LIVING WITH NATURAL KITTY LITTER

Here in the Third World, we don't have access to fancy-shmancy cat supplements, artificial cat play environments, self-flushing litter, or any of the wonders consumer society cats enjoy. So we use natural cat litter in the form of wood shavings. This can be mixed with sawdust, too, but we find sawdust-only too smelly and soggy when wet. We cat caretakers think a lot about what our dears urinate and defecate on. That's one way we are different from other people. Here in India we don't yet demand imported cat litter, and there are no domestic litter manufacturers because hardly three people keep indoor cats and hardly five have ever heard of the concept of trying to keep a cat safe. Cats are supposed to die young, as in "Only the good die young." If that is true, then I want only bad cats (as though there could be such a thing)! Soil is impossibly messy but what works for us are these wood shavings, which come in various grades, according to the mill. Our local sawmills love to sell this useless (here) by-product of illegally cut giant trees to obviously mentally challenged people like us. At 20 cents (figuring in U.S. dollars) for a waist-high bag, we're happy. Now we can buy two grades: fine powder and short curly shavings which we once used to top-off the powder. We changed to all-shavings, and change it every three days. No odor problem because we remove and flush the solids daily with a long handled kitchen implement used to fry vegetables (no longer). However, some people who have too few or too-small pans for the number of cats they have, or who do not have adequate natural ventilation in their homes, or whose lives require them to spend time within a foot or so of the litter box will notice a NATURAL whiff of urine now and then, UNLESS they have discovered the wonder chemical VINEGAR. We use artificial vinegar to save money. IT IS AS GOOD AS ANY FANCY, EXPENSIVE CAT ODOR ELIMINATOR!  We use it full strength in a spray bottle, although you might experiment with dilutions. You can spray it on top of the litter, and it will eliminate odors. Maybe eight squirts will be enough. If you put it under a fan, it will dry quicker, but the instant it touches the wet litter, the neutralizing takes effect. And, if you have a spraying cat, no matter what it sprays on, from beds to doors, vinegar will neutralize it like magic. Doesn't destroy cloth and completely removes the smell instantly. Another tip: a shallow plastic tray, EMPTY, is very attractive to some of our cats. They won't leave droppings in it, but some will urinate in it, and what a litter-saver that is! Just flush it away and rinse clean.