When can I let my kitten roam the house unsupervised?

[bantamchick]

Hello,

I have a 2 month old kitten. She's 10-11 weeks, to be exact. I've kept her in my room upstairs for almost 2 weeks now. I've let her explore the upstairs, which has the bathroom and 2 other bedrooms. I've always supervised her when she was exploring even after kitten-proofing everything, and she was wary about going downstairs so she's avoided going down until a few days ago. I keep her in my room overnight.

I was happy with her progress until we ran into a problem: she leaves the litterbox mid-poop and she ends up with poop stuck to her fluffy butt and a nugget on the floor. This happened 2 times. She's never had this problem before I let her explore--and it was solved when I kept her in my room again. What should I do? Do I give it a few more days until letting her explore again? Why did this happen?

To note: I have a litterbox downstairs that I've introduced to her.

 

[Furballsmom]

Hi
You might give her bum a trim so that she isn't having dingleberries, whether she's roaming or not

 

[bantamchick]

Hi
You might give her bum a trim so that she isn't having dingleberries, whether she's roaming or not

Will do!! She usually cleans herself thoroughly and I haven't seen this happen before, but for extra measures, I will give her a sanitary trim.

 

[Furballsmom]

It'll be an interesting introduction to "things humans do" for her lol

 

[klunick]

My rule of thumb for letting them explore unsupervised was whenever they were big enough to no longer fit under furniture like couches. Less likely to lose that way.

 

[bantamchick]

My rule of thumb for letting them explore unsupervised was whenever they were big enough to no longer fit under furniture like couches. Less likely to lose that way.

The gaps between the floor and some of my furniture is so high so I don't know if that's possible I thought about buying her a collar with a little bell but I've heard bells could actually hurt their ears? I've heard mixed things

 

[sidneykitty]

First, happy adoption and congrats!

Thanks for asking, I'm really curious about this, too! I'm sure there is no "one size fits all" answer and it depends on you, your comfort level, how your kitten is doing, but I'm interested to see what people say and what advice is given.

My place also has furniture even adult cats cat hide under so that isn't possible for me, either. There is a small gap under my oven and fridge, though, which I am convinced kittens could squeeze under and that would obviously be very bad, so at my place, I'd definitely wait until they are big enough not to be able to do that.

I'm not sure about bells, I've never heard they hurt their ears... but when I first moved into my new place with my former cat, I put a collar with a bell (and tags) on her, so I could hear her around the house, and because I was very worried about her dashing out the door. Eventually, we got comfortable enough without doing so but it sure helped me, even hearing her bell in the middle of the night. Definitely be sure to get a breakaway collar if you decide to do this though!