Calling all cat owners
Seadragon has a question. Can you help her out?
In the interest of keeping this place relatively clean, I am wondering if anyone has any advice about how to manage two cats. Our cats have been at my parents' house for the past month and a half, but they are being returned to us this weekend (today!). As much as I am looking forward to having them back here, I'm a little terrified of the cleaning that we are going to have to resume. Besides the fur which literally flies everywhere, I'm wondering how we can control the litter that inevitably seems to get tracked all over the place. I am not sure why, but the cats have a habit of bounding out of the litter box as if they've been shot from a cannon, then doing a Road Runner scramble as they try to find some footing on the wood floors, and then racing around the apartment scattering litter everywhere they go. Sweeping helps, obviously. But any suggestions for how to control the spread of litter and fur would be very, very much appreciated.
posted by Ianqui at 12:26 PM
7 Comments:
Make them wipe their damned feet! Seriously, I have this problem, too. The way I deal with it is to have a fairly deep litter box, which helps with the throwing of litter, but means it flies a bit when they jump out. And I have a fluffy rug extending from under the lb through the doorway (the lb is between the washer and dryer just off the kitchen). And I keep a broom nearby. Very little gets tracked past the kitchen, because I am barefoot girl and sweep a lot. It's a bitch, but for some reason, the litter seems to stick to their paws -- I use swheat scoop, because it's flushable and non-clay/non-chemical.
Anyone who knows me knows what I'm about to say...
ROOMBA!
My cats are filthy little demons and I swear one of them balls up cat litter in his fists to deposit around the house. Having a robot to clean it up for me makes me feel better about it all.
I have a covered litter box. This helps, but kitty still scattered litter when he jumped out. So now he jumps out of the covered litterbox into an apple crate. It has a rug on the bottom to trap litter. Then he jumps out of the crate. It looks dumb, but I don't have to vacuum as much now.
When I had a cat, I had a special mat/rug thingy in front of the box that trapped a lot of litter. I got it from "Cat Claws" (a catalog -- but if they're still around they're online now) but you could probably find similar things elsewhere. My cat was the persnickety type who shook her paws off soon after exiting the box, but she still managed to track some litter, especially since she used to get out of the box before digging to cover the waste. Once I got that mat, though, I had a lot less litter past the litter box area.
I use a covered litter box and litter that's large enough not to track (environmentally sound too!). It's called Yesterday's News, pellets made out of recycled newspaper. You can find it at pet stores. Generally doesn't track -- and if it does, the pellets are large enough to pick up easily
We also use Yesterday's News and it barely tracks as it doesn't stick to their paws. What little does come out with them is easily picked up with a paper towel or broom. Finally we also use the Buddha Dome (I don't think it's spelled that way) which is covered and has steps down the side so that most litter falls off before they're actually out. And, much to my surprise, the Yesterday's News has really reduced any smell coming from the box too. We also have two cats so it's great.
Thank you all so much for your extremely helpful advice about controlling cat litter!! If you're interested, posted an update to my blog.
I can't wait to try out Yesterday's News...
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