I didn’t used to think mulch about cat litter

All web developers have at least one cat. Cats are essential because they bug you to get up to take care of something – the dead mouse, food out, food in, and, of course, the cat box. It helps one avoid looking up after the last coffee sip and noticing that it has grown dark outside. So today I’d like to talk about this development-related topic.

I don’t like clay-based cat litter. The cheap variety is dusty and produces an ammonia-cloud whenever the cats paw it.

The more expensive brands have extra chemicals and suspicious little green bits.

For years, I dumped the sodden clay-mass in a pile in our back yard until it developed into a moldy mountain.

Concerned about this environmental time-bomb, I began removing the mountain to our transfer station where the only disposal option was to dump it in with the household trash.

I knew this could not go on much longer.

Then, Petco came to town. It was an eye-opener to see the products there for all the in’s and out’s of our little furry friends.

Besides the usual clay-based litter product, Petco carried litter made from wood, paper, grains, shells, breadfuit, ground-up currency featuring deposed dictators, and something that appeared to be hand-made pencil shavings priced at about the same price-per-pound as sirloin steak.

Alas, paying a higher per-pound-price than I was paying for cat food would not be sustainable.

This gave me the idea that I should try sawdust, or something like it, that might be available for free or low cost. I did get some sawdust, but since I’m not a carpenter, I couldn’t see myself hunting down sawdust on a continual basis.

I noticed that one of the litter products was little pine pellets similar to the pellets used for stoves. I purchased a bag of those, and also borrowed a bag of pellet-stove pellets from a friend. The large bag of fuel pellets was half as expensive as the smaller bag of pine pellets.

I followed the instructions on the pine pellet bag which specified gradually introducing the pellets into the clay cat litter. The verdict on pellets was that, although the pine smelled nicer, the softwood mix fuel pellets did the job just as well.

Then my wife came home with a bag of cedar mulch for the garden. These are big bags that cost $4 each.

The cedar smelled very nice, so I threw in some of that into the cat box. Eventually the mix in the litter was a couple handfuls of pellets and a couple handfuls of mulch.

Tom Stier

Tom Stier

Mulch had the advantage of being less expensive than pellet fuel and not as heavy to work with. And did I mention it smelled nice?

At the same time, I wanted to make sure the cats would remember where they should do their business. I began laying out the used woody mix in the hot sun on a large piece of cardboard, after removing turds and the usual single packed clump of wet material.

This resulted in a sun-dried, fresh-smelling material, with just a hint of that eau de cat. I began adding in varying percentages of the recycled product to their pristine mulch/pellet mix. And sure enough, they never noticed the difference.

It’s been over a year since I began this experiment, and the cats have remained happy and healthy with their sanitary facilities.

The routine, which takes just minutes a day, is to take the litter box to a wooded area off our driveway and fling the mulch-covered turds (which look just like coconut-covered dates!) into the woods. I then drop the pee-patty mulch around flowers in our yard. I don’t use it around edible plants. In any case, a hard rain and hot sun cleanses all.

The remaining dry-to-slightly damp mulch is baked by the sun in good weather and dried in the basement in the winter. The woody aroma is predominant, which makes the whole process a breeze.

At this point, the mix for the box is about 60% new and 40% purified. The odor from the litter box is unnoticeable, even in winter and I feel good about using a completely recyclable and sustainable material for my daily cat dooty.


Since posting this, it has come to my attention that cedar can be toxic to cats. So, first I want to say that I am not advocating the use of cedar and that this post is for entertainment purposes ONLY! Now, here are my conclusions about cedar and cats.

Apparently, there was a natural flea & tick product for cats some years ago which contained CONCENTRATED cedar oil as an ingredient. It was applied to the back of their necks and some cats became ill as it was absorbed into their bloodstream.

In my converting from clay litter my first step was gradually introducing the pine pellet product, then the softwood pellets and then the cedar mulch. The mulch I use does not have any kind of  strong ‘oily’ feel to me and then when it is baked by a day of sun, I doubt it has much oil content at all.

Some online info says that cedar mulch can be used as a deterrent for cats because they don’t like the smell! My cats spend about two five minute sessions a day with their paws in contact with material that is likely only 30% fresh cedar bark.

I appreciate being notified of this potential downside and I am certainly willing to adjust the mix if I see any adverse effects on the cats.


January 2020 Update. At this point, I have phased out mulch from the mix. The current mix is almost 90% dissolved pellet stove fuel.

So, it’s hardwood sawdust pellets that is soaked overnight, producing puffed up balls that crumble apart.

At an economical $6 for a 40 lb. bag, this produces a lot of soft, uniform material for the cat box routine.

14 thoughts on “I didn’t used to think mulch about cat litter

  • Try pine horse bedding from tractor supply. CHEAP and it creates the saw dust. Need special litter box that is 2 parts. The bottom collects the dust. The box can be purchased online at feline pines website.

  • I recently became “Auntie” to my brothers 2 cats as he has been living on the road this last year .I am experimenting as well..Things are different when we had our farm cats and then into adulthood ,catbox shenanigans,usually with my cats and the roommates cats.I appreciate the article..Knowing someone else is doing and thinking along the same lines gave me a smile for the day. Natalie

  • Thank you for the information. I have a question below.

    We alternate over the year among using pine pellets and the 3Xwheat litter, but mostly prefer the pine pellets because they do not clump. We flush cat turds only down our toilet, but trash the litter. Recently, instead of trash disposal we started to put the dissolved pellet litter into our compost pile and my thought is the ammonia from the urine will facilitate microbial decomposition in the compost. (note: our indoor cats are toxo negative)

    MY MAIN QUESTION IS, WILL THE PINE LITTER ATTRACT TERMITES? IF YOU HAVE KNOWLEDGE ON THIS PLEASE POST!

  • Jean, thanks for your comment. I’m not sure about pine litter attracting termites. You should keep a close watch on that. We change our littler daily, clean up the spilled wood etc. I would not be in favor of dumping litter in compost, since we use our compost to grow herbs and edibles. I think it’s fine to spread the used litter around flowers, sparingly at first, making sure the plants are OK.

  • Thanks for the post. I have 7 cats and 3 dogs. I recently switched to pine and the cats are getting used to it.

    PS, Cubby (Cat Under Bed) after 2 years has been coming out into the house to socialize… And lay on the laptop. Very helpful!

  • Thank you so much for this article. I have two 14 year old cats and they are huge cat litter users. I used clay litter and recently I switched to Worlds best cat litter. It is super pricey, so I am going to try the pine pellets. How often do the pellets should be changed? Is there much litter tracking? Thank you once again

  • Thanks for your comment! Currently my mix is almost all pellet stove fuel – compressed hardwood sawdust. It’s extremely economical, $5 for a very large, heavy bag. I add water to about 4″ of pellets in a pail, and it blooms up into fluffy sawdust in a few minutes. I recycle the cat box daily, remove the turds and wet clumps, then sanitize the rest in the hot sun, then fill the box with previously sanitized mix.

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