End of tether with my cat!!!

[YouDoTheMath]

OK - so we have a British Blue and in an effort to make life easier re scooping the mess from her litter tray, we changed from Catsan to World's Best Cat Litter.

It's great - clumps really well. Trouble is, she won't cover up her faeces. I have to do it or the house stinks. :(

We changed in the first place because Catsan wouldn't clump, so whilst it was fine to remove the poo from it, you'd disturb the urine in the process and the house would then stink of ammonia.

Does anyone know of the perfect cat litter, or is there a cat food that will make her stools smell less (i.e. should I change her diet?) Sounds ridiculous, I know - but I'm getting to the end of my tether with her as I just can't be doing with a stinking house. Ideally I don't want to rehome her, but if I can't find a solution I will have to.

Ps she was going to be a house cat, but we let her out in the garden. She's up to date with all injections etc.

i breed maine coons so plenty of cats in our house!
i am totally paranoid about my house smalling of cat wee so i have tried several different litters. imo the best one is the OKo Plus cats best wood based cat litter. one of mine will also occasionaly not cover up after herself so aside from scooping trays daily i invested in a covered litter tray, it really does keep the smells in.

maybe try her with a covered tray for in the house? inistally use is with the door taken off until she gets used to it then you can attatch the door (cat flap style).

good luck

To be honest, I reckon the only way round this is to change the litter in its entirety every time she poos. We foster cats and I am pretty houseproud, and have tried them all to see which deals best with smells, and it's Catsan by a mile. We go through about £10 of catsan every month but that's fine by me. I'd rather that than either give up the fostering or have a smelly house.

At the moment ours just goes outside - but then, we have a largeish garden and the whole of the Pennines beyond the back fence. We keep a tray and a bag of litter in case she's ill - and in previous houses we weren't able to let her out so easily. Then I used Lidl cat litter and never had any trouble with smells.

Oh we had one like this. Sadly she is no longer with us. She used to go into the tray & dig a hole. Then she would shit on the pile of excavated litter so not only was it not buried, it was on a pile of litter two inches higher than the rest of the surface

Lord the smell

I use asda smart price litter, clumps well.

But I use it in a covered tray from argos with a charcoal filter, it cost about £12-15 and I cant smell anything from it.

Thanks all - I think I will go down the covered tray / carbon filter route next.

Fingers crossed!

it's 50/50 whether my Ginger Moron uses the tray or shits on the floor, if the tray has any wee in it, the poo will be on the floor. They have a catflap so there's no reason for it. He's just as happy to go outside.

just clear it into a bag the minute you see the cat squatting in the tray surely?
One of my cats is really stinky, so we hover the minute we see her going to the tray.
you really cant rehome just because the shit stinks...honestly!

I buy Tesco's value, very reasonable about £1.50 for a massive bag. Have 2 mad bengals, and a British Blue, litter tray sits outside the back door during the day, they hardly ever use it in the day. At night the tray comes in, in the morning my first job is to change all the litter (usually a bit smelly) spray the tray with dettox, and pop it back outside. Usually leave the back door open for a bit just to let the air circulate....House smells fine all day.

We have a house cat, a Burman. We've never had any problem with a smelly litter tray since using cats best cat litter from pets at home, we keep her litter tray in the bathroom as the litter is flushable too, the only time it smells is when your on the loo and She comes in too for a poo!. I tried all sorts of litter and hated the urine smell but this one is loads better. We do feed her on royal canin food too so don't know if that helps it be less stinky.

Has your cat been neutered as that helps too.

my cats now won't go near the tray if there's a poo in it - covered or uncovered. my cats at the moment don't cover it at all so i just have to scoop as soon as they've pooped.

it's worth a try to change food for a bit and see if it makes a difference but at the end of the day poo is poo!

you would rehome your cat because you changed the litter and now the poo smell is more obvious?!

Thanks for the responses folks. As said before, will go down the covered litter route.

Sorry if the rehoming comment offended some - got up yesterday to a stench downstairs, not nice before breakfast and put me in a bad mood, but I suppose we just have to get on with these things when we take pets on!

Our current one can't work the doors on the covered tray. She sat looking at it, batting it with her paw. Eventually we bodily pushed through the door.... and then she sat for ages doing the same thing from the other side. So we had to take the doors off the trays. Bless her she ain't the brightest cat in the world but has Considerable Character.

pmsl at ginger moron!

I have the covered tray and just use smartprice/value litter and just clean out more often i dont have a smell issue and have 3 cats and one tray :)

Another vote for a covered/carbon filter tray and cheapo litter! We have 2 cats, out through the day but in at night. The tray goes out in the day with them (in a vain attempt to stop the shit in the back garden....) and comes in at night with them. Tesco value litter goes in the tray and its cleaned of, ahem, solids every morning.

Good luck!

We used a covered tray, but with the door open as my Persian was (RIP Fifi) too damn stupid to open it herself, with silica gel litter. We took poos out as soon as they happened, and every morning, and to disperse the wee, it just needed stirring.

expensive dry food (eg. hills science diet) instead of whiskas and its ilk makes a big difference to pond IMO.

We use silica gel litter too. I couldn't believe the difference in (lack of) wee smell. We always scoop immediately ( if at home) so no poo smells. We have found that even if we have been out all day and they have both been in ( no cat flap unfortunately) there is no wee smell.

Ooh not even heard of silica gel litter. Is it expensive?

youdothemath It's not cheap, but it's comparable to catsan and we think it is much better value in terms of ease of cleaning out and lack of smell. Because of these attributes we also don't need to empty the tray quite so often and the cats are quite happy to use it. (I know some owners insist that a tray for each cat is required but we wouldn't have room for two.)

our cats are now on biscuits only because of their teeth and the poos aren't as bad. the vet told us they don't need wet food and it's bad for their teeth. the cats in question are not impressed.