Pretty litter- safe to use or it causes cancer??

[pamela]

Hi. I haven't been on this forum for ages! I saw a thread on Fb about prettylitter which Ive started using and it has gotten me worried about my cats' health and safety plus my own safety.

I have 9 cats so I want litter that hides odor, isn't dusty and doesn't track everywhere and isn't too expensive.

I've started using pretty litter but I saw a few posts in the thread I saw on Fb which stated that silicone in pretty litter causes cancer. Is this true!?

post I read said "Silica causes cancer. I work with dusty silica and have to scrub my hands before eating so I don’t ingest it and wear a mask so I don’t breath in any dust, even the dust I can’t see… so how is a silica based liter that your cat digs in and potentially ingests while cleaning their paws classified as safe?"

 

[daftcat75]

Without knowing any details about Pretty Litter or the post in question, I’m going to guess that the difference between silica as a workplace hazard and silica in cat litter is the size of the particles. The poster on FB probably works with much smaller, inhalable particulates than the cats get in their litter box. (Similar to the whole “menadione causes cancer”—only if you inhale it which feedlot operators do, which is why it has an MSDS and they wear masks. But your cats don’t inhale it and aren’t exposed to the same routes of exposure or concentrations.)

I’m guessing that in our litigious society, if there was any chance Pretty Litter could cause cancer, some weasel strip mall lawyer would have already brought a class action case against them.

 

[treeclimber]

The silica dust that is harmful to breathe comes from true crystalline silica. These particles are dangerous to breathe because they are extremely small ( < 10 micrometers) and are sharp/pointy in shape, so they can get lodged in lung tissue and cause scarring and an inflammatory response. This can lead to the lung disease silicosis, and also to an increased risk of lung cancer. The danger of these dust particles is from their shape, not their chemical composition.

Crystal cat litter is made with amorphous (non-crystalline) silica that is formed into crystal-shaped pieces during processing. But despite being called "crystal" litter, it is not true crystalline silica - the little pieces are actually more of a crystal-shaped pellet than they are an actual crystal. When they break apart the dust they make isn't the same tiny, pointy particles that true crystalline silica releases, and it is not considered more dangerous than any other kind of dust.

Weirdly, some clay litters can contain true crystalline silica if it was present in the clay used to make the litter. So if the goal is to avoid breathing the kind of dust that leads to silicosis and lung cancer, silica "crystal" (gel pellet) litter is likely to be safer than clay.

 

[pamela]

Thank u both for ur replies! U have put my mind at ease.
Curious- what litter do u use that is good at controlling odors, isnt dusty, doesn't track much but isn't too expensive??

 

[treeclimber]

BTW, for anyone who's nerdy enough to be curious, here is a page showing the chemical structure of crystalline silica (left) and amorphous silica (right). The regular repeating patterns in the crystal structure are what let crystalline silica make the tiny, sharp, dangerous dust particles.

The amorphous silica on that page is glass. Silica cat litter probably contains some other atoms besides silicon and oxygen to make it less fragile, more absorbent, and help guarantee that none of the silicon and oxygen atoms present will be crystalline silica. But it will still look a lot more like the glass structure than the crystalline structure - no breaking apart to make nasty sharp dust.

 

[Furballsmom]

what litter do u use that is good at controlling odors, isnt dusty, doesn't track much but isn't too expensive??

Hi
I use a combination of Tidy cat free and clean, or Petco's SoPhresh bulk bin litter, mixed with Littermaid's Walnut or corncob. However, the Littermaid is currently unavailable so I'm experimenting with grass and other replacements for Littermaid.

 

[daftcat75]

I use World’s Best Cat Litter. It is excellent at controlling odor. But it probably doesn’t tick your other boxes. I have a large litterbox enclosure with the front door removed.

Tracking is reduced. But not completely eliminated. Neither me nor her are sneezing after scratching, scooping, or sifting so it must be okay on dust.

 

[treeclimber]

Thank u both for ur replies! U have put my mind at ease.
Curious- what litter do u use that is good at controlling odors, isnt dusty, doesn't track much but isn't too expensive??

Let me know if you ever find an answer to that!

I use silica, which is good for controlling odors and isn't very dusty. It does track some, but I've got a honey-comb shaped litter mat with little knobby things that gently encourage the cat to splay his toes and drop the litter, so I rarely find litter anywhere other than the immediate area surrounding the box. It's definitely NOT cheap, but it does go longer between litter changes, so the price difference isn't as big as it looks at first.

Other things we've tried:

• Feline Pine - affordable, doesn't track, little to no dust, and reasonably good at controlling urine smells. Doesn't do ANYTHING to help with poop smells or dry poop out. Some cats don't like the feel of the larger pellets under their feet (mine didn't mind), and the size of the pellets means you need to either use a special scoop with big holes or adapt your box-cleaning technique to "bring poop to surface, then pick up using scoop" as two separate steps. If I ever could't get silica litter, this would be my second choice.
• Yesterday's News - Don't bother, it doesn't control pee smells as well as Feline Pine, but has all of the drawbacks of the large pellets
• Okocat natural wood clumping litter (sawdust-like) - OMG, never ever again. At first it's not bad - the clumps come apart a bit easily, but are OK if handled gently. OK with pee smell, not great with poop smell. But after a few days any wet litter that doesn't get removed as clumps starts to develop its own unique smell - imagine a particularly vile cross between stale bread and the way someone's breath smells when they're sick. When I changed to a different litter the okocat left that smell behind clinging to the box, along with a slimy feeling that was hard to wash off. It took another two box changes before they were totally gone.
• Purina Breeze system - absolutely amazing with pee smells, not so great with poop smells. It uses pellets, but the pellets are smaller than Feline Pine or Yesterday's News which makes them easier to scoop (and probably more pleasant on the paws). The pellets do not absorb urine, which is why you can go a month or more without changing them - the pellets sit on top of a plastic grid, and the urine is meant to drip through the pellets and grid down to the drawer where there's a very absorbent pee pad. Each pee pad lasts about a week before you start to smell anything - when you change the pad you want to put the dirty one in outside trash immediately, it smells too bad for indoor trash. The hooded version of the Breeze litter box has ridges at the sides that will accumulate pee and stink if your cat likes to pee against the wall, but they're easy to access to give them a quick wipe when you scoop the box. I really liked the Breeze system and might still be using it, if my little guy wasn't prone to tummy issues and diarrhea - the long-use non-absorbent pellets and the plastic grid under them turn into a nightmare when covered in diarrhea.

 

[treeclimber]

Feline Pine - affordable, doesn't track, little to no dust, and reasonably good at controlling urine smells. Doesn't do ANYTHING to help with poop smells or dry poop out. Some cats don't like the feel of the larger pellets under their feet (mine didn't mind), and the size of the pellets means you need to either use a special scoop with big holes or adapt your box-cleaning technique to "bring poop to surface, then pick up using scoop" as two separate steps. If I ever could't get silica litter, this would be my second choice.

I feel like I should clarify when I said "Doesn't do ANYTHING to help with poop smells or dry poop out." that my cat has digestive issues and tends to produce exceptionally gooey and stinky poop.

Feline Pine may be fine for regular cat poop. It does a good enough job with urine that it must be pretty absorbent - if your cat doesn't have digestive issues, it's probably worth a try.

But for "digestive issues" poop, silica litter is worth its weight in gold. I sometimes have to bury the aftermath for him, but within 10-15 minutes of the poop being buried, the smell is completely gone.

 

[Tobermory]

Is there a way to edit posts here? I meant to say "litter mat" not "littermax"

Once you reach 20 posts you should be able to edit. That option will show up at the lower left of your post next to the word ‘Flag.’

 

[DreamerRose]

I use Fresh Step, and it's very good at controlling odors and clumping, but it tracks and is VERY dusty. My whole basement is covered in dust. And in addition, to my chagrin, it looks like in the past week it's doubled in price. Used to be $8.99 for 15 pounds, now is $17.99. Yikes!

So I've been considering Pretty Litter. My biggest hesitation is whether it clumps or not. I can't see how it can control the odor if it doesn't clump. Does the whole pan have to be emptied every week or so? If it does, that could get expensive for three litter pans.

 

[treeclimber]

So I've been considering Pretty Litter. My biggest hesitation is whether it clumps or not. I can't see how it can control the odor if it doesn't clump. Does the whole pan have to be emptied every week or so? If it does, that could get expensive for three litter pans.

It does not clump, but it is great for odor control. The crystals suck up moisture and the urine gets locked inside the crystals - once that happens the crystals are dry and odorless. Ditto for poop - the crystals desiccate it into hard little rock-like turdlets that look like they came from the world’s most constipated cat, and once that happens it stops stinking.

Instead of removing clumps, the maintenance crystal litter needs is to be stirred daily, so crystals get moved between high-pee and low-pee areas. (You should also still remove poop.) Individual crystals can hit their limit for how much urine they can absorb, so the goal is to keep stirring the box so that crystals that have absorbed some pee get mixed together with ones that haven’t, and the workload is shared so none of the crystals get “full”. Crystals don’t start to stink until they are full, so the more you can spread things around so no crystals get full, the longer you’ll be able to go between box changes.

It’s usually pretty easy to tell which crystals have been in contact with pee - blue ones start turning green, and white ones start turning yellow. The more they absorb the more they change, so when something goes from blueish-green to vivid green it’s probably near its limit. The box should be one even color after stirring, and when it starts looking more green than blue overall then it’s about time for a change. I find it a little harder to judge the different shades of yellow you get with white crystals, but keep stirring to keep the box an even color, and let your nose tell you when it’s time for a change.

The other important thing with crystal litter is to make it deep enough that most of the pee gets absorbed as it passes down through the crystals, so there’s not much left to pool at the bottom of the box. If the crystals at the bottom sit there marinating in a puddle of pee they will get full fast, possibly before you even have a chance to stir. But using 1/3 more litter to make sure it’s deep enough more than doubles the time I can make it last between box changes, so deeper is definitely the way to go.

Final tip - look at reviews for specific crystal litters. Most crystal litters are pretty good, but there are a few bad ones out there. In particular there was one brand I came across in a pink bag with a drawing of a cat with enormous eyes - even with stirring and deep litter I could only get half the time from that one that I do from other brands, so I only ever buy it as a last resort when everything else is out of stock.

 

[treeclimber]

Oh, one other crystal tip - if you do find crystals sitting in a puddle and they’ve changed to a very vivid green or yellow, use something like an empty yogurt container to scoop out the crystals in that spot and throw them away. Once they’re that full, they’re going to stink, so better to get rid of them instead of mixing them in with crystals that are still good.

That’s why it’s important to make it deep enough to avoid moisture accumulating at the bottom - a crystal sitting in a puddle will hit its limit in a few minutes/hours, so puddles are a big waste of litter and money. Unless it is freshly used or close to needing a change, the bottom of your litterbox should be dry. If it isn’t, add more crystals or try a different brand.

 

[hongducwb]

to hide odor, i think you should use something like Rose Oil (but dont use with Diffusers)
but the best is practice them to use toilet with modified part

with litter i just mixing multiple brand into one, lemon,Activated Carbon, natural coffee, etc..

 

[daftcat75]

It does not clump, but it is great for odor control. The crystals suck up moisture and the urine gets locked inside the crystals - once that happens the crystals are dry and odorless. Ditto for poop - the crystals desiccate it into hard little rock-like turdlets that look like they came from the world’s most constipated cat, and once that happens it stops stinking.

Instead of removing clumps, the maintenance crystal litter needs is to be stirred daily, so crystals get moved between high-pee and low-pee areas. (You should also still remove poop.) Individual crystals can hit their limit for how much urine they can absorb, so the goal is to keep stirring the box so that crystals that have absorbed some pee get mixed together with ones that haven’t, and the workload is shared so none of the crystals get “full”. Crystals don’t start to stink until they are full, so the more you can spread things around so no crystals get full, the longer you’ll be able to go between box changes.

It’s usually pretty easy to tell which crystals have been in contact with pee - blue ones start turning green, and white ones start turning yellow. The more they absorb the more they change, so when something goes from blueish-green to vivid green it’s probably near its limit. The box should be one even color after stirring, and when it starts looking more green than blue overall then it’s about time for a change. I find it a little harder to judge the different shades of yellow you get with white crystals, but keep stirring to keep the box an even color, and let your nose tell you when it’s time for a change.

The other important thing with crystal litter is to make it deep enough that most of the pee gets absorbed as it passes down through the crystals, so there’s not much left to pool at the bottom of the box. If the crystals at the bottom sit there marinating in a puddle of pee they will get full fast, possibly before you even have a chance to stir. But using 1/3 more litter to make sure it’s deep enough more than doubles the time I can make it last between box changes, so deeper is definitely the way to go.

Final tip - look at reviews for specific crystal litters. Most crystal litters are pretty good, but there are a few bad ones out there. In particular there was one brand I came across in a pink bag with a drawing of a cat with enormous eyes - even with stirring and deep litter I could only get half the time from that one that I do from other brands, so I only ever buy it as a last resort when everything else is out of stock.

I’m sure there’s something about the crystals that makes this more sanitary than it sounds. But this sound gross: stirring your pee soaked crystals until they can’t hold anymore pee.

 

[treeclimber]

I’m sure there’s something about the crystals that makes this more sanitary than it sounds. But this sound gross: stirring your pee soaked crystals until they can’t hold anymore pee.

It can be a little gross to think about - that’s part of why I like blue ones that turn green more than white ones that turn yellow.

But they’re not soaked, they’re dry. No liquid left. If you ever find wet crystals and it’s not because your cat just finished using the box, something is wrong.

They absorb (technically they “adsorb” - they are extremely porous on the inside with a lot of interior surfaces that trap water molecules) the heck out of liquid, and that which was wet becomes dry much, much faster than would happen from evaporation.

My use of the word “full” was probably a little unfortunate because it sounds like there’s wetness involved - there isn’t. “Used up” might have been a better description. No wetness and anything that makes pee yellow/stinky is trapped inside, not on the surface, so you can’t smell anything, only see it. The crystals do that for as long as they can, until they’ve reached their limit - only then do you start to find pee-soaked stinky crystals.

The hygenicness comes from the fact that there’s no wetness and no odor - just dry crystals that gradually change color to warn you how far along they are towards losing their magical ability to always be dry.

 

[daftcat75]

It can be a little gross to think about - that’s part of why I like blue ones that turn green more than white ones that turn yellow.

But they’re not soaked, they’re dry. No liquid left. If you ever find wet crystals and it’s not because your cat just finished using the box, something is wrong.

They absorb the heck out of liquid and some kind of chemical reaction happens inside them so the water in the pee ceases to be water. That which was wet becomes dry much, much faster than would happen from evaporation.

My use of the word “full” was probably a little unfortunate because it sounds like there’s liquid pee inside of the crystals - there isn’t. “Used up” might have been a better description. They do something that gets rid of the water and smell from the pee so all that’s left are the substances that make pee yellow. But anything left is trapped inside, not on the surface, so you can’t smell anything, only see it. The crystals do that for as long as they can, until they’ve reached their limit - only then do you start to find pee-soaked stinky crystals.

The hygenicness comes from the fact that there’s no wetness and no odor - just dry crystals that gradually change color to warn you how far along they are towards losing their magical ability to always be dry.

I’m sure the science is sound. It wouldn’t be so popular otherwise. But it still sounds gross. I’d rather scoop the clump and be gone with it. Sure there will be some leftover. Not every clump or scoop is perfect. But it’s only a small amount. And I change out the box completely every month. I have a standby duplicate box sitting underneath the active box. When it’s time to change, I pull out the active box. Fill up the standby. Her box is now changed and I can clean the formerly active box on my own time. No “out of service” time for her bathroom. When the formerly active box is cleaned and dried, I place it back underneath the active box and it becomes the new standby. I use a large multi gallon kibble storage unit to hold her unused litter to keep the grain bugs from showing up. I also use a UV flashlight to peek into the enclosure to see if she’s used the box. This has the added advantage of lighting up any accidents. Thankfully, there have been none so far.

 

[treeclimber]

I’m sure the science is sound. It wouldn’t be so popular otherwise. But it still sounds gross. I’d rather scoop the clump and be gone with it. Sure there will be some leftover. Not every clump or scoop is perfect. But it’s only a small amount. And I change out the box completely every month. I have a standby duplicate box sitting underneath the active box. When it’s time to change, I pull out the active box. Fill up the standby. Her box is now changed and I can clean the formerly active box on my own time. No “out of service” time for her bathroom. When the formerly active box is cleaned and dried, I place it back underneath the active box and it becomes the new standby. I use a large multi gallon kibble storage unit to hold her unused litter to keep the grain bugs from showing up. I also use a UV flashlight to peek into the enclosure to see if she’s used the box. This has the added advantage of lighting up any accidents. Thankfully, there have been none so far.

I edited my post shortly after I made it (I can do that now!). Posting before morning caffeine led to a brief mix-up of absorption vs. adsorption. So the version quoted in your reply is from when I had it wrong.

But you’d probably find either version gross, and that’s OK - totally fine to prefer urine be removed from the box entirely instead of trapped/dry/odorless but still present.

What I like about the crystals is how fast they work - I can’t scoop the box 10 times a day, but the crystals make wetness and stink be gone so fast that the box always smells like it’s clean. That absence of odor is incredible - even when it’s due to be scooped and stirred there’s no litterbox smell at all. I could eat dinner sitting right next to the thing - as long as my cat hadn’t just done a #2 you can’t even tell there’s a litterbox nearby.

 

[daftcat75]

I edited my post shortly after I made it (I can do that now!). Posting before morning caffeine led to a brief mix-up of absorption vs. adsorption. So the version quoted in your reply is from when I had it wrong.

But you’d probably find either version gross, and that’s OK - totally fine to prefer urine be removed from the box entirely instead of trapped/dry/odorless but still present.

What I like about the crystals is how fast they work - I can’t scoop the box 10 times a day, but the crystals make wetness and stink be gone so fast that the box always smells like it’s clean. That absence of odor is incredible - even when it’s due to be scooped and stirred there’s no litterbox smell at all. I could eat dinner sitting right next to the thing - as long as my cat hadn’t just done a #2 you can’t even tell there’s a litterbox nearby.

And that’s where I like my traditional litter. Betty (and Krista before her) have dropped a deuce at dinner time. They both buried it and if I felt so inclined, I could finish my dinner first. I work from home, and I have only one cat (Krista passed in 2020. Betty is my new cat adopted this year.) I have a Litter Genie atop the enclosure. Betty announces her bathroom trips. So I’ll scoop about as quickly as she drops. When she uses the box when I’m sleeping or I’m out, I often wouldn’t know unless I shine the flashlight into the enclosure. Or I get the camera alert. My litterbox protocol has been developed over a couple of years of dealing with Krista’s butt and gut woes (IBD, clostridium, and eventually lymphoma. ) I have tried covered boxes and automatic boxes and different kinds of litter. For now, a simple box (with a standby underneath it) with World’s Best Cat Litter, and a door-less enclosure works the best.

 

[treeclimber]

My little guy also likes to poop when I’m eating - if buried (by him or me) the smell goes away quickly. Much faster than clay.

The crystals dry out the poop so fast that whenever I need to take a sample for the vet I have to watch the box like a hawk and rescue the poop from the crystals as soon as he’s done or it turns into a desiccated poop-rocks the vet can’t analyze. The poop-rocks still have a faint smell if they’re at the surface and I’m leaning in to scoop the box, but not when they’re buried. When the initial output is on the loose/diarrhea side, the crystals stick to it and turn it into a very dry crystal-coated clump - when that happens I scoop the whole clump.

Sorry to hear about Krista’s issues. I’m glad you’ve been able to come up with a protocol for managing the litterbox part of the situation, and I hope the lymphoma is the low-grade kind that might still let her have a few more good years.

We’re still working on a diagnosis for my little guy - they’re leaning towards eosinophilic enteritis based on his bloodwork, but I can’t afford the endoscopic biopsy to confirm so we stopped at “ultrasound doesn’t show anything wrong” and now we’re just working on finding the best way to manage it. No thickening of the intestines on the ultrasound, which I think might be unusual if it is EE, but everything else medical with him (asthma, granulomas) ties back to eosinophils and they’ve gotten even higher in his latest bloodwork, so I can definitely see why EE would make sense.

I’ve never tried World’s Best Cat Litter, but if someone else with a gut-issues kitty thinks highly of it then that bumps it up to the top of my list of things to try next time our crystals are out of stock!