I need advice for litterbox placement

[Odonata]

I've never posted over here before but I'm on break and working on the finishing touches to our house and I'm kind of stuck with this.

The house (a small cape cod) has a layout that leaves very little space.   Every corner is filled with things and this is even after I've thrown a ton of clutter out.  We have a 5-month old and her stuff (my god, the STUFF) takes up the rest of our livable space.

So the cat litter box (a litter robot, which I love) is in our unfinished basement.  I cannot think of anywhere upstairs where any kind of litter box will fit, especially this huge thing.  The bathrooms are tiny and there is no room for even the smallest litter pan.  Currently, we keep the basement door cracked and the cats (I have 2) go in and out as they please. 

This situation works well, EXCEPT for the fact that now we are looking to get the basement finished and our baby is going to be mobile eventually and keeping the door cracked open to a large flight of stairs is obviously NOT GOOD.

So if I keep the litter in the basement, and this has been the best situation so far, can anyone suggest a way to allow the cats access w/o putting my LO in danger?  Has anyone put a pet door on an interior door?  Is this safe for a crawling baby? And, since we are going to finish the basement, what tips are there to contain the huge mess my cats make, even in an enclosed box?

Or - should I find a way to move this box upstairs somewhere, which I feel is also a hazard for a mobile baby.

[niemand88f]

You can put a pet door inside, and could get the type that requires a signal from a collar to open. However, there is probably potential for accidents while they adjust to a pet door, or they get the collar off and are trapped away from it etc.

I would try to find a place upstairs first. Maybe test a top-entry litter box? I live in a very small apartment with 2 litterboxes - one is in a closet and the other is in our very small bathroom. Is there an upstairs room you can baby-gate off so the cats can get in the room but baby can't? Likewise in a finished basement, gate off a corner of the room with the litterbox inside? As far as mess goes, I think a top-entry box would allow less of that if your cats will accept it.

[Deleted]

Friends of ours put up a baby gate which the cat can jump over. Our cat is fat so that wasn't an option for us. We have a pet door to the basement. My kid has never crawled through it. Well, she has, but not as a baby who could get hurt. More like a 3 year old who thought it was funny. 

[Odonata]

Mar 10, 2015 12:53:12 GMT -5 oceanspray said:

We had this same situation. We put a cat door in the basement door and the litter box at the bottom of the steps. The first couple days we pushed the cat through the door and gave her extra treats when she came back up.

If you are looking to finish the basement eventually is there a small room down there you could put a cat door in? I would put one in the basement door for now to let her get used to it and then worry about where to put another one in the basement later.

Odonata

ETA: The way we got the little box downstairs was to move her food next to  the door.  Then every day we moved the food/water down one step until it was on the basement floor.  The first step (day two), we moved the litter box to the top of the steps. Once the food was on the basement floor we moved the litter box down. So now all of her stuff is right at the bottom of the basement steps.  Works for us.  You might want to keep moving things until it's in a space that works for you.

The food and litter is actually down there already, so that part is easy!  

I think getting them to go in and out of the door will be an issue and will have to train them.  Funny, but these kitties fit themselves through the craziest places to get to where they want to go.  It's almost impossible to contain them.  But go through a cat door?  Nope.  I had one in my old apartment and they refused to use it!  

[caddywompus]

I know someone with a pet door in the door to the laundry room, and the cat box is in there. She had a baby- and never any problems.

[caddywompus]

Also, they make some cabinets that are meant to hold a litter box. they have an opening in the back or on the side, so the cat can go in/out, but you don't see the box. Perhaps you could put something like this in a "little used" room of the house?

[dr.girlfriend]

Can you remove the doorway at the top of the stairs and put in a baby gate? I think most cats fit through the slats of a baby gate. I have this dreambaby one and I think even the fattest of cats would fit through. :-)

[dr.girlfriend]

Also, I'm guessing you don't have any type of attached garage or mudroom?