Cat pooping outside of litter tray

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Catface-gb
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Joined: Fri Jul 22, 2022 8:08 am

Cat pooping outside of litter tray

Post by Catface-gb »

Recently our cat has started pooping at the entrance to the litter tray on the bathroom floor. We've had our two cats for years and have never had this problem before.

He's always been a bit of an anxious soul. We went away for 2 weeks in June on holiday and he had trusted cat sitters come in to look after him and his sister. Since we've been back he's been miaowing a lot more than usual. The pooping started about a week and a half ago. We went to the vet who said he thought it may be a symptom of anxiety and recommended Pet Remedy plugins to calm him down, which we're going to try.

Other info:

I work from home and have been in the house every time he's done this
He's been to the vet and physical health is fine. He's 8 years old.
He is eating/drinking fine
He's always had occasional bouts of diarrhoea but we treat this with his food (following vets advice) and it's never affected where he poops.
The litter is the same as it has been for years
No new cats or other massive changes in the house
I've tried stepping up the cleaning routine and also removing the flappy door to the tray in case he was suddenly finding that awkward to use. No difference.
I will try an enzyme cleaner on the floor, rather than just disinfectant.

Any other advice, tips or shared experiences would be much appreciated! Thanks
TessUK
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Joined: Fri Oct 28, 2022 7:21 am

Re: Cat pooping outside of litter tray

Post by TessUK »

Hi Catface-gb, found your post while searching for help! Wow we sound like we have identical cats and issues (apart from fact our cat is female). We rescued out 8 year old from Cats Protection just over a year ago. She’s quite a timid gentle soul who we initially had issues with a runny tummy (original Felix sorted that out). We had no issues with the litter tray until a couple of months ago when she started pooing in front of the tray (pees in the tray ok).
She’s an indoor cat and like you I’m at home all day. We’ve tried different litter trays, different litter, changing the position of the tray; you name it we’ve tried it. Her health is good, she’s eating and drinking fine. She is a bit of a ‘princess’ so I don’t know if she’s just decided that that’s going to be her new spot but like you if anyone can help that would be great!
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Cat-FAQ
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Re: Cat pooping outside of litter tray

Post by Cat-FAQ »

Just something you could try, is putting the litter tray inside a large box with the top and front cut off, as in the photo. The box should be longer than the tray so that some of the bottom of the box sticks out beyond the front of the tray. If you line the box with a bin bag and then newspaper on top, it will make it easier to clean if/when the cat poos or wees there.
Hopefully, a little while of having the tray like this may encourage them to go back in the tray again.

soil-spray-litterbox.jpg
soil-spray-litterbox.jpg (9.62 KiB) Viewed 9469 times
More suggestions for inappropriate toileting on our advice page here: https://www.catchat.org/index.php/cat-t ... ay-indoors

Hope that helps!
TessUK
New Cat Chatter
Posts: 2
Joined: Fri Oct 28, 2022 7:21 am

Re: Cat pooping outside of litter tray

Post by TessUK »

Thank you for replying! We’ve tried that kind of set up with no luck but we think she might be stressed and anxious so we are trying Feliway (which we did use when we brought her home from Cats Protection). There is a neighbours cat that has decided it likes to sit on our outside front door mat and she may have seen him. Hopefully shooing him off regularly and the Feliway will do the trick. Until then we’ve protected the floor around the tray with some easy wipe pvc tablecloth material (not to be used for a tablecloth afterwards😁)
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