The Great Booda Hack

EDITED TO UPDATE: I AM SAD TO REPORT THAT NELEA WAS EUTHANIZED ON JULY 6, 2016
https://www.facebook.com/holly.hurley/posts/10207094926517541

The older my sweet Nelea gets, the more I learn. She's 18, so I don't know how much smarter I can get.

She has always been a very faithful user of her litter box. She tends to back up to the very edge, and she would often have her rear hanging over the edge and the pee would end on the outside. She's also a vigorous digger. 

I tried a few high-sided boxes, but the only successful one was the Booda. We have been using it for at least 10 years. 

I got tired of fighting her off while I was in the process of her monthly litter changeout and eventually got the bright idea of two boxes. One to use, one to wash. 

When we moved to our present house, Kent made a kitty door by cutting a hole in the downstairs half bath closet door and made a floor liner by cutting a piece of cheap shower stall siding and gluing a little moulding fence around the edge to contain litter. 

Just a couple of months ago, I realized it's much easier to do the scooping of all the litter if I pull the box flush with the door, instead of practically crawling in the closet. See, slow learner. 

The next thing I learned was that World's Best Cat Litter lives up to its name. I used Swheat Scoop for years. It's cracked wheat, flushable, and biodegradable. When we lived in Joplin and had a yard, I would dump the leftovers around the base of a tree as mulch.

In our apartment in KC, and now in our townhouse, there is no yard, so I double-bag it and put it in the trash.

When Kent was found to have celiac disease, I tried to purge the house of wheat. We like to think the chances of ingesting kitty litter are nonexistent, but it gets tracked pretty much everywhere, so I switched to the corn-based World's Best. It clumps faster, but the clumps are also very fragile, so you can flush it right away. Swheat Scoop recommends 20 minutes of soaking before flushing. 

I do think the wheat gave better odor control than the corn.

Since the only reason to have the Booda is because of its high sides, I popped out the center piece beneath the handle that holds a charcoal filter. The filter does nothing.

Then I cut round holes in the dome. There was already one round place with a grid across it to get air to the filter, so I pulled out the trusty multi tool and cut three more. 

The edges are ugly, but I sanded them enough to avoid sharp spots. Now she has high sides to keep her in the business zone, but the dome won't be able to concentrate odors. When we leave her alone for up to two days on weekend trips, it gets pretty rank, and I have been afraid she would try somewhere else. Now that is much less likely.

Oh yeah, I have only had a long-handled scoop for about a year. Why? I dunno.