Multicat households are one of the most common causes of chronic stress in domestic cats, requiring careful resource management and environmental design.
Cats in multicat households with inadequate resources experience chronic territorial stress that cannot resolve because they cannot leave. Unlike acute fear, which ends when the threat passes, constant exposure to a perceived competitor causes sustained HPA axis activation and associated welfare impacts. Chronic stress in multicat households is a leading cause of feline idiopathic cystitis, over-grooming and inappropriate elimination. Environmental modification that provides genuinely separate resource provision for each cat resolves most multicat stress without rehoming.