Self Cleaning Litter Boxes And Their Shortfalls

As cat owners we are all concerned with regards to the health and fitness of our cats.  We are human however, and many of us would like to make taking care of our pets as easy as possible.  Inventive advertising experts realize this, so they produce a new device which is going to help reduce the amount of time it requires to care for our pets.  Well, this isn’t usually the case.  Consider an automatic cat litter box for example.  Even though the idea sounds convenient, I discovered otherwise.

With the lure of convenience, many pet owners were deceived into paying for an automatic litter box.  Nearly all models have a rake system which is initialized soon after the cat exits the litter box.  At this point the rake is supposed to effortlessly scoop up the clumped cat litter and discard it in the disposable litter tray.  In my case, it just didn’t work out as I had hoped.

To start with, it is important to note that my cat is very old.  His feces is often soft.  As soon as the rake came across this, it was a mess.  I was required to peel apart the top of the litter box just to get at the release tabs of the rake so that I could clean it.  Under ordinary conditions this might not be bad, but the rake was unbelievably soiled.  After I eventually got the rake out, it was difficult washing between the teeth.  This alone was more than enough to make myself question the judgment to purchase one of these so called self cleaning litter boxes.

Where I live, we encounter regular difficulties with electricity failures.  There are occasions when the power is out for a long time.  One day I was caught off guard when the electric went out and the litter box did not function.  Sure, the self cleaning litter box has battery backups in the event the electricity goes out, but it does not alert the pet owner when the batteries are discharged.  After the power was restored, I heard the litter box continually working.  After taking a look at it, I realized that the rake cycle was only going midway where there seemed to be too much clumped cat litter creating a great deal of resistance that the rake couldn’t discard it.  For that reason, the rake cycle was disrupted and would reset over and over.

If you are looking for a litter box, mull over the way it will perform in the real world.  I also bought into the view that a self cleaning cat litter box would save me a considerable amount of time.  In the end, the self cleaning litter box wound up in the garbage, and I purchased a sturdy litter scoop instead.  And to be sincere, there are no surprises nowadays.  Regular scooping is a lot better then taking apart an automatic litter box to get to a dirty rake to clean.