Hi all.  I have looked thru some past FMLs and still feel I need help.
Some of you may remember that Finnegan, whom we adopted at five months old
from a shelter, took us over two months to litter train outside his cage.
However, we finally did it and he was 100% with his litter box even out
of the cage (which they're hardly ever in anymore) for about 3 months.
 
Now, after three perfect months, he has started pooping and peeing wherever
he feels like it again.  They have had the run of most of our apt.  when
we're home for some time and he was great with litterbox usage, so I don't
know why he all of a sudden started doing this again.  He knows he is wrong
and knows where he's supposed to go, because often if I catch him, I'll say
"no" and point to the box and he'll then run right to the litterbox.  But
it's just getting worse and worse.
 
He will go to the litterbox and stop directly in front of it and go on the
floor there!  He has started going on the floor under my computer table
again (in front of the litterbox and under my table are the most likely
spots), but he'll also occasionally go in the hall, next to my bed, in the
corner by the door.  Putting down bedding and toys in those spots has not
been a deterrant-he goes right on the bedding, even if Nic is sleeping
there-nor has limiting his free roam time and parameters.  Nicodemus has
fortunately not picked up Finn's bad habit.
 
We scoop out the box every day (not to the point where they can't figure
that it's a box) and change it out completely every few days, so he's not
doing it b/c it's too dirty.  Time outs in the carrier do not help.
Nature's Miracle, Bitter Apple use have not really helped other than to
make it less stinky for us.
 
I am really at a loss.  I am going to buy a squirt gun and hope that helps,
but I don't know what else to do or why he is doing it.  He is perfectly
healthy.  It has been too hot for us to leave them in the cage for any time
and there is not room for it in our only air-conditioned room, the bedroom,
but I have limited him to that room.  HELP!
 
-April
[Posted in FML issue 3508]