Disposing of cat litter without plastic bags

[CoffeeMum]

Bit of a silly question as i'm sure there is no solution...but is there any other way to dispose of cat litter other than emptying it into plastic bags and taking it out to the bin?

We want to start shopping in Aldi to save money which means we won't have a big stock of plastic bags anymore - plus, i'd obviously like to avoid using plastic bags, thinking of the environment. However, i can't imagine how we'll manage to deal with the cat litter without the plastic bags.

Thoughts, ideas, solutions much appreciated!

Thanks

Is cat litter compostible if put inside the council composting bins (I think you can put any other food waste in there). Or does cat litter not count?

I always have heaps of plastic bags left over from other purchases, I end up giving carrier bags to the corner shop and trying to find other places to recycle them. Big bags that were covering the mattress or new computer equipment, smaller bags we buy detergent or bread in.

I put mine into biodegradable dog poo bags but that's not going to help you save money as it involves buying something. Can you bury it in a designated spot in the back corner of your garden?

I use the wood chip cat litter so it's biodegradable.

You can't put cat litter in the compost bins. Do you have a large wheelie bin? outs is emptied directly into the big bin which is lined with a giant wheelie bin liner.

Wrap it in newspaper before binning it?

Thanks everyone.

We don't have a garden, so can't bury it unfortunately.

We don't really buy much these days [again, money saving efforts] so really only seem to acquire plastic bags from the supermarket.

Our council doesn't do composting - and yes, as oops says - i'm not sure you're allowed to put cat litter in compost bins are you?

Soupdragon - am i being thick? - would gladly use biodegradable cat litter, but how would it being biodegradable help with this situation? Surely it biodegrades over a long time...i have to change the cat litter more often than that

However, what are these dog poo bags? They sound quite good - maybe we will have to accept we'll have to buy something - but they're quite small aren't they? Probably not big enough for emptying the whole tray?

Putting it straight into big bin, and using big bin liners is a good idea, but we share our big bins, and don't know how pleased the neighbours would be with the situation. Plus we're in a first floor flat so would have to carry whole tray downstairs and muck around with it by the bins...not so tempting.

Perhaps i'll collar the bin men next time i see them and see if they have ideas.

Thanks for your suggestions everyone, it's a grim business!

Biodegradable litter won't help seeing as you don't have a garden but i didn't realise that at the time :) No use burying non degradable litter though!

the dog poo bags are roughly the same as a nappy sack, maybe a little larger. I do fit a whole litter tray in one but I only put one scoop of litter in at a time.

Okay, that makes sense! Thank you. Of course, if we had a garden, we wouldn't have to deal with the sodding litter tray...

Tell my stupid cat that. [sigh]

We get Cat's Best Oko Plus, which is flushable - just the poos and wee clumps, and you have to be careful not to chuck too much loose litter in with it, or it clumps in the loo and blocks it, but it DOES work. It's more expensive than bog-standard (sorry) litter but was the only kind that I found I actually had to make a special effort to change the litter occasionally, rather than being driven to do so by the stench.

More economical if you buy a massive bag, which we did shortly before starting to let the cats out, upon which they completely stopped using the tray ...

I line the tray with newspaper, then when it needs changing I just wrap it all up in the newspaper in a big bundle and chuck it in the bin.

We use the clumping litter too, it's a bit more expensive than the other stuff, but it means the newspaper doesn't really get damp and we use it much more slowly because the clumps can just be lifted out and more litter added as required.

Use biodegradable nappy bags to pick it up (hand inside out etc) then put it into the dustbin. (we have two bins - we line one with bin bag and put nappy bags into it - that way normal dustbin doesn't stink of cat poo).

When you then do whole litter tray, we empty into a bin bag and put into dustbin. Then wash out tray with hot soapy water.

Have a friend who has some organic stuff that you can flush down the loo

Thanks for the further suggestions everyone, much appreciated. Don't know if i'm quite brave enough to start flushing cat poo/wee down the loo - can't face dealing with blockages, and our loo is at the other end of the house to the litter tray. Newspaper is a great idea, but we don't get a paper, so that's more expense there!

I think we'll have to stick with the plastic bags unfortunately - i've got friends and family to start gathering them up for me! [sad old git icon]

tesco/co=op value nappy bags are way better than chucking out plastic carrier bags and you can get bio-ones.