Keeping dog out of litter box

taryn

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I have no way of blocking off Dexter's access to the boxes so that is not an option. Nuts' favorite box happens to be in the bathroom which I obviously can't directly observe most of the time since I don't live in the bathroom. The one in the kitchen is easier to observe since I can see the area it is in from the couch. Not that that is perfect since I'm having to relocate the cat food as Dex keeps getting into the container(it just holds Nuts' food, his bowls are on the counter so he can eat, so Nuts isn't eating near his boxes) between the bag of cat food for the outside cats and Dex's food the cabinet that holds food is full, and it is near the location of the box.

Other than cleaning the boxes often(I got them twice today) is there anything I can do to keep him from indulging in 'cat box crispies'? I think I should mention Dex is on pills(for dogs only) because we have had issues with him attempting to indulge in his own poop. It seems sporatic(as does him raiding the litter box) but he has raided the box more than he has tried to eat his own poop(and since he is walked on a leash to go potty as we don't have a fences yard it is a lot easier to prevent it from happenning.) He was rescued with 13 other dogs and they weren't being fed so I'm assuming he learned to recycle what came out.

Half this problem might have just solved itself, Dexter just ambushed Nuts in the litter box so I might have to look into getting a gate to block off the hallway to the bathroom. Freaking dog.

Taryn
 

goldenkitty45

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I suggest you look into some of the litter box furniture they have now that hides the litter box and only the cat can access it.

Another suggestion I've seen is to have a box built that the only way to get to the litter box is from the top.

Our Lab is trained to stay out of the side of the basement where the litter box is. She is very good and will not even go over there if her ball rolls on that side!
 

danewillow

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A large Rubbermaid container with a hole cut in the side big enough for the cat but too small for the dog. Of course, that only works if your dog is bigger than your cat. You could also get baby gates for the rooms with the litter boxes.
 

nerdrock

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We have a low baby gate that the dogs can't jump over that separates the litterbox from the rest of the apartment. We want to get one of the litter furniture things, but just don't have the room right now. We also use non clumping cat litter so that if the dogs do happen to get into it, it's not going to harm them by solidifying into a giant rock in their intestines. I also get up and clean the litter first thing in the morning before we let the dogs out and whenever I notice that the cat has been in there. I actually found Sadie sitting inside the covered box once having a snack, lol.

We've been debating on trying to teach the cat to use the toilet, but I fear that Mike would just end up going on the litter covered plastic before she was trained - lol.

I've never found those pills that you give to the dog to stop eating it's own poop to be effective. You mentioned earlier that he was on a lower quality kibble than what you wanted to be feeding him (I think?), is he still on that? If so, not much of the food is digested properly so it still has a lot of nutrients when it comes out, thus making him want to eat it - especially if he was in a home where he was not being fed before.

I'm not sure if pineapple can be fed to cats, but if it can and you can get the cat to eat it, it's supposed to make the poop less desirable to dogs. You can feed it to dogs to help with the problem, but some dogs will eat anything.
 

feralvr

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We use those Carlson gates from Petsmart or online. You can adjust them along the sides to be a bit wider, just enough for the cat to slip through and not the dog (if the dog is bigger than the cat that is). The gates I have are short, about fifteen inches tall so I can easily step over them. They have taller ones too that have a swinging door on them. I use the WBCL and my Jrt's seem to like the corn litter as a snack every so often, so I try to keep them away from the litter boxes.
 

momofmany

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I used a baby gate to block off areas with litter boxes. Once they are trained to stay out of that part of the house, I remove the gates.

I have litter box furniture with a circular hole cut in the side for the cats to get in and out. The dogs still stuck their heads thru the hole to get at the litter.
 

jennyr

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I have the same problem with Tasha and hte litter boxes. I scoop them before I let her in hte kitchen in the morning, and monitor through the day, but she still gets in occasionally although she knows it is forbidden, and often comes to tell me afterwards, with that guilty look! I have found her waiting beside the box till a cat has finished. All the boxes are the covered sort, and most have doors, but she can still get her head in. No one has given me a definite way to stop her except to continue with the training. Now I have only two boxes downstairs, the rest are upstairs where she does not go.
 

miagi's_mommy

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I put up a baby-gate in the laundry room where their litter-boxes are.. the dogs can't get to it that way.
 

cococat

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This has a super easy solution which is to make it not accessible by your dog anymore.
You can use a baby gate, put it up higher, put it in one of those litterbox small fake furniture, or behind a couch, get creative...
My dogs all want for nothing from the second they were born and beyond, but they would still indulge in kitties crispies frequently if given a chance. It is gross and part of being a dog. So we use baby gates. A bit of an extra pain to baby gate off a whole room and area but in the big scheme of things no big deal at all.
 

orangeishcat

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Sylvie (my Aussie mix) loves litterbox diving... so gross! We have two litterboxes, though- one is on the main floor in the laundry room, we just shut the door when she's out and about. Our main floor is one giant greatroom, so she has a ton of space to run around and do her thing... and we have a baby gate leading up the stairs to Peanut's domain and litterbox #2. We keep them separated because Sylvie always wants to play and Peanut has some special needs that make him less mobile than he needs to be when engaging a big, dumb Aussie.
 

destiny4u

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can someone tell me how common it is for a dog to eat cat poop? i had a german shepherd that was obessed with it it was so disgusting i had to catch him and pick out all the cat poop and litter out f the dogs m outh

he would see the litter box DIVE IN CHOMP CHOMP CHOMP try to swallow it like it was big globs of meat or something and then i would grab the dog pulll it out with my hands and pick the top of his jaw with my hands cuase it would get stuck to the dogs roof of his mouth

DIGUSTING DIUGSTING I HOPE MY NEW DOG ISNT LIKE THIS lmao
 

Willowy

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Originally Posted by destiny4u

can someone tell me how common it is for a dog to eat cat poop? i had a german shepherd that was obessed with it it was so disgusting i had to catch him and pick out all the cat poop and litter out f the dogs m outh

he would see the litter box DIVE IN CHOMP CHOMP CHOMP try to swallow it like it was big globs of meat or something and then i would grab the dog pulll it out with my hands and pick the top of his jaw with my hands cuase it would get stuck to the dogs roof of his mouth

DIGUSTING DIUGSTING I HOPE MY NEW DOG ISNT LIKE THIS lmao
Almost all dogs are like that. For some reason, dogs just think cat poop is the best treat ever
. It's recycled cat food, after all, and dogs just love cat food! If you don't want your new dog to go litterbox diving, you have to keep the litterbox where the dog can't get to it.

Ewww, LOL. There is NO WAY I would ever pry cat poop out of a dog's mouth. Gross!
if he wants it that bad he can have it!
 
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taryn

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Originally Posted by Willowy

Ewww, LOL. There is NO WAY I would ever pry cat poop out of a dog's mouth. Gross!
if he wants it that bad he can have it!
I agree Willowy, if it's in his mouth and he doesn't drop it, he can have it, it isn't going to hurt him. I pry enough 'crap' out of Dexter's mouth that I'm not about to try and pry literal crap out of his mouth, he can have that(and he isn't stupid enough to raid the litter box at anytime when he might get caught.)

Taryn
 

nerdrock

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Lol I pry it out of my dog's mouth when I see them with it.

To the dog, it goes like this: Raid litter box, eat poop, mom sees me eat poop, must be ok because I got a treat (poop).

My boyfriend will not pry it from their mouths, he'll keep yelling drop it at them until they either do that or swallow it.

They are actually better about NOT eating poop for a period of time after I pry it out of their mouths than when Mike yells at them and they eat it anyways.

As for it not hurting them, I think that's debatable depending on the dog and the type of cat litter and food you feed your cats. If your dog has any allergies to the food that you feed the cats, he's getting some of that allergen when he eats the poops. He can also get coccidia, giardia, parasites, etc if the cat has them. He can get a blockage if you're using a clumping type of litter.

Did you know, lol, that if you feed your cat a raw diet that your dog is less likely to eat the poop? The reason being that all that comes out is literal waste, whereas with commercial diets, even the best ones, there are still some nutrients and "food" that come out. Of course, if your dog has a habit of eating poop then he would probably continue.
 

momto3boys

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I turned my litterboxes backwards. Depends on where you have it in your house but one of mine was in a corner, so I just turned it around so the entrance for the cat was in the back instead of in the front, the cat can easily get to it but the dog can't.

Then my other litter box is in between my washer and dryer, same thing. I just turned it around so the entrance is facing the wall, not the open room. It works for us.

Hopefully you come up with something.
 

just mike

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I fought this issues for years. I tried everything I read about. I tried different suggestions from people that had conquored this problem in their own households. I tried just about everything. I have 4 cats and 4 litter boxes. 1 is upstairs in an office and 3 are downstairs in the laundry room. The dogs would still raid the litter boxes and it was making me crazy. I'd have litter and cat poop all over the house. Then I came across a very simple, and very inexpensive solution. I went to the hardware store and bought 2 of those inexpensive latch hooks. I screwed the eye hook onto the woodwork and the latch onto the door. I bought the 3 inch hooks. I installed these on both doors and it has worked miracles. I had thought about cat doors on both of the doors but one of my dogs is a Maltese and he can squeeze through just about anything. The latch hook keeps him out. When I'm in the rooms the dogs are free to come and go at will because I can keep an eye on the boxes. When I'm out of the room, the doors are latched and the kitties can come and go without the dogs pestering them. The downside is; the latch hooks are not very pretty. The upside is my peace of mind
 

starryeyedtiger

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With a little patience and training, you can easily teach your dog to "leave it" and not go near the areas with litter boxes. Macy and Ranger never mess with the kitty boxes, even when the door is open. If you'd like to pm me, I can walk you through some training exercises that might help.

In the mean time, try and relocate the box to a different area that the dog is unable to access...you could even figure out how to put a box on top of the litter pan (top off) and have an entrance from the top that the cat can jump in and out of but that the dog is unable to access.
 

just mike

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Originally Posted by Willowy

Almost all dogs are like that. For some reason, dogs just think cat poop is the best treat ever
. It's recycled cat food, after all, and dogs just love cat food! If you don't want your new dog to go litterbox diving, you have to keep the litterbox where the dog can't get to it.

Ewww, LOL. There is NO WAY I would ever pry cat poop out of a dog's mouth. Gross!
if he wants it that bad he can have it!
I've not done research on this but a vet tech once told me that dogs are attracted to cat poop due to the protein in it. I dunno. Like everyone else, I find it to be a disgusting habit. My dogs have been trained to "leave it" when I'm around but the minute my guard is down they're in the litter box if I don't have the doors latched.
 
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