How to keep my cat from eating/playing with litter pellets?

badems human

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I have a 9 month old kitty and we recently switched her from corn based litter to pine pellets. The reason we did that was mainly the tracking problem. She used to track the dust right into our bed and it was getting really hard to keep up with it. First we switched her box to a plastic storage container with the lid cutout from the top. She liked it since it is very spacious for her. She is more than 7lbs. So it is very roomy. After she got used to it, we switched the litter to pine pellets. She didn't have any problems at all going there for peeing or pooping. Only thing is she can't cover the poop properly since it has bigger grains. Till here, everything is awesome.
But, she takes a pellet out and plays with it. Sometimes chews and swallows it. If I don't realize what's she up to,she can do this for hours. I don't like the idea to have yucky pellets around. And the most important thing is, it is not healthy to eat litter! I don't wanna scare her away from her toilet, but I need to somehow teach her that she is not supposed to eat and play with them.
Anyone has any ideas how to do that? Or do I need to switch her back to the old litter again?

Additional info:
I am home most of the time and we play a lot. Her favorite is fetch and bring and we play with the sponge ball all day long. (Yes, she may be spoiled. Because if I don't play with her, she just goes to another room and sleeps.) Also, she has 2 cat trees, she can go out to the screened in porch whenever she wants (and comes back in, and goes back out a hundred times). She has a healthy diet witha good balance of wet and dry food. We have been to the vet 2 weeks ago and everything seems fine. So, I don't think that eating litter is nutrition related. It seems it is just curiosity and having fun with wrong choice of a thing.
 

SeventhHeaven

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All kittens want to taste try everything out, still find an adult swatting a pellet around now and again.

If you type your question into the search bar above you will find other conversations on similar subject.

Have never found it an issue had many more problems with the clumping litters, they would lay in it and play

like a sandbox for them same as you tracked all over the place!

Is the box far away in a room that's not used very much? That's usually an ideal spot.
 
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basscat

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I had to stop using pellets.  Mine would turn them into little piles of sawdust. No telling how much of that he ate.
Switched to clay litter, mixed with a little bit of Sweet PDZ (horse stall freshner) for the smell..... and the eating it stopped.
 
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