Homemade Cat Litter

Have you ever thought about making your own cat litter? Well, if the answer was YES... I have stumbled across a few ideas. First off; we have a darling family of fur-babies, four to be exact. One of our lovelies Mr. Chin developed a urinary tract infection when he was two. When we got the terrible news from his vet we decided some things needed to change around our house. One of the things we changed was our cat litter. Our veterinarian is a huge fan of eco cat-litters. So we purchased a few bags of Yesterdays-News and a box of Swheat. These products were well loved by our babies, but they are very expensive. So after about a year of using Yesterdays-News we decided to try making our own litter. The first thing we tried was just shredded newspaper.....BUT THIS IS VERY MESSY... so we opted to try the wet method. This method is as followed....


NEWSPAPER LITTER
(1) Shred or chop several newspapers "for extra try going to nursing homes, hospitals or contacting your local paper for extras to recycle". 

(2) Put the shredded papers in a bucket or empty pool. Pour water over the shreds until it is workable. If your local paper does not use soy based ink add a small amount of dish detergent to the water mix.

(3) Mix the paper-water mix until you get a pulpie mix. {think homemade recycled paper}

(4) Squeeze the pulp making sure to remove as much water as you can. If you needed soap, squeeze the water out and then rinse the pulp once again. 

(5) OPTIONAL once you squeezed the water add some baking soda to the pulp this will help with odors and we all know every cat won't use a stinky box. {bobs redmill or arm and hammer}

(6) Place the pulp to dry in the sun on a screen or in a box spread out so that it can dry thoroughly. The texture is up to you fine or chunky. Simply just break it into smaller clumps. I recommend the box method if you are going for a fine litter. 

Option 2

Wheat litter:
When  you first buy Swheat or other name brand wheat litter, you are fooled into thinking this litter is special. Well, it's not. All this litter is, well, WHEAT. And you can make it at home for a fraction of a fraction of the cost at home. 

(1) Purchase bulk wheat berries at a grocer that sells bulk wheat, or hit up a grange/pet store and buy animal grade wheat. {any wheat berries will work}

(2) Grind in a blender,food processor or grain grinder until it is a coarse consistency. 

This method also works with corn and oats very effectively. However, for some reason unknown to me the wheat clumps better.

If you know why? Put a comment in the message box.

But if these ideas don't appeal to you, you can still make some snazzy "Tidy Cats" reusable bags.