Litter Kwitter Training

[Cburton]

I have two female cats that I have trained to use the litter for the first red stage. For the last month. Now, with the second stage using the Amber ring, their bathroom habits have switched to ones and twos both on the litter quitter and on the floor in the bathroom. I have no idea how to encourage them anymore that I am, already am with constant positive reinforcement. This is getting infuriating and it’s taking quite a bit out of me to not lose it and punish them. I just don’t know what to do. Can someone please please please give me some direction tips, pointers links, videos, instructions, anything!

 

[Kris107]

I tried this with one of my cats. She would do number 1s but didn't like how number 2s splashed. She let me know by going elsewhere. I listened and we went back to a regular litter box. Some things just aren't natural for them.

 

[Kieka]

Honestly, I am against using those.

From this article, Why You Should Not Toilet Train Your Cat, some very good points are:

1. Toilet training doesn't encourage your cat's natural instincts. Cats are wired to bury their waste, an instinct that litter boxes encourage. If your cat uses the toilet exclusively, they no longer have an outlet for this natural instinct.
2. Evidence of potential health issues gets flushed away. As gross as it sounds, changes in the amount and frequency of your cat's urine can indicate a number of health problems such as hyperthyroidism, diabetes, kidney problems, urinary tract infections, cystitis (bladder inflammation) and dehydration. One complication, urinary (urethral) obstruction, can quickly become fatal. Keeping tabs on the contents of your cat's litter box is one way to detect early signs of these illnesses and seek veterinary care that much quicker.
3. Your cat could get injured or fall in the water. While most cats are eager climbers, the toilet can be a hazardous obstacle to mount, especially if your cat is older or frail. Plus, cats of any age can slip into the bowl — an unpleasant experience for everyone involved.
4. It can cause unsanitary conditions for others who use the toilet. Cats can potentially be infected with the parasite Toxoplasma gondii, which can spread through their feces to infect humans. While most humans with Toxoplasma gondii have immunity to the disease, pregnant women and people with weakened immune systems are at higher risk for health issues. If humans are using the same toilet as the cat, the risk of zoonotic (animal-to-person) infection can increase.
5. It's harder to board your cat. Most boarding facilities don't accommodate toilet-using cats; they provide litter boxes instead. You can also assume that if your cat needs to stay at the vet's office overnight, or if you are traveling with your cat, they won't have access to cat-friendly toilets

I would also add that there can be a host of problems that you can encounter if your cat slips and falls then refuses to use it again (or when they are too injuried, old or ill to use it). Including using other areas of your home inappropriately and refusing to transition back to a traditional litter box.

Finally, I once attended a Jackson Galaxy talk, someone in the audience asked about it. He had a very passionate response about it that basically boiled down to its going against everything a cat is. TBH, it was the only topic he seemed upset to have been asked about during that particular talk and the person who asked was a little shaken by the vehemence in his response. You can see his response in this YouTube video , which isn't of course word for word what he said at the talk but same vibe.

If you do want to continue trying, please know that punishing your cats for not using it won't work. Cats simply don't understand punishment the same way people do and you are more likely to drive them to more stress reactions and worst behaviors in addition to damaging your relationship with your cats. This article goes more into training techniques and why punishment doesn't really work with cats and can make things worse How to train a cat | BPS

 

[Alldara]

I'm going to second NOT training this further for your cats.

As your cats age, it's going to get harder and harder for them to jump up, and balance on the slippery rim of a toilet.

As cats age, we even need to adjust to different litter boxes in many cases. Often reverting back to low sided boxes.

If your cats are not longer used to litters, youre going to be more frustrated with the amount of accidents they have around your home (fault of old age, not the cat).

Lastly, your cats aren't liking it or they'd go to it faster. Pushing a cat to "go" somewhere they don't like, also increases the likelihood of increased house accidents, constipation, bladder infection, etc

 

[Alldara]

Ps. Punishing them it's inappropriate and weong, as the house accidents are due to what you are trying to get them to do.

Please try peeing and pooing while balancing on a slippery surface and then think about how often you'd like to do that (3 or 4 times a day? When you're sleepy and just woke up and really have to go??? Could you accomplish that?)

Humans don't stand and balance on the rim. We sit, and the toilets are designed for that and we are secure. Heck, people have fallen asleep on their toilets before and been safe. That's not the situation for our cats.

 

[iPappy]

I'm with the others on this one. If they're going around the area, they're telling you they know where you want them to go but don't like it at all. If they're making a mess in the bathroom, a litter box is going to more than likely be the easier solution all together. What were the reasons you had for switching to this method? Was it to make things easier on you, or, is it because your cats have a litter box avoidance?

 

[Meowmee]

I tried to train my Angie years ago and she was ok with peeing but she wanted to poop in a box so eventually we went back to that. You may have to stay at stage one hole for a lot longer. She also got more upset with the bigger hole at first but then she would pee in it. I was going to try with Quinn but it was so hard to get family members to leave the door open and put the litter training device back so I never did.

Before that I had found the cat genie which is essentially a cat litter box toilet bowl that has plastic litter and is washed every cycle. Unfortunately mine had some plumbing issues and is not usable currently but I had switched to regular boxes again when taking Merlin in and ended up never training him to it. It can be hooked to a toilet or a sink(under the sink plumbing line I had put in) Unfortunately the leak happened in the cat genie tubing so I will have to buy a new one if I go back to it. It did get clogged sometimes. I ended up scooping the poop out anyway and flushing it, it was great for Wizard for urine because he had crf and urinated a lot.

Eventually Quinn changed to that, before that I used litters in a box in my bedroom when he was little.

I trained Wizard and Quinn to that by putting there regular box near the cat genie and then slowly not cleaning it. They took to and liked the cat genie as it was always clean and never smelled etc. The only issue would be if you have really soft stool/ diarrhea it is a bit of a mess to clean, but that is a mess anyway usually.

One of my part siamese cats years ago would pee in the sink and bathtub so she actually preferred that so, some cats can adjust to that or to a toilet, someone here said one of her cats insists on using the toilet and trained herself to do it, lol.

Some cats though cannot adjust and need a regular box or a cat genie etc. I would not worry about retraining them to a box after training fully or half way etc. Angie had no problem going back to a box after using the toilet for a while.

CatGenie: Self-Washing, Self-Flushing Cat Box.

Here is a video of how someone trained her Burmese cat to use the toilet using the litter kwitter: