What to do about my poop on the floor kitty?

[Wcross]

I have two kittens that I took in a month or so ago. They are twin brothers and I have grown attached to them as have my 6 dogs. We would like to know how to get one of the guys to stop pooping on the floor? I have three large litter boxes in the house that I keep very clean. For some reason one of the kitty's poops on the floor in the same general area every once in a while.
Do you have any ideas that would stop this? They are very smelly cats!

[DS1]

1. Trade your floor kitty in for an air kitty

:shrug:

[Sanity Claws]

2. Yikes

Try posting a question on allexperts.com. I have found them to give some useful information on things like this.
Good luck

[MelanieArt]

3. Is it possible to put a litter box in that spot?

Or some food bowls, cats don't like to mess where they eat. :) He may be stressed out with the new surroundings. Hopefuly he'll settle down soon. Congrats on your new family members!

[camby]

4. What if you tried placing a litter box in that spot

Then if he uses it, you can slowly move it to a more desirable spot?

[Surikat]

5. To begin with...

...once the blighters start taking a dump in a particular place it is very hard to get them to stop.

Next time they do that scrape up the shit and bury it in their kitty litter, then lysol scrub where they shit on the floor (hopefully not on carpet). After that periodically just pick them up and put them in the kitty litter box so that they begin to associate the box with shit. In most cases you'll find that they'll start using the box.

It may be too late to get them to change. Hopefully, that isn't the case.

It sounds to me like you are a bit neurotic about keeping their kitty litter box clean and odor free. If they haven't got a mother cat to show them where to shit, odor is the only guide they have. This makes things difficult.

[CAcyclist]

17. Good answers here.

Also mention it to your vet , in case there are any medical issues, although that seems unlikely here.

It could be worse. My kitten suffered a traumatic brain injury when he was 6-7 weeks old which is how I came to adopt him. It affected his pituitary, so now he is permanently stunted. Because of this injury, he is also blind, somewhat deaf, and has trouble urinating and defecating at all much less finding a litter box.

So he lives in a playpen, which I clean frequently and he gets lots of baths, which he hates.

But on the upside, he's mostly a purr-bot and is sooo cute.

[Wcross]

21. How often should I change the litter?

I do it every other day. BTW, no momma cat- somebody dumped the guys by the side of the road and as "luck" would have it, it is the exact spot I stopped for the State Trooper. As he was writing up my 180 dollar speeding ticket I kept hearing meows. After he departed I got out of my truck and found these two guys. The trooper came back by and stopped. He helped me catch the kittens (they wanted to play).
So I have two 90 dollar kittens!

[jukes]

25. you're prbly changing too often

scoop daily, change 1ce a week. as mentioned, they need to be able to detect it by odor, but they're way more sensitive, so a little wet litter shd be enough.

also, you might want to try the "feline pine" or 1 of the generics: pelleted pine sawdust. solves the odor problem because fresh pine-scent is released when they scratch. much less dust than the clumpers; besides, dogs *will* act like dogs. coprophagy is an unpleasant fact. before the pine-pellets came out, i had a dog with a seriously impacted rectum due to digesting clumping litter.

BTW, enzyme dietary supp's will help correct that behavior in dogs. natural enzymes are cooked-out of processed food, can't take the heat. dogs will seek enzymes elsewhere if they aren't in there diet. "prozyme" is the brand i use, available in bulk on the net.

[morillon]

29. There are special litterboxes to thwart dogs...

I bought one that has a little ramp going up one side into a covered dome, kind of like a twisty seashell. The dogs can't get their muzzles in far enough to get to the "snacks."

[Catch22Dem]

6. I'd like to find an answer to that myself...litter box doesn't work

My cat poops RIGHT NEXT TO the litter box, but she does pee in the litter box.

[shraby]

9. Get 2 litter boxes. My cats use one to pee in

and one to poop in. Seems they like it separated. :shrug:

[Cadence]

10. LOL! I have a friend

who's cat was doing that. It was funnier to me than to him. He'd see it and get so exasperated! He wound up getting the biggest litter box they sold and it fixed the problem. Even though it was a tiny cat...she had space issues apparently.

:shrug:

[Sanity Claws]

11. Aim problem?

I know this sounds silly but it could be an aim problem. I have an old Tom cat that sometimes sits in the box but lifts his butt out of it and the turds fall on the floor. Poor little idiot.
He does pee on the floor though because he doesn't lift his butt the same way.

[Sanity Claws]

12. Oops

I meant he does NOT pee on the floor because...

[Catch22Dem]

14. Fraid not

Not unless that cat is launching those turds about a foot away. :D

[Wcross]

22. Don't ya just hate that!

I mean, whats wrong with the litter little guy????

[Shakeydave]

7. I have three cats...................

and the same thing happens with us. It happens when one of them wants in the favorite box when another is in it. I've just thrown my hands up and clean it later. Of course we are completely tiled with no carpeting either. I truly believe it's a timing issue!

[matcom]

8. PUNT?

:shrug:

[Angry Girl]

13. How old are they?

Until they're a couple of months old they don't have the greatest control over their bodily functions.

You need to try to catch him/her in the act and plop them into the litter box as soon as you see the signs he/she is about to crap.

It's also possible that there's some lingering odor on that spot. You may not smell it but a cat's nose will. Try rubbing the spot with some CatPoopBeGone or whatever it is they sell at the pet store.

Oh, and sometimes they have little idiosyncracies, like requiring a *covered* litterbox for privacy....

If you like kittens, here's some pictures I took a while ago. There's more photos to come, if I ever get off my butt to finish them!

http://arizonacats.netfirms.com/contents.html

Good luck!

Angry Girl
nightweed.com

[morillon]

15. Enzymatic cleaner works...

To keep them from going on the same spot over and over again, you have to get rid of the smell, and the best way, in my experience, is to use one of the enzymatic cleaners like Nature's Miracle. You can buy this kind of stuff at most pet stores. Until the cleaner has had a chance to work (and this will take several passes), cover up that spot or find some way to keep the cats from being able to get to it.

When I've had issues with cats being out of control with regard to litter training, I have sometimes put them in a room by themselves for a couple of days or weeks until they've gotten out of the habit of going in certain places. This also gives enzymatic cleaners time to work.

I've known of a number of instances where it helped to place a litter box right on top of the place they had been going. It may not work in all cases, but sometimes that's all it takes.

You might think about trying a different brand of litter. Some cats are really picky about which litter they'll go in. And more than a few cats will quit using the litter box if it isn't kept clean enough.

[jukes]

19. good pt=enzyme cleaners!

i do feral-cat rescue & swear by the stuff. Zeps works well, too. you can pick it up off the shelf @ (spit) home depot.

[jukes]

16. that's a tough habit to break

might be stress-related, some cats are less social than others. maybe some "quiet time" in a sequestered room for a short time daily might help.

"felliway" is a synth facial-pheromone that cats find calming; if he's using the same spot, you cd try spraying that area w/ it. available online & through some vets. not expensive, & too subtle for human noses; hence, not offensive.

catnip is a great stress reliever, get the good stuff from a pet warehouse (the grocerystore stuff is trash) or grow your own. it's a pretty plant, actually, related to mint, & grows very easily.

punishment, like you wd a puppy, usu doesn't work; just increases stress.

last sugg: harness/leash train him & take him out for a short walk every now & then. @ that age it shd be easy. get him used to the harness alone, indoors 1st, then the leash indoors. when he seems comfortable, then outside, but only if you can find a time when it's quiet so he won't startle. forgive an assumption, that you're more use to dogs than cats: you'll find that cats need to lead more than dogs do. they will respond to some control, but won't "heel".

hope that helps, also hope i didn't ramble more than you wanted.

[knowbody0]

18. bad kitty

a drop or two of clove oil at the unwanted poop spot. kitty hates smell

[starroute]

20. The food dish method has worked well for me

At one point, we had a kitten that was going in *all* the corners. Behind the tv, behind the lamp, and next to the radiator in the living room. Under the bed. Maybe a couple more that I'm not remembering.

We bought a package of cardboard bowls and put one down with a little kibble in every spot where we found kitty poop. If the kitten moved her poop spot to be a couple of feet further over, we put a second bowl there. As I recall, it took a month or two to hit all the spots, but eventually the cat just gave in and started using the damn litter box.

[King Coal]

23. Sometimes you have to climb in the litter box and show them how to poop.

[hippiechick]

24. bye bye kitty !! n/t

:hippie:

[Merlot]

26. My cat had the same problem.

His twin was always a box user, but he was going in all kinds of places. It takes patience, but after a few months you can get him over it. If I caught him pooping, I'd put the poop in the box, and put the cat and the box in bathroom isolation for about 5 minutes. Isolation works well for modifying a cats behavior. Only 5 minutes is necessary, any more than that and they forget why they're there. Don't put the cat in the box though, they don't get that message.

Putting the box in his favorite poop spot works well, also try positive re-enforcement. Keep some kitty treats near the box, and if you see him use the box, as soon as he hops out, give him a treat. My cat still will not bury his poop, but at least it's always in the box!

NEVER use lysol near cats. I won't even have lysol in my house. You clean a surface with it, the cat walks over the surface, cleans his paws and next thing you know they have kidney or liver (I don't remember which) problems. Use the cat enzymes instead, they work great.

[Merlot]

27. If your cats are smelly, change their food! n/t

[SheilaT]

28. You can also

tape some aluminum foil down in that spot. Cats HATE to touch aluminum foil for some reason, and if they pee on it, the sound of the pee hitting it apparently makes them go nuts.

You can also take aluminum foil on places they scratch that you don't want scratched. Leave it up for a couple of weeks and they should be cured of attacking that spot. Okay, so your place will look like some peculiar alien interior decorator was let loose, but it's quite effective.