his behavior tends to bring to my mind posturing. And it is obvious there is "bad blood" between mom and Bear. Her reaction to his peeing and/or pooping on the carpet, gives him the re-enforcement that what he is doing is capturing her attention. My Regie went through a time of pooping in the living room. I did not make a big deal out of it...I just cleaned it up and anti-icky pooed it and he gave up. No problems since. (a year ago.)
Just some food for thought.

That is quite the theory! It all was about to hit me like some huge epiphany but then I thought about all the other things Bear does to my father because he is the alpha. He is the ONLY person (not even me) that Bear will cuddle with. Follows him throughout the house 99% of the time. And I think he generally gravitates towards men. When there are women in the house, he is a normal cat. When there are groups of guys in the house, for example, when mom was out of town and my dad's childhood friends came over, Bear wouldn't leave any of us alone. It was like he wanted to be one of the guys. He was totally chill and constantly hanging out with us.

I doubt after the years of "bad blood" between them, that Bear has any interest in becoming the mother of the house's "buddy".

Super interesting theory though. Its still definitely something I need to look into.

 

[BearBear]

Well I hope you get everything figured out so you don't lose your best friend and Bear doesn't lose someone who cares about him so deeply.
You will find a ton of good advice from experienced owners here. I hope for you and Bears sake it helps make your parents and him get past this hardship and become good friends.
Now, with that being said, I agree that a kennel would not be a healthy place for Bear. I am a couple hours away from you in Indiana and if it comes down to a kennel situation or worse, please contact me and we can discuss a temporary housing situation.
Best of luck at keeping your best friend with YOU though.

You have no idea how much this means to me. While it seems unlikely at this point that it will come down to that scenario, Indiana really isn't too far and I would very much prefer him to be with a fellow Savannah owner to look after him for a month or two.

I really appreciate that.

 

[DumaLove]

- While we haven't used Anti-Icky-Poo, we have used several Feliway/Comfort Zone products. Including the diffuser AND the spray (not at the same time).

Anti Icky Poo is an enzyme cleaner and Feliway is a pheromone product. Totally different products but both can be effective used in combination. If the area has not been cleaned properly then he will be attracted to use that spot over and over. I'd highly recommend cleaning the entire area with Anti Icky Poo, including the carpet injection kit.

Also if you have two cats, you should have 3 boxes. One for each cat plus one. If the boxes are located next to one another that is the same as one box to a cat. So try getting another box and having the three boxes in three different areas. Also many cats don't like "privacy" such as hoods or curtains. They can't see danger approaching. Mine only like large Rubbermaid containers either without the top or with a very large opening cut into the top so that it leaves just a rim to hop in/out of. I have a VERY large F2 male and he will only poop in a cement mixing tub from Home Depot (the bigger of the two they carry). He'll pee in smaller boxes but it takes longer to poop and he feels too vulnerable. He also won't poop in a box that isn't perfectly clean. He likes to pee in one box and poop in the other. Cat attract litter also helps a LOT to get cats to use the litter box again.

Hope you can work things out to keep your boy!!

 

[dice]

Hmmm, frak, my boys can be quite insistent, but the true Alpha's of the pride, are the females. Males naturally bow down to the Females of the family, and the girls battle it out fur Top Cat!!!

Thinking Big Bear is just hissed that alpha mom doesn't show proper respect, when he submits to her dominance and retaliates cause he got no love back..

Tis funny, though all my gang are highly bonded to me, the girls are much more loving to my wife, than the boys are. When introduced to strangers, the boys are the last to make friends.

Can't believe your folks are giving you so much grief. Sorry, your child is peeing the sheets, you must get rid of him. Seriously???!!!! How the H. E. Double Toothpicks!!! did you last twenty something years without them throwing you out on the street????

Would highly recommend more litter boxes, in alternate locations. The first location, would be where Bear likes to leave his load. Yeas, put a box where he has been doing his duty.

I have 5 cats, 7 litter boxes, 5 cat trees, 4 feeding stations, 4 water sights, with 3 of the litter boxes placed where someone use to crap on the carptet, now they do it in the box.

We don't train Savannah's, we request, plea, entice, beg and pray!!! but when it comes down to it, the cats train the fur caretakers. we just need to figure out what the frak they are telling us to do.

Best of luck. Would highly recommend accommodations where Bear is not separated from you. That would be a most sad outcome. The boy Needs his dad.

 

[Patti]

My suggestions (and reiterations of what has already been said):

Clean the rug area thoroughly and repetitively with Anti-Icky-Poo or Unique Distributors. The ideal would be to use one of these products (I prefer the Anti-Icky-Poo which you can buy online) in a professional carpet cleaner which you should be able to rent at your grocery, pet, or hardware store.

'A bit larger than your average litter box' is not nearly large enough. Purchase a few Rubbermaid or Sterilite containers (minimum 18Gal or larger), or the cement mixing tubs that Heather mentioned (these are the favorite of most of my kittens/cats).

I don't think you mentioned what kind of litter you are using, but try different litters in the boxes (clumping, clay, wood pellet, newspaper, chicken scratch, etc.). You also didn't mention if you tried Dr. Elsey's Cat Attract, but if you haven't this is a must - you can use it either exclusively or mix it in with other litter.

I'm not clear why you are not confining Bear to your bedroom or the cat room exclusively. Is there some reason why you can't do this? It seems this would resolve just about all of your problems.

Regardless of whether you kennel him, rehome him temporarily, or take him with you to the new home, he will be going through change and this will undoubtedly be upsetting to him, so be prepared to spend extra time to help him adjust and settle into his new environment.