cat hates his litter box

joeyeatworld

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hello everyone!

i have a two year old male cat named joey. he's an inside/outside cat, but he prefers to be outside. most of his life, he's been allowed to go in and out as he pleases, except for the few times in which injuries from fights have kept him inside. this was never really a problem until recently.

i had him neutered a couple of days ago. the doctor told me to keep him inside for 4-5 days. my problem is that, the older he gets, the more he hates his litter box. while it's great that he would much rather go outside to do his business, getting him to use the box is like pulling teeth. while he's never urinated on the furniture or on the floor, he'll deliberately misbehave (i assume) in order to make me mad and put him outside. he wandered around the house for about 2 hours this morning, crying, clawing at the furniture, playing in the window blinds, picking at the window screens, hissing at the dogs (he usually gets along with them), and generally making my life miserable, because i had to tag along behind him and/or scold him every couple minutes (he's usually a very polite and well-mannered cat). he finally gave up and peed in his box, then immediately calmed down and went to sleep.

his litter box is never dirty (it's checked and/or cleaned daily), and he used to not have a problem with using it. is there any way i can help him just relax and use his box?
 

sakura

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Maybe keeping him inside 100% of the time would help?


There are products like Cat Attract that can help make a litter box more attractive, in addition to adding boxes in different locations or replacing current boxes with larger ones. He may be trying to tell you he wants to go outside to pee, but if he is only going in the litter box while he is inside it's kind of a non-issue isn't it? I mean, all those things you described him doing (clawing, hissing, playing etc.) are normal cat things. They may or may not be related to him wanting to go outside, and I don't know if it's necessarily a retaliatory action toward you for not letting him out. You can't discipline a cat either, so scolding him will probably not amount to much. He may not be going to the litter box when you want him to, but he is using it right?

Just do your best to make sure that the litter box(es) are the most appealing thing to use inside the house.
 

abstract

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I use KittenAttract for my kitten Turtle, and it's helped a lot. She'll have the occasional "accident" now and then, but it's much better than it used to be. I recommend it, though it is expensive.

Another thing you could try is just switching litters. Some cats are very picky about what kind of litter they use - for example, Turtle won't use anything but very soft, small litter. I bought Tidy Cats Scoop (comes in plastic container, has little blue things in it) about 3 weeks ago. It's got very small granules and we haven't had a problem since.
 

rotobay

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Originally Posted by Sakura

Maybe keeping him inside 100% of the time would help?


You can't discipline a cat either, so scolding him will probably not amount to much. He may not be going to the litter box when you want him to, but he is using it right?

.
Scolding a cat is a funny thing. I scolded Houdini yesterday for pooping on the couch and she just gave me that 'screw you' look. Kind of like 'you're lucky I even grace you with my presence and allow you to pet and feed me'. Cat owners have to understand that they own us, not the other way around.


But I did get some great advice for how to get an outside kitty to use a litterbox:

http://www.thecatsite.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=159479


So far it has worked but it is a bit messy and right now I have 4 litter boxes in my house (for ONE cat).
 

karebearcasey

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my damian is an inside/outside cat. even if he spends his entire day asleep in his cat tree, he will not use a litter box. when he thinks he wants out and it's raining he is a huge pest acting as if i can change the weather to make it stop raining so he can go out.
 
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