You love your cat. You hate his litter tray
Sydney inventor learns from Mr Jinx, and teaches cats to
use the toilet!
Monday 2 May 2005
Jo Lapidge was watching the Robert
DeNiro comedy ‘Meet the Fockers’ with Mr Jinx, a toilet-trained cat. “It was
such a funny scene,” she said. “But then I thought what a great idea! What if I
really could train my cat? How would I do it?”
Jo decided to create a device to make
it easy for anyone to train their own Mr Jinx – and the result is the Litter-KwitterTM
Cat Toilet-Training System. “The system takes a three stage approach to make it
easy for cats of any age – and their owners - to make the transition from litter
tray to toilet” she explains.
The invention is a godsend for cat
owners who want to protect native animals by keeping their cats indoors – but
hate the smelly litter tray. And it will reduce the risk of spreading dangerous
germs around the house.
Developed with assistance from leading
vets, the Litter-KwitterTM
Cat Toilet-Training System leads your cat through a simple behaviour
modification using three colour-coded training discs.
The red, amber & green discs slot into
a seat-like device that sits securely on the floor like a normal litter tray,
then up onto the porcelain rim of the toilet. The Litter-Kwitter system
gradually teaches your cat to seek out the bathroom, hop onto the toilet and
position himself over the hole to go just like everyone else.
“The core idea is to introduce an
increasing hole with reducing amounts of litter to wean your cat off the litter
habit & improve his balancing skills” Jo explains. “The discs allow your cat to
progress at his own pace to build his confidence and ability”.
Although it sounds comical, the idea
of a toilet-trained cat has a more serious side.
The RSPCA tells us to raise
indoor-cats and many cat owners spend $200 on litter per year doing just that.
The other half has cats that get into all sorts of trouble – they attack the
wildlife, they dig up the neighbour’s garden, they settle midnight disputes
noisily, and they wander off to become strays. They’d be so much happier indoors
but most people say they let them out “to do their business”.
The problem is that an indoor-cat
needs an indoor toilet. The cat goes in the litter tray & buries its waste in
the litter – just like in the garden. But when the cat does this in the tray it
gets the waste on its paws then treads it around the house – a germ danger for
the family, especially children & pregnant women.
Dr Randolph Baral and Dr Melissa Catt
of the Paddington Cat Hospital in Sydney, agree, “Training your cat to use the
toilet means less mess, less time spent cleaning up and is more hygienic for the
owners than manually removing solid waste from the litter,” they said.
Jo’s innovation has won her a place at
Fresh Innovators—a national initiative to bring the work of 16 early-career
inventers to public attention. After training in Sydney, the Innovators are
talking to the media, schools and business about their ideas. One of the 16 will
win a study tour to the UK courtesy of the British Council Australia.
For more information contact
Jo t: 02 9453 2216 m: 0437 307 724 e:
jo@lapidge.com
w:
www.litterkwitter.com.au
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| First is practice on the training ring with kitty litter
- Doogal showing how it's done |
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| Then onto the seat. Next step is to remove the training
ring |
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