Neither of which goes into typical landfill here. Newspapers are recycled and have been for some 20 years wherever I've lived. Large-scale construction debris is usually sorted and parts of it reclaimed. Large sections of concrete and other unreclaimable materials around here have been used to build out new land over water. The Toronto Islands, Ontario Place and Tommy Thompson park to be specific.

Plastic bags are a hazard for wildlife and water systems (treatment, drainage, etc.) Not to mention they're made of petroleum products. You should consider using biodegradable bags and then composting your cat poop. Or, flush the cat poop - it will go directly to a facility designed to deal with it.

The bags I get from the supermarkets here are now made out of some kind of biodegradeable plastic as they literally fall apart after a few months. I used to keep all the bags I got as I could reuse them when you can't do that now as the bags just don't last.

Apparently you're not supposed to compost cat feces because of the relatively high likelihood of it containing toxoplasmosis cysts.

Agreed that plastic is a hazard if you let it get out of the landfill- but I'm not doing that. The plastic bags aren't blowing away with 3 pounds of cat litter in them. Flushing cat poop and "urine cakes" (solidified litter) from the catbox would be a very bad idea. A sanitary sewer system cannot handle that- you would probably clog your sewer line costing you potientally hundreds of dollars. The only way it would work is if you didn't use cat litter at all and that would make your house smell disgusting. I wish there was a real biodegradable solution to cat litter but I don't see one at the moment.

Yes, I didn't mean that you should flush any gravel type litter, just the poop. Better still is to teach your cat to go right on the toilet, like in Meet the Fockers.

I've seen videos on YouTube showing you how to train your cat to do that.

...hmm... seems to me we've touched on this before. I'm sure we have.

I was responding to a person who said that they put the litter in a bag and then put the bag in the trash outside. I can't do that because I'd be walking out to the trash every single night, which I don't feel like doing. I currently put the bags in my trash inside and then take it out every other day because we have a 13 gallon trash can that fills up quickly.

There are a couple reasons I don't use grocery bags. They aren't designed to hold cat waste - odors leak from these much more than bags designed for the purpose. Similarly, about half the plastic bags I get from the store have tiny or larger holes in the bottom (possibly from carrying the groceries and stretching the seams in the plastic). Sure, I'm talking about 2mm holes at most, but that's enough to let little pieces of soiled waste through and again, lets odor through. Also, no matter how tight you tie the handles together, it's not an air-tight seal.

I'm currently using these bags which stow in this. Despite the 22 cents per bag, it's still worth it for the convenience. Still, I think I can do better

I double line the grocery bags, and use a small lidded pail that's about the size of the grocery bags. When the pail fills, the bag gets tied, and put outside in the trash.


22 cents a bag? You are getting hosed.

Yes, that's actually the standard, here, and it has been for the last 5 or 6 years.

Dunno about the others, but the Toronto Islands apparently predate modern trashy white people. The Leslie spit is a debris of beauty, though.

The local municipality here, explicitly wants cat litter tossed into the "new" Green Bin containers for composting, rather than into general waste.

So long as the compost is allowed time to really cook (high temperatures), it's probably fine. But this is municipal "governance" we're talkin' about, so..

Check Babies R Us or similar, they have bags for holding poopy diapers that block/cover the smell.

They need to get one of these then, not some feline diaper genie. I have one. It's wonderful. I don't walk any cat crap to the trash. Now getting the dog to stop trying to find snacks in it...

Wow. Nice device, and insanely expensive (to operate).

That CatGenie is just bloody awesome. I don't think I could ever own a cat without something like that.

Is that litter or litter + crap? I know a few people that put the used cat litter in their flower beds (the ammonia in the cat pee is supposed to be good for the soil, or something), but all the fecal matter needs to be taken out, first.

Crap included. Weird, but that's what they want.

Interesting. I wonder if our green bin folks allow the same. I'll have to check it out. Right now, the litter box stuff accounts for approximately 1/4 of our weekly trash.

Nope. "Curbside yard debris does not include [...] animal waste" Of course, it also says no food waste, but I throw that stuff in there, too. What's the difference between a weed (allowed), and a piece of old lettuce (not allowed)?

I would think that it would take a while for the granules to dry ? but yeah aside from getting the cat to use a toilet I can't see how the technology could advance past this

That sounds like what our council calls "yard waste". We have separate, seasonal pickups for that stuff. The green bin program is explicitly for food scraps, meat, fat, bones, used tissues, and other biodegradable house waste.

Cheers

Same as Mark here, except no animal waste allowed in my current municipality (it was allowed in the previous).

Yard waste doesn't have a dedicated bin here, you generally use large paper bags.

It has a blow-dryer, so once the granules are washed, they're blown dry. From what I've read, the entire wash/dry cycle takes about 30 minutes.


I can. If you read enough reviews, you'll see that thing is not without its design flaws. It uses a ton of water and electricity, and it takes a page from the inkjet printer manufacturer's playbook, and has proprietary, non-refillable cartridges.

In the end, I decided to stick with a regular litter box.

Yeah... that's what it's called. I put anything biodegradable in it, with the exception of animal by-products, which I still put in the trash. It's not seasonal, though, as yard-cleanup is year round out here.

Yard waste around here in the winter is typically snow. And it just melts away in the spring.

Oh, yes. I've not been an expat for so long that I've forgotten about the snow. I have fond memories of walking down the middle of Yonge St. one winter evening, when there was a over foot of fresh snow on the ground (and still coming down). Ordinarily a lot of traffic at that time of the night, the only cars on the road were a few foolhardy taxis, and they weren't moving too quick. At least, not forwards.