Bathroom Concern

Let me first introduce myself. My name is David and I'm from western PA. We have one cat, named Sassy, whom we've had since she was a kitten. She's about 14 or 15 and has a clean bill of health.

Her litter box used to be upstairs in our bathroom, and she'd use it without any problems, however when we remodeled our house we moved it downstairs, and that was about 10 years ago? Maybe less, or more, but it's been a long time since we moved it. I don't know when this started, but at some point she stopped pooping outside of the litter box. She pees inside, but poops right outside the box. We've been trying to get her to go inside the box, but we haven't had any success. We've cleaned the floors, painted them, tried new boxes and nothing works. Well now we remodeled our basements and we can't have her going to the bathroom on the floor, for about a week she pooped inside the box, but now is back to the floor. I've watched her a few times and she goes into the box and pees, but comes out, sniffs around and poops on the floor.

Are we doing something wrong, any ideas?

Thank you, David.

Get a second box. Some kitties like to pee in one and urinate in the other. They can even be side by side, or if you have the space, in a separate place. Also, make sure you clean up the spot where she's been pooping with an enzymatic cleaner or she'll continue to poop there.

In addition, make sure you clean (scoop) the box constantly. She may prefer a nice clean box.

I have a couple of cats that I'll watch, two boxes side by side, they'll go in one, urinate then climb into the other and poop.

Hi,
If you have not tried this already, it has worked for almost everyone that I know who has had this problem. It sounds gross (but you love your baby), but you pick up the poop and put it in the litterbox so she can see it. Let her see you do it. It won;t work right away, but eventually (after about a week or so) she will get the point. Best of luck to you.

Peace ,
Rob & Sport

Try a 2nd litter box. We have two now and they use one more for peeing, the other more for pooping.

BUT I can sympathize with you. I had a Cornish Rex that all her life was like your cat. She would pee in the box, but would poop outside next to it. Didn't matter if there was more then one box, what the box was on, etc.

I discovered that if the litter box was on tile or non-carpeted surface she would use the box like any other normal cat. She would only poop on the floor if it was a carpet or a rug or plastic covering. No one ever figured her out and believe me I tried everything and asked tons of people for suggestions.