Flushing dog or cat poo down the loo

[loubielou31]

I found out recently that someone I know, (but don't know well) flushes their dog poo. Please tell me this isn't actually a thing that's okay because it seemed pretty gross to me. I don't have dogs or cats so I haven't given it any thought before. I do know that cat poo in particular can have some parasite that is pretty dangerous for people. But maybe it's okay and water treatment is good enough to clear out all the nasties.

YABU: flushing is fine and better than all the plastic poo bags going into landfill.
YANBU: It's gross and carries germs that are not adequately removed from the water during sewerage treatment.

No cat litter is safe to flush, despite what it might say on the packaging. Christ, this is worse than the recent conversation with all the people who didn’t know they shouldn’t flush tampons! Pee, poo and paper only (human)! 😱

😵‍💫 always used to lift manhole and drop our dogs poop down and then go in and flush. Never heard it was dangerous, every days a school day

Some cat litters are advertised as safe to flush! How are you supposed to know that means not safe to flush!

I bag most of my cat's poo, which feels against the environment anyway as I have lots of cheap plastic bags to use up. The litter tray in the loo I have always flushed down the loo. I won't know I know, obviously.

I don't see what's disgusting about this and not human poo down the loo. I'm missing something here.

Some cat litters are advertised as safe to flush! How are you supposed to know that means not safe to flush!

I mean...for me it's just common sense, lol. Cat litter is bulky and not in any way designed to go down the toilet. It's just an advertising gimmick.

I was unsure so I got in touch with my water company and they said it’s fine to flush cat poos as long as there are big loads of litter with it. All poo is gross, that’s the deal.

Surely all these poo bags with animal waste are still a risk as the bags don’t usually break down in landfill???

That's disgusting and weird. Why not just pick it up and chuck in a bin. Imagine having a garden full of buried dog crap 🤢

So it's ok if they've been wormed?

Exactly!

*aren’t big loads of litter

Pooh is pooh, we scoop and flush 🤷‍♀️
Surely water treatment works remove bacteria and parasites as part of their treatment whatever their animal origin.

Is there a “not” missing from that sentence? I can’t believe any water company advised you to flush cat litter! It absorbs water, expands and causes sewer blockages. Does no one see or hear the campaigns about not flushing things down toilets or is just my local one that promotes this??

To anyone saying that animals don't poop directly into rivers - sorry but you're wrong. Cows and sheep poo in rivers all the time - as well as any other animals who happen to be passing - which is why you're not supposed to drink from rivers without boiling or treating it. Water companies release raw sewage into rivers on a regular basis. Farmers spread runoff and scrapings from their yards on to the fields and it also runs into the rivers. Rats run around in sewers and poo there. Basically there is sh*t everywhere 😂

I don't imagine flushing cat or dog poo down the loo has that much of an effect on the general poo scale 😂

My apologies then. I interpreted your post as the beginnings of a rant against domestic cats but obviously got it wrong.

It’s poo.
not pooh. leaves thread

I always bag and bin and have never considered this before - and I can see the point about parasites and if water companies are saying not do do this .

But to say this is 'grim' or 'gross' is ridiculous - people are talking of flushing it down the loo, as with human poo, not putting it on the kitchen table!

It's a shame our sewage system can't cope with it actually- as picking it up with a shovel and flushing feels like it would be environmentally better than binning in little plastic bags .

I know. Incredible.

Doing gods work

I know

No you definitely shouldn’t do this. Why not just put it in the outside bin? Surely that’s easier than flushing

Interesting. I've trained my cat to use the toilet. Dirty fecker doesn't flush, though.

She is regularly wormed though, I wonder if that makes a difference.

No

You shouldn't really do this anyway - it stops the cat from being able to behave naturally before/after using the toilet.

She's got a litter tray and access to the outdoors too, seems to prefer the loo. Trained is perhaps too strong a word. Maybe she just watched me peeing one too many times and thought "that'll do for me too". I'd far rather she shits in my toilet than anyone's garden, tbh.

https://biocatolet.co.uk/ is literally little bits of shredded newspaper. I'm not sure how the small amount adhering to Dcat's deposits is going to clog the sewers. If it was clay litter, that would be different.