No one mentioned the smell....

[Mumdiva99]

We welcomed our 10 wk old kittens on Friday. They are gorgeous. They are well behaved. They play. They sleep. They eat. And boy do they poop. And it stinks.....proper stink the whole ground floor out stink. Is this normal? How often do you completely change the whole litter....every day?

We'll stick with non-clumping litter for now as safer for kittens. (I have 3 different bags of different brands to try so will see if that helps.)

We're wondering if we have lined it with too much paper. Maybe that's holding the wee smell. (What are your opinions on the tray liner bags? I was concerned kittens and plastic might be a bad mix).

Covered litter tray box and wooden pellets cat litter. I use the stuff they use for biomass boilers. It's cheaper if you buy in bulk "for fuel" as it's 5% VAT.

The only time I smell anything is when I've forgotten to change it in a couple of weeks. It just sits by the back door getting forgotten about because there's no smell except fresh cut wood when you first change it. You wouldn't even know we had a cat.

And I don't use liners because when I change the tray I tend to give it a good rinse anyway.

I’ve never lined the tray with paper, I would guess that’s not helping. I just use wood pellets, no liner of any sort, scoop any poos asap and change fully once a week. No need for a liner as the wood pellets don’t stick to the tray like fine litter does. I don’t find the wees smell in the meantime, the wood pellets seem to neutralise any smell.

(Now my cat goes outside but this is what I did when she was in for a month)

I never used liners or paper in the tray. Zoflora is safe to use as long as its dry before they use it again. I bought a litter tray spray from pets at home though and use that for cleaning instead. I found Catsan was smelly. You cant let them out to do the toilet for ages yet - not until spayed/neutered and chipped.

They pop prolifically early on, pretty much every time they eat. Mine are now nearly four months, but got them at three months and I changed litter every day for about a week. It is calming down now and am probably changing every five days but my adult cat only poos once a day mostly. Mine are fed on Applaws grain free and Lily’s Kitchen soft food.

We do

Plastic liner
Newspaper
Wooden pellets (not many)

Then you can quite frequently just bundle the newspaper and wood pellets and there's not wee smell about. Maybe once a day or so.

And then a bigger change as needed.

Cats poos really do stink I'm afraid. Meat diet.

Thanks for starting this thread! Lots of useful advice. Sorry to hijack, but I do like the idea of putting the litter box in bathroom. My cat is 5 months old- will she allow me to change the location of her tray? Or will she just pee in the area she used to?

Cheddars poo stinks. She doesn't flush either! I scoop one / daily or post poo and full charge monthly.

Cheddar is 8 by the way. It doesn't get better!

World's Best or Cat's Best litter.

I found that using paper liners just made the cats play with the liners but all cats are different.

You might be able to change the location of the litter tray - I have one cat that doesn't mind and one that will just carry on peeing where it was before, so it depends on how bright your cat is.

The crystals are probably the best for smell but one of my cats decided she didn't like the feel of them on her delicate cat feet. Unfortunately what we like as humans is usually the opposite of what cats like.

@AudaCityLimits

Thanks for starting this thread! Lots of useful advice. Sorry to hijack, but I do like the idea of putting the litter box in bathroom. My cat is 5 months old- will she allow me to change the location of her tray? Or will she just pee in the area she used to?

Give it a go?

I’ve had move it before and Toots was fine but she’s 4.

I’m sure their sense of smell would lead them to their toilet easily enough

Cats can have very sensitive tummies. What are you feeding them? If we change food in our house it can take a couple of weeks for the stinking to stop.

When I tried them on a super high protein fancy food they ended up with liquid diahrhea which could've knocked you unconscious 😷

Kittens do smell worse, have they had their worm treatments?

You will have to change the whole tray every day, if you don't use clumping litter. Remember they should have atleast one tray each.

I've posted this a number of times, but will say it again , chicken starter feed (big bags) is supposed to be the same as world's best litter, it's corn/grain so not bad for your cats, and if you leave it min. 10 min after peeing, it will be clumping.

It will get better .

I've never used any liner. Surely the wee just soaks into the paper. I use clumping cat litter, any own supermarket brand, and remove waste as soon as I spot it. Leave windows/door open for 10 mins or so to ventilate the room (with cats safely shut in another room to prevent escape attempts!).

Worlds best is coconut husk?

Several years ago, I was told world's best was corn.

Worlds best is corn based

Mine are like this if I feed them any wet food with fish in it 😂 it does improve when they're older though!

This is the pet Zoflora

Ordinary zoflora is pet safe too if used as directed and is dry before the cats use it again

Oh, a totally one off, don't use anything with ammonia or bleach/chlorine. It attracts peeing.

I’m sure I read on mine that it was coconut husk! Hmmm must have been the old litter I used

To clean, I mean .

I never line the tray, it encourages scraping and messing around. It’s much easier to rinse the tray than fiddle about with lining it.