Litter Box Training Your New Kitten

By nature, cats are fastidious and instinctively cover wastes with sand or dirt, and indoor cats find that a litter box suits this purpose well.

Your new kitten wants to please you. Most kittens are litterbox trained by their mothers. If your kitten isn't accustomed to a litterbox, it is your job to teach him what you expect and reward him for good behavior. There are three factors to consider: the kittens ability to control his bowels and bladder, his sense of home and toilet areas, and the method you use to communicate what is acceptable behavior for your new pet.

After you take your kitten home -- after meals, drinks, exercise, or excitement, gently place it in an easily accessible box filled with litter, several times if necessary until he gets the idea. After one or two tries in the litterbox, the kitten will usually become housebroken. Remember to praise the kitten lavishly for correct actions. Patience and continued loving care should handle any problems.

If your new kitten is sick with diarrhea or some other disease, it is almost impossible to housebreak him at that time. Nurse him back to health and then resume his training.

Order is important to cats. Changes in the environment including color or location of the litter box, color or type of litter, senility, lack of sanitation, odor of other animals on clothing, a new animal, baby, or visitor in the home, territorial anxiety in a multiple-cat home, a nearby female cat in heat, moving or getting new furniture, unsterilized cats in the home, stray cats outside the home, change in the household schedule, insufficient attention, loneliness, or emotional crisis in the family, can all lead to litterbox use problems.

If your cat stops using the litter box in favor of other surfaces in the home, a veterinary examination should be your first step. Inappropriate urination is a common problem due to urinary tract diseases or behavioral expression of feline displeasure. Occasionally the stress or discomfort of some non-urinary tract disease will lead to this problem. One (rare) cause, is retained or remnant ovarian tissue in a spayed cat. A sudden fright or an extended period of confinement may also cause occasional accidents.

Common problems may arise if the cat doesn't like the type of litter, its odor, or its consistency. Experiment with several brands until you find one the cat likes. The box may not be private enough or some object frightening to the cat may be near the box's location. Another problem may be that the litter pan is too small.

Try different cat box fillers, placing feed dishes where the cat has been urinating (a cat will not usually relieve himself near his food and water), or moving the litter box to a quieter, more private area. If commercial litter doesn't seem to work, try sawdust, sand, or newspapers. With multi-cat homes, several litterboxes may be needed. Frequent cleaning is a must, regardless of the number of cats. Make sure the litterbox is accessible, keep the location consistent. The sides of the litter box should be reasonably low for easy access and kept 'baited', but clean. Avoid scented litter or deodorants, Scoop or sift out waste often and change litter several times a week.

"Spraying" is when a cat marks a vertical surface with urine, This is a form of territorial marking, although cats with urinary tract disease will occasionally mark a vertical surface, too. The cat generally stands on all four feet, lifts his tail straight up, and squirts urine backward. The erect tail often quivers just prior to and during the expulsion.

Soiled areas must be cleaned thoroughly to destroy the presence of ammonia. Common solutions are those of equal parts white vinegar and water; baking soda, mouthwash, detergents, and Clorox. Other products sold specifically for this purpose are available through local pet stores. In any event, the area must be saturated, and then blotted over and over again until all urine has been removed.

If the cat still refuses to use the litterbox, the confinement method is an alternative to retrain the animal. Select an area which is just big enough to hold the cat’s litterbox at one end and his bedding, food, and water at the other. Confine the cat to this area 24-hours a day for a minimum of two weeks. Close supervision is needed initially to ensure the cat doesn’t revert to soiling outside the litterbox. After 2 weeks of successful confinement, gradually allow increasing periods of freedom. Praise him whenever he uses the litterbox and once he begins using it regularly on his own, you can feel confident that retraining is complete.

It is also possible to obtain drug therapy for inappropriate urination. This treatment must be done only through consultation with your veterinarian.