My cat stands in litter box but pees outside of box, help!

[tacosundaellama]

Hi,

Our cat (he's between 10 months - 1 year old) has a weird habit, and we don't know how to help him.  Whenever he needs to pee, he stands in the litter box, props his back feet up on the edge, and pees all over the floor right outside the very edge of the litter box.  Then, he steps further into the litter box so that he's fully inside it, and starts pawing at the litter like he is trying to bury the pee.  He has done this his whole life, and he's not afraid of the litter box at all - he has no trouble getting his poo into the box properly.  It doesn't seem to matter how recently the box has been cleaned - he'll even do it 5 minutes after the litter has just been changed - and we have moved the location of the box once or twice and that doesn't seem to affect his behavior either.  And he has watched his older brother (5 years old) do it properly for his whole life, but he just doesn't seem to get it.  How can we get him to angle his pee into the box?  He is adorable and we love him to pieces but it would be nice to not have to clean up his pee off of the floor everyday.

Thanks - any advice would be greatly appreciated!!

 

[nansiludie]

What kind of litter box does he have now? My youngest male cat, does this, just stands and pees right over the ledge. I fixed that by buying a large Storage Tote sweater bin, 35 gallons and cut in a doorway. that way he can stand and pee and the floor won't get wet.

 

[detmut]

i agree. try a larger box and/or one with higher sides -- at least 22 inches by 16 inches and 6 inches high

 

[theyremine]

Had the same experience as nansiludie.   My two ferals  would pee over the side of the box.   A box with higher sides solved the problem.

 

[MoochNNoodles]

I agree; higher sides or even one you have to get into from the top.  

Noodles likes to ":hover" on the side of the box and will sometimes pee over  at the entrance because she isn't in far enough.  It's a fun mess to clean! 

  I can see that she pees on the side of the box; which are higher than the front.  It's that little bit lower side that gives us issues! 

 

[Columbine]

We had a cat that would miss the box from time to time. He favoured a covered box (minus the flap) and it was the biggest we could get. Despite the cover he'd still miss The greyhound got the blame for a while until I caught Cali in the act :rofl: The only solution we found was to put a puppy training pad in the offending area (we'd stick the edge under the box to keep it in place). Not ideal, but it did save the floor and make cleanup easier.

 

[kerri21]

Hi

I had the same problem with my kitten. How many litterboxes do you currently have per cat? Some cats prefer having two litterboxes, one for pee and one for poop. Naturally their instinct is to pee and poop in different places in the wild.

Getting another litterbox might solve the issue.

I hope your days of cleaning up oopsies are numbered!!

 

[tory]

My cat did the same, so I made my own litter box.  

  I bought a large plastic storage box at target and cut a round hole in the top lid, I also added some vent holes in the side.  Easy to clean and no messes outside the box anymore.  Let me know if you want to try this and need more details - I think it's perfect.  I do own a dremel though, which made it super easy.