How to get your cat's pH tested

[Ari Moore]

Urine testing keeps coming up so I thought I would create a thread where we can exchange ideas and strategies around how best to do this without driving ourselves and our cats crazy. Collecting pee can be hard!

We do it this way: We hide their regular litter box and put out a small clean litter box with clean gravel in it. (We bought the gravel at an aquarium supply store.) We then watch to see who pees in it first, so we can label her sample. They don't like peeing in it but given no other option they will! The pee flows down under the gravel, so you can just tip the box up and pour the pee into a container. Then you have to clean the box and gravel and dry both of these very well (I put the gravel in a colander to drain) before using it again - if you need to collect from multiple cats.

Then you have to test the pH. The safe range is 5.9 - 6.4. You can test it yourself if you buy a pH testing kit - these are available online and consist of tiny color-changing paper strips that you dip in the urine and then compare to a color chart to determine the pH.

Or, you can bring the sample to your vet for testing, which is a good idea - because then s/he can test it for crystals, protein, and other levels that you can't test yourself. If you can't bring it to your vet when it's really, really fresh (some vets accept drop-offs at almost any time...), put it in the refrigerator. The sooner you can get it tested, the better.

It's very important to test your cat's urine every six months, or at least once a year. You could test even more frequently if your cat has FLUTD or other urinary tract issues. Testing is wonderful because it gives you a very clear picture of your cat's health! If the pH isn't where it should be you and your vet can adjust it before it gets into a very unhealthy range, and you can prevent crystals from forming. Your vet will appreciate your vigilance, and your cat will REALLY thank you. Crystals are no fun.

There! Urine testing. Yay. Do others have other collection strategies? Has anyone used those little plastic beads instead of gravel? Anyone run into any problems while doing this?

[Imogen]

Thanks for the tips, I tried this technique for collecting and testing cat urine and it seems to work well. I used a fine-meshed garden sieve, instead of a colander which was perfect for washing and drying the gravel in, as I could spread it out thinly and leave it to dry in the sun. The main problem is waiting for the cats to go and use the tray when you're at home, so that you can tell whose wee it is, especially if they are annoyed at the fact the cat flap has been locked and they can't go and toilet outside.

[Eric Milano]

I have 4 cats (1 6 yr old female russian blue, and 3 orphaned tabbys who are 7 months old. 1 girl 2 boys). Before starting them on a vegan diet I wanted to get a baseline pH for their urine. I tried buying a new litter box and put in some aquarium pebbles. Then I bought some pHion ph test strips. The cats seemed more interested in eating the pebbles than peeing in them. I ended up just waiting for the time when I might catch them going in their normal litter box and I'd put the test strip in their urine stream. So far i've gotten two of the 4 (both the males). I'm wondering about the accuracy of the strips though because they seem to show my tap water as being around 5.0 pH! So either the strips are wrong or my water is slowly killing me... The males ph were both around 5.5 and my own saliva is around 6.25. Which strips do you use Ari (or others) and have they matched the Vet's results?
Eric

[Imogen]

I use the PHion strips, but I haven't had a vet test for comparison. I tested one of my cats urine this morning with the PHion sticks and it read 6.0. I hope the sticks are accurate, but i also hope your tap water isn't dangerously acidic !
I will try one in my water and see what reading I get.

Its such a good idea to test before the transition to see if the vegan food does have any effect. I've had a variation of PH values on my cats wee, so I'm assuming the the PHion sticks are capable of indicating different PH values, but the vet's tests would probably be far more precise. My cats were, for a short while, sneaking through the cat flap next door and eating large amounts of normal meaty kibble that my neighbour left out for her cats. During this time their wee was really alkaline (7.5!) Now that they are shooed out from next door and they all eat just the vegan food, their Urine PH's are all around 6.0.