Anal Gland Problems in Cats: Scooting, Swelling, and What to Do About It

Most owners never think about their cat's anal glands until the day their cat starts scooting across the living room floor, or a strong, fishy smell shows up out of nowhere. Unlike dogs, cats rarely have chronic anal gland trouble — but when it happens, it escalates fast, from mild discomfort to a painful abscess in a matter of days if it's ignored. Knowing what these glands are for, what normal looks like, and which signs mean "call the vet today" rather than "keep an eye on it" makes the difference between a five-minute fix and emergency surgery.

What Anal Glands Actually Do

Cats have two small, pea-to-grape-sized sacs located just inside the anus, at roughly the four and eight o'clock positions. Each one is lined with glands that produce a thick, foul-smelling, brownish-yellow fluid — not faeces, and not related to digestion at all. In the wild, this fluid is a scent signature: a small amount is normally expressed onto stool every time a healthy cat has a bowel movement, marking territory and passing along identity information to other cats. Under normal conditions, the glands empty themselves this way and an owner never knows they exist.

Trouble starts when that natural emptying doesn't happen. Soft stool, a low-fibre diet, obesity, or glands sitting at a slightly abnormal angle can all mean the sacs don't fully express during defecation. Fluid builds up, thickens, and the glands become swollen and increasingly uncomfortable — this is called impaction, and it's the starting point for almost every anal gland problem a cat owner will encounter.

The Signs to Watch For

• Scooting. Dragging the bottom across carpet or floor is the classic sign, though cats do this far less often and less dramatically than dogs — a single scoot is worth noting, but frequent scooting means the irritation is significant.
• Excessive licking or biting at the base of the tail or under the tail, sometimes intense enough to cause hair loss or raw skin in the area.
• A sudden strong, fishy odour that seems to come from nowhere, especially noticeable when the cat has been startled or has just used the litter box.
• Visible swelling, redness, or a lump on one or both sides of the anus — a hard, painful lump usually means the impaction has progressed to an abscess.
• Straining or reluctance to defecate, or crying out when using the litter box, since swollen glands make the whole area tender.
• Tail-chasing or unusual aggression when touched near the tail base, which some owners mistake for a behavioural issue rather than physical pain.

A vet explains what anal gland impaction looks like in cats and how it's typically treated.

Impaction vs. Infection vs. Abscess

These three stages sit on a spectrum, and knowing which one you're dealing with changes the urgency:

• Impaction is a full, backed-up gland with no infection yet — uncomfortable, but resolved in minutes by a vet or vet nurse manually expressing it. This is the stage most scooting cats are actually at.
• Infection (sacculitis) develops when trapped fluid becomes a breeding ground for bacteria. The gland turns red, warm, and increasingly painful, and the discharge may take on a bloody or pus-like appearance. This needs antibiotics in addition to expressing the gland.
• Abscess is the end stage: pressure builds until the skin over the gland ruptures, sometimes visibly bursting and draining foul-smelling fluid and blood. This is genuinely painful, carries a real infection risk, and needs same-day veterinary care — not a wait-and-see approach.

How to recognise the early signs of impaction before it progresses to infection or an abscess.

Why Some Cats Get This and Others Never Do

• Chronically soft stool or diarrhoea doesn't apply enough pressure while passing to empty the glands naturally — a firm, well-formed stool is what does the job.
• Obesity changes the position and muscle tone around the glands, making natural expression less reliable.
• Low-fibre diets tend to produce smaller, softer stools with less of the bulk needed to press against the gland openings.
• Anatomical variation. Some cats are simply built with glands or ducts at an angle that doesn't express as efficiently, and these cats tend to have repeat problems over their lifetime regardless of diet.
• Older, less active cats and cats recovering from any illness that reduces exercise or muscle tone are also more prone to it.

What Happens at the Vet

For straightforward impaction, a vet or vet nurse manually expresses the glands — a quick, slightly undignified procedure for the cat, but not typically a painful one, and it's over in a couple of minutes. If infection is present, this is usually followed by a course of oral antibiotics and sometimes a topical treatment. An abscess needs more: the area is usually clipped, flushed, and left to drain and heal, sometimes with a brief sedation for the cat's comfort, plus antibiotics and pain relief while it resolves. Most cats are back to entirely normal within a week or two even after an abscess, provided it's caught and treated rather than left to rupture untreated at home.

Should You Try to Express Them Yourself?

It's technically possible to learn, and some owners of cats with chronic recurring impaction are shown how by their vet. But for a first-time problem, or if you're not confident about the anatomy, this isn't the place to improvise — done incorrectly, manual expression can bruise the tissue, push fluid the wrong way, or simply miss an infection that needs antibiotics rather than just draining. A vet visit for this is quick, inexpensive relative to most vet visits, and removes the guesswork.

Preventing Repeat Episodes

• Add fibre to the diet — a vet-recommended fibre supplement or a therapeutic high-fibre food gives stool the bulk needed to express the glands naturally during defecation.
• Keep your cat at a healthy weight. Weight loss in an overweight cat measurably reduces recurrence in many cases.
• Treat chronic soft stool or diarrhoea as its own problem worth investigating, rather than something to just manage around — a food sensitivity or parasite is often the real root cause.
• Keep up with regular vet check-ups if your cat has already had one episode — cats that get impacted once are meaningfully more likely to have it happen again, and catching the next one early is far easier than waiting for a scoot.

When to Treat It as an Emergency

• A visible lump near the anus that is hot, hard, or clearly painful to the touch
• Any sign the skin has broken open or is actively draining fluid or blood
• A cat that is straining repeatedly without producing stool, which can also point to an unrelated blockage
• Fever, lethargy, or a loss of appetite alongside rear-end symptoms
• Scooting or licking that is constant rather than occasional, especially if it's new

The Bottom Line

Anal gland problems in cats are far less common than in dogs, which is exactly why owners tend to miss the early signs — scooting, a sudden odour, or fussing at the base of the tail. Caught at the impaction stage, it's a two-minute fix at the vet. Left alone, it can progress to an infected, then abscessed gland within days. A cat that's suddenly bothered by its own back end is worth a same-week vet visit, and one with visible swelling or a burst abscess is worth a same-day one.