Cat pooing in the wrong place

[Minta85]

My lovely Burmese boy has a covered litter tray, with a step with holes in that he walks over to get to the actual litter. I guess that the purpose of this is to remove bits of litter from his paws. In the last few days, he's done a few poos on this step. He's still going as normal in the litter too, no signs of a UTI, toilet habits as normal, and we haven't changed the type of litter. I scoop the box every day, so it's clean.

Could anyone suggest why he might be doing this, and what I can use to clean the step? I'm assuming that it now smells of him, so he therefore thinks it's an appropriate place to poo. Are there any special cat cleaning products that will stop it smelling of him?

Is the litter part too small? So his bum hangs over, as it were.

He's always been fine up til now, though he is only a year old so has only recently stopped growing, so possibly.

I have two burms and run a Cattery too. Of all the cats we board Burns are definitely the most complex in their personalities.
A change of toilet habit can be down to a number of things. Firstly I would add another litter tray to the house so that there are two and see if that makes a difference. In terms of the smell you can mask it by cleaning with bio washing liquid or alcohol. Make sure you rinse it well as you don't want the smell to stop him going into the litter tray.
It could be s stress thing. Have you had lots of people in the house over Christmas? I'm not a huge believer in it but maybe worth trying some feliway.
Finally and i should have written it first (blame the hangover). If it persists get a vet check. Keep a close eye out for urinary tract problems as they are very dangerous in Boy cats.
Good luck and I hope he gets back to normal soon.

And finally if it were me I would bin the step or at least remove it to see if he goes as normal in the tray.

Thanks, Grumps! We've been away over Christmas and haven't had any guests. He's been in a cattery over Christmas and him coming back did co-incide with him starting to poo on the step. Maybe that's why, although he's been to the same cattery before and hasn't done this when he came back. I'll keep an eye out for any bladder problems.

Hi again Grumps, good idea - I've now removed the step so will see what he does next.

How are you getting on?

He's been fine today so I've put the step back, as he was tracking dirty litter across the floor. I thought he might have deposited something earlier, but he was just leaning his front paws on the step while he used the litterbox. He's dark brown and I didn't have my glasses on at the time!

Good news. Fingers crossed it's broken the habit.