Hi - I'm looking for tips and suggestions on how to deal with smelly cat poop.
We adopted a 6-month old kitten about 2 months ago. Since getting him, we noticed that the smell of his poops was really bad. Now we understand is going to smell, but this is a clears the room situation. Other cat owners who have witnessed it agree that this is not a normal smell.
We've tried different litter boxes and types of litter, but nothing seems to help. We also took a sample to the vet who checked for parasites and everything appears to be normal. The vet said it might be a diet issue and suggested we try different foods.
We were originally feeding him Kirkland Signature Maintenance Cat food based on the shelter's recommendation. After reading that grain might be the cause of the smell, we switched him to a kitty grain-free formula from Performatrin, but that hasn't helped at all. In fact, at times it seems like it's worse than ever.
I read the cats.com article on this topic, but all the food recommendations appear to be very expensive options. I was hoping to try other foods before resorting to paying those kinds of prices for his food.
Has anyone dealt with this situation and successfully fixed the problem? Any food suggestions?
Thank you!
Hi, we were going through some backlog in the forums and came across your question that was never answered. Apologies! Perhaps you found a solution for your kitty and if so, please feel free to share it.
In my own experience, it's not uncommon for newly adopted stray cats or shelter cats to sometimes have digestive issues like this because their diets may be very inconsistent. Some stray cats are nosing through the trash or getting fed whatever our hard-working cat colony monitors are able to get. Shelters can be the same way, feeding donated food or whatever are able to rotate through. Sometimes, it just takes time and a consistent diet to work itself out.
Grains in my experience aren't going to be a cause of this issue. Instead, the ingredients that take their place in grain-free diets (like beans, lentils, etc) may get heavily fermented and contribute to gas. You might try a limited ingredient diet to see if reducing variable helps to isolate a problem cause. A fresh-made delivery diet like Smalls may be another choice (though perhaps pricey).
Gas might also be related to dysbiosis in the GI tract. I would advise putting any cat with an inconsistent diet history and gas or loose stool on a good probiotic (the best we use in practice include Fortiflora, Proviable, and Visbiome). Fortiflora and regular Proviable are available without a prescription.
Hello! Jumping in here with some additional thoughts. In cases like this where you're struggling to decide what food to try, it may be helpful to think less in terms of specific ingredients and more about overall digestibility.
The vet was likely on the right track with pinpointing grains as a potential issue but I'd add that the grains themselves might not be the crux of the problem but rather the amount of them. Inexpensive cat foods like Kirkland Maintenance tend to rely on heavy concentrations of plant ingredients which carnivores like cats have a limited ability to digest efficiently. So, as Dr. Vanderhoof mentioned, those grain-free alternatives like beans and lentils could be just as problematic.
When your cat's digestive tract has a hard time processing the food, it doesn't move through the system as quickly. Food that passes relatively undigested through the small intestine into the large intestine is then further broken down by bacteria. This process involves fermentation which produces the gas that's responsible for all that odor. If you can find a food that's easier for your cat to digest, it should cut down on the odor.
For cats, animal products are generally more easily digested than plant products. Ideally, you'd want a food that contains less than 10% carbohydrate measured as dry matter, but that tends to be the more expensive stuff like you mentioned. I'd say look for a product that lists an animal ingredient as the top two (ideally three) ingredients with just one or two plant ingredients. Any ingredient that appears before the first nutritional supplement (or sometimes salt) can be considered a "main" ingredient—if there are plant ingredients at the end of the list, they're only a minor component of the food.
Don't limit yourself to grain-free, as you'll spend more time trying to find a product that doesn't rely heavily on beans and legumes. Once you find something you want to try, stick to it for a good 8 weeks. Like Dr. Vanderhoof said, frequent diet changes could be contributing to the issue as well. Make sure your cat gets plenty of moisture and maybe give one of those probiotics a try.