New pooping outside box

Hi - we have two nine year old littermates. For nine years now they've used a litter box with no trouble. They're indoors cats and a couple of years ago we changed to a large round box which worked wonderfully to prevent 'litter spraying.'

In the past few months though, one of our cats (we've only just figured out which it is) has been peeing inside the box but pooping just outside it.

We've tried going back to a lower box, two boxes, moving the box, moving it to another room, cleaning it more often, cleaning the floor with nature's miracle to get rid of the smell. All to no avail.

Any ideas to get him back in the box? And why pooping but not peeing outsdie the box?

<Hi - we have two nine year old littermates. For nine years now they've used a litter box with no trouble....In the past few months though, one of our cats (we've only just figured out which it is) has been peeing inside the box but pooping just outside it.

We've tried going back to a lower box, two boxes, moving the box, moving it to another room, cleaning it more often, cleaning the floor with nature's miracle to get rid of the smell. All to no avail...>

Was there any change immediately prior to his going outside the box (change of litter, cleaning the box less often, fighting with the other cats, less attention from you)? If not, it might be that it's very difficult for him to be defacating (as opposed to urinating.) There might be a medical problem..he could be straining and finds it easier to poop outside the box. What is best is to eliminate on reason at a time to determine the cause, then the solution.

This may be a silly question, but you haven't changed brand of litter, have you?

Try putting them in a room where they are in close proximity to their litter box (like a bathroom or laundry room). Make them stay there for 24+ hours. This is how the vet had us deal with a new cat who had been 'discarded' from her former home and it worked. We kept her int he bathroom with the litterbox for 3 days.

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This happened a few years to one of our cats (pooped in the kitchen sink), and she appeared to be very ill. Her sister used to pee on my husbands chair, everytime she had bladder-troubles. So everytime one of our cats is pooping or peeing strangely, we take them to the vet. (after having excluded other possibilities). Good luck!

My aging male cat began pooping on the papers just outside his box while continuing to urinate in the box. I finally decided that because it was a covered box (although he had used a covered box for 15 years or more) and he was a big cat, as he aged he became constipated and had to stand and strain to have a bowel movement and didn't have enough room in the box. I worked on the constipation issue, but never really solved it completely and he continued to poop outside of the box. I always cleaned the box daily anyway and his companion just stepped over poop on the outside to use the box, so it never became a big issue for me. I had him examined by my vet who pronounced him healthy except for the constipation. He ALWAYS went right on the papers just outside the box until he died 3 years later..