If your cat has never buried her poop, it might be because she never learned from mamma kitty. Give her treats when she does cover it. You can also use clicker training to "capture" the right movements and slowly encourage her over time. If a cat's not covering his poop, it might be because the litter box is in a location your cat doesn't like.
Or maybe you don't have enough boxes. It's a good rule of thumb to provide at least one litter box per cat. Put the litter boxes in different locations. Make sure that some are away from loud noises like washing machines or heavy foot traffic. A cat who gets distracted by noise might forget to cover his poop. Sometimes stress can cause cats to leave their poop uncovered. In the wild, cats may cover their poop to hide their scent so predators don't know they're around.
So a cat who isn't covering his poop might be in competition with another cat and is trying to show dominance. Other stress triggers, like other cats wandering outside the house, might leave her feeling insecure. Even having visitors over or moving to a new house might trigger your cat to feel stressed.
If you've got a stressed-out kitty, reducing stress can help her feel more confident about covering her poop. Try a calming diffuser.
These release a drug-free, odorless vapor that mimics the pheromones a cat uses to indicate an area is safe. Cats may also learn this behavior from observing their mothers, and kittens taken away from their parents too early may not have had a chance to observe this. The behavior is largely instinctual, though, so this is possible but unlikely. Litter box issues are possibilities, as your cat may not like the feel of certain litter or where the litter box is situated, so they avoid using it.
In general, there is probably nothing to worry about if your cat is not burying their poop, as cats are notoriously finicky and the smallest issue may be preventing the behavior.
You can now rest easy knowing that your cat burying their poop is perfectly normal behavior! Oliver Ollie Jones is a zoologist turned freelance animal writer living in South Australia with his partner Alex and their mini zoo consisting of many aquatic creatures, dog Pepper, and of course, cat Steve. He hopes to share his feline knowledge and expertise with people so they can share in his passion and help their cats live their best lives.
Territory In the wild, big cats are at the top of the food chain, and as such, there is a constant battle for territory and dominance. Image Credit: xamnesiacx84, Shutterstock 2. Predators While territorial disputes with larger cats are certainly a concern, there is more in the wild that smaller cats have to worry about.
Genetics Your domesticated cat still has survival mechanisms in their DNA , and certain habits are purely instinctual. Why do they bury their poop? Learn why in this short article. Cats are exceptionally clean animals. This is not the only reason that they bury their waste, though. All cats instinctively cover their waste. This includes wild cats, too. This instinct derives from the use of urine and feces to mark territory. So while all cat poop probably smells the same to you, cats can identify one another by the way their poop smells.
Dominant cats like lions, tigers, and leopards do not always cover their feces, instead leaving it uncovered to mark their territory. Other cats further down the food chain usually do bury their waste in order to not appear as a threat to more dominant cats. Moreover, cats of all sorts bury their waste so as to not attract predators since burying something decreases its smell. Domestic cats know that they depend on humans to survive and are not the most dominant in a household, which is why they too cover their poop and pee.
Cats are territorial by nature and their society is structured in a dominance-controlled hierarchy governed by strict rules of conduct. They mark their territory by depositing pheromones, chemicals that convey information about an individual to other cats. They use a variety of methods to mark their territory in this manner, including scratching, rubbing against things … and leaving their feces uncovered. In colonies of feral cats, subordinate individuals cover up their feces, while dominant stray cats leave waste uncovered in conspicuous spots.
Most indoor cats bury their waste, probably because they feel subordinate to their human family. However, in multicat households, the dominant cat will sometimes leave feces uncovered to announce his presence and status.
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