New kitten will not use litter tray

[Newmeunderthetree]

Apologies for the long post but wanted to cover everything we have tried with this to see if there is any more advice you can give.

We have recently brought home two kittens. They have the same dad and were born in the same house but two weeks apart so they think they are litter mates they are 11 and 13 weeks . They play together and sleep together wash each other and generally get on very well. The older one uses the litter tray with no problem and that has been the case from day one. We discovered the younger one had been going under a chair in the house so we cleaned and blocked that off and now she goes near to the litter trays but not in them. We have started to see the signs and put her in the tray and she then wants to get out and go near it but not in it. We put her back in and, after a couple of times, she will go in the tray. We have praised her for going, given her treats and then cleaned and sprayed a solution for ridding the smell. We have not created any drama with it and not chastised her at all. We are at home with them at the moment but cannot supervise her all the time. When we go out they are put in an upstairs room with plenty of toys and beds etc and with an adjoining bathroom where the litter tray is. She had started going for a wee in the litter tray independently yesterday and did several poos after some persuasion. I left them for a couple of hours this morning and she had done everything outside the tray again.

We have tried all the methods we can think of to encourage her. We used the same litter at first and have tried changing this. We always scoop out poo and have cleaned the trays every couple of days. There are two trays downstairs near where their 'play area' is as well as upstairs, two are completely uncovered and one is tucked under a bench but with plenty of room. Our house is quiet with no other pets and no children and we don't think her aversion is caused by us. They came from a house with adult cats, dogs and kids so very busy. We did notice on our second visit (when we collected them) that the one litter tray we could see in the house was full and smelt bad we don't know if there were more but could a previous dirty and overused tray be the cause of her aversion and how do we try to help her with that? any advice will be very gratefully received.

What kind of litter do you use?

Get another tray so there are two and make sure they are in low traffic areas. My little girl will not use a litter tray that another cat has used so this can be an issue.

I also had a cat who wouldn’t use a covered litter tray and kept peeing on the bed until I worked that one out and took the lid off.

How many trays do you have in total? Four?

Have you tried different types of litter? Fussy beggar TempCat doesn't like clumping litter and was not keen on wood shavings either. I think he's a princess with sensitive paws.

Have you seen kitten go outside the tray or just the aftermath? Because my princess hangs his bum over the edge of normal sized litter trays for a poo so I've had to swap to a longer one (actually an underbed storage container with lid off).

And finally, is the layer of litter deep enough? Princess also likes to dig to China before and after poos and was missing the tray whilst spending ages scraping the shallow litter layer out of the tray. He's OK know it's a regulation minimum 5cm!

Thank you for your suggestions, it is appreciated!

@FormerlyPathologicallyHappy we are currently back using the wood pellets as that is what the breeder used. We have tried offering catsan and the catsan wood pellets that are smaller (more wood chip). She will sometimes go in any and more often go at the side of them all.

@whirlyhead @cinnamonfrenchtoast they have 3 trays at the moment. Two are downstairs one is covered one isn't. One is upstairs. They generally hang around with us and play near the two we have downstairs.

@TemporaryCatSlave that is our next step, we have found some 'kitten litter' which I assume is really soft. We are a bit wary of changing too many variables at once in case we confuse her even more. She definitely is not trying to go in the tray but is going at the side. We have also experimented with depth too. I am going to get a couple more trays and put them next to each other in case they both want their own. That is the task for today.

She has had a poonami this morning but it is green and runny and it definitely caught her by surprise in the kitchen. They had their vaccinations yesterday so I think that is a by product of that. They were also checked over and all healthy so that is great news. We will continue to persevere and hope she gets it eventually.

Kitten litter is definitely the way to go, my huge outdoor going Bengal refused to use wood pellets.

Those pellets are really big, like walking on Lego for them.

Try one like intersand with a sandy texture. Easier on the Pawsome