This post contains mischief on many different levels, and it was all started by our cat Conrad. It’s really just a result of living in a multi-pet household, with different species, and the added complication of old age.
Level 1: Cat won’t use the litterbox.
It’s been a while now that Conrad has refused to use his litter box most of the time. We had him checked by our vet, and tried every trick in the book to get him to. We cut him a break now because he is at least 17 years old this spring. It’s on the lower level of the house and not easy for him to get to. We take him down there several times a day and sometimes he’ll use it, sometimes he won’t. Honestly, I don’t think he has a lot of control over it these days. So we live with it. We have wood and tile floors and we can clean it up. The big problem is that if he poops in the house, this is an exciting event for the dogs….and they all go running for it. It became the biggest problem in the middle of the night. Who wants to get woken up by dogs running downstairs, and then try to get up and race them down there (and hardly ever win)? No fun!
Our house was originally set up as a Chalet style with an open loft upstairs. When we decided to remodel and move our bedroom up there to enjoy the view from, there was really no way to make a door to that room, so the staircase is open, with no way to block the dogs up there easily. We didn’t want to move the kitty litter to the main floor, and I don’t think Conrad would always use it even if we could find a place away from the dogs. The other option was to corral Conrad somewhere at night. For years, Conrad was a skittish cat who spent a lot of time hiding away, so we just didn’t like the idea of now having to hide him away somewhere.
But when Cricket started having some stomach issues lately, we felt that the late night “poop runs” were not helping! We had been propping up a baby gate at the bottom of the stairs, anchored by a chair, but Cricket had figured out a way around or through it. So we had to come up with a new solution. With the staircase the way it is, getting a gate up there wasn’t easy but we finally figured out a way to do it.
Level 2: Luke won’t go through the gate.
Luke wouldn’t go through the gate. I don’t know why….we’ve used these gates many times since he was a puppy, in different locations, and it was never an issue. We used it most recently when he was recovering from having his knees checked. I guess because it was in a new location, our fearful boy was going to have a problem with it. So the first few nights, my hubby had to keep taking the gate down to get Luke up to bed, and then put it back up again. Not ideal.
So during the days I started working with him using treats and trying to get him to come through. The best I could get was him stretching his neck through, but he just wouldn’t come up. We simply weren’t making any progress. By the way, he would go down through fine, but he would not go up! I honestly think it’s because he wasn’t thinking about it when going down, he’s usually at a run when he’s headed down!
Sheba was a bit timid about it at first too, but not for long.
Level 3: New lure, and a thief.
OK, who uses a tissue as a lure to get their dog to do something? Desperate people, that’s who! Luke loves tissues, so I just figured it was worth a try. It actually worked one time, but after that he was on to me, and he wasn’t doing it twice. And then this happened as well:
I didn’t see that coming. Sheba is not a tissue lover like Luke. Though come to think of it, years ago she was the reason we had to start putting our bathroom trash can up on a shelf. She was a trash picker.
Level 4: Do NOT try this at home.
Tired people don’t always think clearly. More than once, we happened to get behind Luke when heading up to bed, and found that just a gentle push up through the gate would get him to go through. My hubby elevated that to actually half picking him up and just kind of putting him through. Does it seem wise to force a fearful dog to do something he doesn’t want to? No, it does not. But force is a strong word…if Luke had actually struggled at all, we would have immediately stopped. He let us do it, and guess what? It worked. Luke is now going through the gate with no problems. All we can figure is that just giving him that push fairly quickly didn’t give him time to think about being scared. When he is afraid of something, if he can’t see it, he is often fine (my hubby learned that at Luke’s recent vet visit…another story for another time).
We’re just grateful that we finally found a solution to the Conrad problem. Cricket’s stomach seems to be feeling better, and we’re proud of Luke for overcoming one of his fears. The first few times he went through that gate on his own, we gave him lots of praise and I think that helped him along too.
We are joining the Monday Mischief blog hop. Thank you to our hosts: Alfie’s Blog, Snoopy’s Dog Blog, and My Brown Newfies. Please visit other blogs through the links below for more mischief fun!
Litter box mischief is the worst. Glad that you found a solution that works for everyone. Barley is weird about change, too–we went to our favorite place to walk yesterday and there as a white flag marking something in one of the gardens and she stared and crouched and refused to walk by it for a good while.
If we move furniture, Sheba often won’t go in a room for weeks! We haven’t moved any since Luke came,but I imagine he’d do the same. Sometimes I think our dogs are TOO observant!
Wow you sure did have a lot of mischief in this one.
Does Conrad mostly stay on one level? If so, they do make gates with cat doors, maybe a little box in a room with the cat gate/door might help?
Conrad does stay on one level. That’s a great idea, and the gates we have do have cat doors in them. Guess what? Cricket can fit through the cat door!
I think Luke trusts your husband and that gave him the extra encouragement. Way to go hubby and Luke! 🙂
Oh, I think you’re right, thank you. Now if we could just use the same principles for some of his other fears.
Yeah Luke! Sheba you are funny you tissue steel-er. Sorry to hear about conrad, I don’t blame the old guy either, I would do the same as you. G and G for the past year have went to eating MK poop out of the box, weird how they just started. Darn dogs.
I’m not sure we’ve ever had a dog that didn’t want to eat it…maybe our first two? I can’t remember that far back…LOL. Once we got our first beagle all bets were off anyway.
This is pretty funny on many levels… as you’ve listed here LOL. I can’t imagine having to race a herd of dogs downstairs after cat poop! I can totally see Shiner doing the same thing. She used to eat our old cat’s poop from the litter box when she could. Callie has a lightly scented litter and I can never smell her poop, so maybe Shiner can’t either because I haven’t caught her eating any cat poop since we got the cat. She’s not great at picking up scents sometimes… Plus the litterbox has a door flap.
You’re so lucky! I guess we have too many dogs with hound in them, there’s no chance they’re not going to smell something! LOL We’d by lying on the bed and all of the sudden Luke’s and Cricket’s noses go up in the air…we’d know and sometimes then we could beat them downstairs!
Lots of mischief going on for sure 😉 Glad you figured out how to help your cutie Luke over his gate issue..the tissue was a nice touch!! It’s all about knowing the right kind of motivation for your particular pet!
And sometimes it just has be trial and error!
We like your creativity…even if the dogs didn’t get it at first.
Do you think Conrad is having problems getting in and out the box and that may be one of the reasons he’s not using it regularly? There are boxes that are lower on one side to help older cats who may be arthritic. Or you could cut one of the sides of his box to make it lower. Just a thought.
Thank you so much for the thought. But the litter boxes we have do have a cut out section to make getting in and out easier. We think he might just be a bit senile too…and just doesn’t always remember where he’s supposed to go. 🙂
Creative methods are good! Mr. N is not afraid of the baby gate at all… in fact he figured out how to knock it over.
I guess it’s all “thinking outside the box”, right, which is pretty necessary when you have pets!
Yes, our lives would have been easier if Cricket had been the one to be afraid of the gate…no such luck. 🙂
We have the same issue with the dogs going after the Litter Treats. They also apparently like cat barf too. Followed by the need to give humans lots of stinky kisses. We found a special latch that keeps the bathroom doors open just enough to let cats in but not dogs, and that solved the litter problem.
The cat barf problem is another issue, which is more like the extraneous poo issue you mention. We never know when it’s going to happen and usually the first we know of it is when Lilah is halfway through a “meal.” Yuck.
–Wags (and purrs) from Life with Dogs and Cats
Oh, that’s a cool latch, I have never seen one that did that.
Yes, you certainly can’t anticipate when a cat is going to get sick either!
We always check the dogs’ breath before we let them kiss us…LOL.
Sounds like our place, never a “normal” problem!
LOL…so true! There’s always something new when you have this many, right, Emma?
The tissue trick is pawesome, even when it came different as suspected. I will try it with a tissue too, easy is a tissue-fan and that thingies have zero calories :o)
I figured that too…what does the occasional tissue hurt anyway? Luke gets enough of them on his own when we forget and leave one lying within his reach! I’m surprised how many dogs love them!
Love the tissue lure!
I’m glad you don’t think I’m crazy! Whatever works, right? 🙂
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Oh wow, thank you so much, Molly! I will shoot you an email first thing tomorrow!
I’m glad Luke got past his fears and a solution to the “cat treat race” was found. One never knows what will frighten a dog or why. Wouldn’t you love to have a conversation with them to discuss? I know I would!
Life would be so much easier, wouldn’t it?
Oh my. Oh my oh my oh my. Our dogs love tootsie rolls, but not just from the cat. They eat a lot of duck and chicken poo, too.
I’ll keep that in mind in case we ever thought about expanding our menagerie!
Its very reassuring to read about other’s lives with so many pets! Our household has encountered so many similar situations and it just depends on the house and the pets on how you come to a solution. Luckily we have this cover dad made for our air conditioner on the back porch. The dogs can’t reach it so it makes perfect spot for the litter box. The food has been moved to the kitchen counter since its been an epic fail to keep Rhette off the counters. Love Dolly
Samantha eats on the counters too, there’s also no keeping her off them and it’s just easiest. But poor Conrad can’t jump any more. I’m glad you are figuring out your challenges too since you expanded your household!
It is weird how some dogs react to situations. Pierre has trust issues with everything, but once he “gets it” all is well. I’m glad that you found a solution.
Luke really is “out of sight, out of mind”. As soon as he can’t see the scary thing, he’s totally fine.
Dogs are just so mysterious sometimes aren’t they…
Glad you finally got him through. PS Love the tissue lure.
Thanks! I guess that’s another way dogs are good for us….they keep our brains working trying to solve issues!
Daisy’s also scared of the baby gates we have because of the loud noise it makes when it falls over plus the loud commotion it caused when I fell over it. But we don’t want her going through the gates when they’re up anyway, so it works out okay. 😉
We’ve put them in other different places where it was good that Luke was afraid of them. Yes, I’ve tripped over ours more than once, and the metal ones can definitely be loud!
It’s times like these that I really want to know exactly what our pets are thinking. Wouldn’t it be great if just once they could look at us and say “hey, – – – ?” Well now that I think about it – it would be sort of scary! BTW – the loft sounds amazing – take a photo of your view one day! Take care
I have posted some photos of the view….you must have missed them. I actually have another one coming up I think of Cricket looking out the window up there.
Yes, we might actually be happier NOT knowing what our dogs are thinking!
Glad Luke overcame his fear of the gate! Just that little “nudge” or two was all he needed. But I smiled through the whole story. Glad Cricket’s tummy is feeling better! It was probably all that cat poop she was getting into. Thank doG we don’t have cats – I’d never get Ducky’s issues under control!! LOL
Oh yeah, you definitely wouldn’t want that issue factoring into Ducky’s problems! Cricket’s stomach has still been fine so I think that was definitely it.
Mika is actually scared to walk through my baby gates as well. Although she will, but she goes very slow and very cautious while walking through them haha! I’m glad he overcame his fear!
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Sheba was pretty slow about it at first too, but she was easily coaxed. Luke was a little more work, as you saw!
Jan you sing the song of the multi pet household people…we too had issues with tray diving! the solution we had was pop the litter trays into the big clawfoot bathtub in the man bathroom..the dogs can’t get to them..and any overspill cleans easily (of course i can never have a bath anymore ) but alas with Marbles getting older this was becoming an issue..she could not get up and in..so now we need a tray on the floor..square one dogs and tray diving..so we bought a toddler gate for the bathroom..of course the bars are too close and she can’t get through or jump over due to her hips..so it is up and propped open and if it is moved by the dogs i can hear it..at night all the girls go nuts so they all sleep on their beds in the bathroom with access to the catio..and i have to lock the door because Pickles worked out how to jump up and open it..so trays are safe…we can sleep..dogs sleep in our room..and all is well..phew…we sure do have to work many things into our days don’t we 🙂 hugs Bev xx
I think you knew exactly what I was talking about here, Bev! Don’t you think it’s good for our older brains to get this kind of exercise trying to figure these things out? These animals will keep our minds young I think. xxoo
I bet that gate looked scary to Luke. I am glad you found a way to help him overcome his fear. 🙂
One down, and a few more to go! 🙂
You had me laughing out loud by the time you got to the tissue lure.
So glad you can bring a sense of humor to the challenges senior and fearful pets bring to life. 🙂
Honey has some fear with the steep stairs in our house. I find that touching her side or neck will encourage her to go up or down when she’s frightened. I wonder if instead of “forcing” Luke to go through the gate, he found your husband’s touch helpful.
Dogs bump and jostle each other all the time and sometimes I wonder if we shouldn’t imitate their behavior sometimes. Maybe your husband was just acting like a dog. 🙂
I’m so glad you enjoyed this, Pamela! Our lives with our dogs are so silly sometimes, and it’s so much fun sharing our adventures. If we don’t laugh about it, we would just be depressed over their aging.
You are right about the touch between my hubby and Luke I think. Luke loves to lean up against us and push when he wants attention, and I often just lean back into him and I think he likes that, probably because we’re acting like dogs!