Dr. Elsey’s Ultra UnScented Clumping Clay Cat Litter 40 lb. Bag : Pet Litter : Pet Supplies

5.0 out of 5 stars

I settled on this after a few years trying different litters

I wanted to give a very detailed review because I tried using reviews to choose litter, but it was very hard to do because often the reviews vary wildly in describing the same qualities of the same litter. I’ll start by saying I’ve tried Fresh Step, Tidy Cats, Arm & Hammer, Pretty Litter, and various other silicone litters before settling on this one. I have one short haired, older female kitty who has one litter box.For a long time, I used Arm & Hammer clump and seal litter. I didn’t hate it, but felt like it didn’t clump as well as it could and I wanted to try something else. So I switched to Pretty Litter for a while because I liked the color changing aspect. However, I started to notice that it wasn’t lasting as long as it was supposed to and I didn’t want to keep paying that much for something that wasn’t doing what it was supposed to. I liked the no-clump aspect, but it seemed to irritate my kitty’s toes. She was constantly picking stuff off the hair on her feet (and she doesn’t have long hair at all) and I felt like it tracked a lot. I then tried a few different silicone litters, but the more affordable ones were too hard to find regularly (ie often out of stock).So after all that experimentation, I had a few qualities I was looking for:- low dust- low tracking (I live in a very small apartment where there aren’t many steps between the litter box and the couch or the bed)- low odor- hopefully non-clumpingI ended up compromising on the non-clumping part, because this litter meets my other wish list items so well.- Dust: I haven’t tried some of the “natural” litters like the ones made from corn, wheat, etc. so I can’t speak for those. But otherwise I have used many of the popular litters and I have concluded that there probably isn’t a 100% dust free litter. I think it’s just the nature of such a product. However, this has less dust than any other litter I can think of and I love that.- Tracking: again, not sure if there exists a 100% no track litter. But in my experience, this tracks the least. I did notice after I was sick for a couple weeks (still scooping ofc but not as worried about cleaning up the litter on the floor) it did start to get a little spread out and ground into the carpet. But as long as I was vacuuming regularly I barely noticed any tracking.- Odor: this and the low tracking were probably the main selling points for me. I’ve honestly forgotten to scoop the box a couple times because I. NEVER. SMELL IT! Even when scooping it, it hardly smells. Only towards the end of its life cycle does it tend to stink much, but again, that’s only when scooping. And I use the scent free one! I hate the smell of scented cat litter (it gets too strong for me and in my head it’s a “cover up” smell, like spraying perfume on a dirty shirt or pants lol) I think this is the best quality of this litter. If odor is your sticking point, I’d definitely recommend trying this.- Clumping: as I said above, this was what I compromised on. **This IS a clumping litter.** But it clumps EXTREMELY well. Honestly sometimes it’s a bit like scooping a rock. If it’s a larger clump sometimes I have to put in some effort to break it in half. So because of that and how great the other qualities are, I was fine with switching back to a clumping litter. I have a Litter Genie so it’s not too much of an inconvenience. Actually, my only (very minor) complaint would be that the clumps get too heavy to fill the Litter Genie bag as full as I’d like, but it doesn’t bother me that much.- Price: I haven’t sat down and figured out how this one compares to the others in terms of price, but it’s at least comparable and I think very reasonable for the quality of what you get. The 18lb bag is a little more than enough to fill up the litter box, and has been lasting about a month.So glad I decided to try Dr. Elsey’s! I hope this review is helpful to anyone else shopping around for litter like I was.

1,724 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

Great Litter – but a cloud of dust when you pour it

Cat litter – I love and hate it. I love that I don’t have to take my cat on walks and follow it around with plastic bags to pick up steaming piles of rank, soft poo. So it is great that the cat can go when it wants, indoors. On the other hand, I never want my house to smell like a toilet, so I am very particular about cat litter. I clean the litter box every day; as part of my morning routine, and dump and replace all the litter (and sanitize the box) monthly.I have tried all kinds of litter boxes from simple pans, to expensive automatic self-cleaning boxes, including decorative enclosed boxes (hidden) in nice looking wood furniture. I have a large (14 lb) male cat, and he is assertive with his digging and cover up. He also sometimes pees on the inside wall of the box, so a high wall box is critical for us. We have found that top entry boxes are the best overall for containing waste, smell, and litter spray when digging, as well as minimizing tracking. The basic Amazon one is good, but the PetCo brand is by far the best (pricey, but worth it!) because it has a larger walking area on the top to capture litter. This litter drops back into the box with a neat hinge when you clean it. This model is also the easiest to clean because the hinge top is very, very convenient. With the Amazon box, you have to remove the top and put it aside. If you clean the PetCo box daily (which is very easy to do), it outperforms the expensive self-cleaning units, by far, in mess and odor control. Cleaning daily is much easier if you keep a bag dispensing scoop handy and toss out the daily bag of waste.When it comes to litter, there are 5 critical factors IMO (ranked in order of importance to me, as #1 is the most important):Odor control. If litter doesn’t contain odor, what is the point? That is its #1 job!Hard clumping. Scrapping a mushy litter paste off the bottom or side wall is awful, messy, time consuming, and disgusting. Plus it leaves your scoop all gross.Low tracking. I don’t want litter all over the house. Keep it in the box please!Price. It is a regular purchase, so it adds up. Price matters.Low dust. I don’t want to feel like I am breathing in poison or getting permanent lung damage every time I change the litter box.Here is my breakdown of some of the leading brands. Note the best solution is last.Dr. Elsey’s Ultra (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell waste even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 4444 stars: works pretty good for 15 days, in the second half of the month, I am occasionally scraping pasty off the walls, but not always, it is pretty good for most of the month.Low Tracking: 4444 stars: the granules are large enough that most of them stay in box; however, there is always some that sticks to his feet and gets scattered nearby.Price: 333 stars: not the cheapest, but not really expensive either.Low Dust: 333 stars: always a cloud of dust when I fill the box. It settles quickly, and I don’t see any more until I fill it next month.Arm & Hammer HardBall (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell even even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: fast and hard clumping, pee on the side wall comes off in a clean hard clump without pasty scraping … very nice!Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 22 stars: it is pricey.Low Dust: 55555 stars: no dust when I pour, no dust all month.Fresh Step (total 16 points):Odor Control: 4444 stars: I don’t smell much but odor control starts to fade near the end of the month.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: clumping is not that great plenty of pasty scrapping, especially in the back half of the monthLow Tracking: 333 stars: the granules are smaller, so there is more tracking.Price: 4444 stars: it is cheap and readily available in bulk at places like Sams and Costco.Low Dust: 333 stars: lots of dust when I pour, and some dust when the cat stirs it.Boxie Cat (total 10 points):Odor Control: 1 star: Started good, but in only 3 days I had the very strong odor of cat urine – no odor control after a few days.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: Started good, but daily pasty scrapping after 3 days.Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 1 stars: it is crazy expensive with TONS of marketing you are paying for.Low Dust: 4444 stars: some dust when I pour, not much after that.Mixed! The best solution I have found is to mix ⅓ Arm & Hammer HardBall with ⅔ Dr. Elsey. This way you get all of the benefits of Dr. Elsey with the added hardening from Arm and Hammer. (total 20 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: no smell all month.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: Already good clumping from Dr Elsey, beefed up Arm & Hammer’s HardBall formula.Low Tracking: 333 stars: adding the Arm & Hammer adds a little bit more tracking that you would just get with just Dr. Elsey.Price: 333 stars: not crazy – mixing makes both last longer so pricing is moderate.Low Dust: 4444 stars: less Dr. Elsey means less dust when I pour, not much after that.I hope this helps!

809 people found this helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars

Way too dusty

Did a 25 day test w/ World’s Best Cat Litter Clumping Litter Formula, Nature’s Miracle Just for Cats Corn Cob Litter, and Just the Crystals Premium Crystal Cat Litter. I’ve also previously used Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat Ultra Premium Cat Litter and can offer a comparison with it as well.(#1) World’s Best: Clumps very well and doesn’t track much at all. There is a small amount of dust, but the dust appears to have a large particle size and doesn’t stay airborne, so it settles quickly back into the box instead of getting all over everything. There is a slight odor to the litter which is a little unusual, but it doesn’t smell bad, and it seems to control the cat odor well. It’s also light weight, which makes it easy to scoop. My four cats had no problem w/ World’s Best. Of the four litters, this is the one I’ll probably end up going back to. Some people look at the cost per pound and say it is too expensive, but it is less dense than the clay litters, and as a result it takes less poundage to fill a litter box. While I didn’t measure this precisely, I’d tend to say the 28 lbs bag of World’s Best goes at least as far as a 40 lbs bag of Precious Cat (or other fine clay litter), which makes the costs a lot more comparable (just don’t overpay for the litter – some of the Amazon marketplace resellers gouge on the price).(#2 – tie) Just the Crystals: I tried this litter based on the excellent reviews here on Amazon. It doesn’t track very much at all (and given the large granules, it is easy to vacuum up when it does). It is easier to scoop than the others, as you just scoop out the poop and then stir it – you don’t need to remove the urine. While that sounds a bit gross, it really doesn’t appear to get wet, smelly, or dirty any quicker than the others. I was also really impressed with the manufacturer, who definitely seems to stand behind their brand. All of that said, while Just the Crystals is much less dusty than the clay litters, it did create a small amount of airborne dust while scooping. It wasn’t particularly objectionable, but was more than either Nature’s Miracle (which had none) or World’s Best (which settled before getting very airborne). My cats also used this box less than the others, though they’ve never used a crystal litter before and likely just aren’t used to it, which I can’t hold against Just the Crystals. The verdict? I probably won’t continue with Just the Crystals myself, but if I used an automatic litter box this would probably be my litter of choice. Price does seem a little bit more than other premium litters when measured by volume (not weight), but because you don’t throw out the peed up litter, you still have just as much litter in the box after 3 weeks as you had when you filled it initially (versus the other litters where you’re steadily throwing away litter as it gets peed up), which balances things out a bit.(#2 – tie) Nature’s Miracle: Basically zero dust, very lightweight (so it is really easy to scoop), and it also smells great coming out of the package. It does track a bit more than the others, though that’s only a minor annoyance to me (could be worse depending on where the box is). The real problem though is that it doesn’t clump well, and since the clumps fall apart, small pieces of old, peed up litter gradually build up in the box, which means it starts smelling bad faster. While I used Nature’s Miracle for years, this is eventually what pushed me away from it. If they could fix the clumping issue, this would probably be my favorite litter because of the non-existent dust and light weight. The clumping issue is a fairly big deal to me though, and World’s Best gets me most of the advantages without that major disadvantage. Per unit of volume this seems comparable to other premium litters – perhaps a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystals – but you might need to change it more often to keep it from smelling bad, which could make it less cost effective.(#3) Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat: Clumps extremely well and controls odor quite well. When I had a stray cat and her kittens, this is the litter I picked once they were of age to use a litter box (rather, I used the kitten version of it) because it seemed to control the odor the best for the longest period of time. It does track a bit more than the litters with larger granules (like World’s Best or Just the Crystals), and it’s fairly heavy, which makes it harder to scoop and change. The worst part is the dust though. As the litter ages, the granules seem to break down into smaller pieces that go airborne and make absolutely awful dust. The older it got, the worse it became. Scooping it would set off the smoke alarm in the room, and I had to wipe down everything in the room with a wet rag to remove the thick coating of litter dust. With one box in the past (prior to this test), it eventually got bad enough I felt like I had to cover my mouth while scooping it. I’ve tried their Respiratory Relief version as well, and that wasn’t any better. I’ve also tried mixing it with a less dusty litter like Nature’s Miracle, but that made little difference. Price per unit volume seems a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystal’s (more comparable to Nature’s Miracle – maybe a little less than it too), but I wouldn’t use it anymore even if it were free – can’t stand the dust.As for test methodology… All of the boxes were changed the same day. They were also washed before changing them using fragrance free detergent (I use fragrance free laundry detergent to do the boxes – it’s mild, leaves no odor, and I’m sure won’t irritate my cats). The litter boxes are converted from large Rubbermaid totes (I needed something with high sides as I have one cat that sometimes doesn’t squat and pees over the sides of regular litter boxes). I scoop them once daily at night.While all of the boxes are pretty large (again, they’re Rubbermaid storage totes), one is about 50% larger than the others. Historically, my cats have preferred that box, perhaps because of the extra room. In this test, that box had World’s Best, and, true to form, they used that box more than the others. That said, the box size may factor into that.Also, I did not actually measure volume for the price comparisons. Those are very loose estimates based on how much it felt like I needed to dump into the boxes to fill them. At the end of the day, the price differences between them weren’t so significant as to be the major differentiator between them.

248 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

The good, the bad and the muddy

We recently adopted an adult cat whose litterbox habits have resulted in going through 60 lbs. of litterbox sand in just the four weeks that we’ve had her. We didn’t realize how easy our previous cats (R.I.P.) made litterbox maintenance. For them, we used a lightweight, hard-clumping litter, and they would do their business tidily atop the litter, cover it up and be done, making it easy to just skim the clumps off the surface, leaving dry litterbox sand beneath. So we only needed to wash the box and completely replace the litter about once a month with our former cats. But our new cat’s litterbox habits may break the plastic scooper, as well as our pet-supply budget. Time to buy a sturdier, metal scooper!When she urinates, our new cat likes to scrape away all the litter (even though we fill the box so the litter is quite deep). Then she wees directly onto the bottom of the box, pretty much negating the main function of clumping litter. She then pushes the cat sand OVER the pool of wee, creating a cement-like mess that lurks hidden underneath and practically bonds with the base of the litter box. The box gets sifted several times a day, but after 3-4 days, the entire box needs to be completely emptied, washed and refilled with another massive amount of litterbox sand. Which is where this new litter comes in.Because our cat creates such a muddy mess at the bottom of the box, the much finer granules of the lightweight litter we were using before was getting stuck between her toes, depositing it all over the house, and in the mornings, we’d wake up to our bed covered in clumps of dirty, damp sand. So, out with the finer-grained, lightweight sand, and on to something different. We noticed that the Dr. Elsey’s litter seemed a bit grainier, though still offering clumping properties, and thought we’d give it a try. It tracks a lot less, and what little is tracked is easier to see and sweep up due to the larger size of the granules. And so far, those larger granules haven’t been sticking to our cat’s feet. But this litter is HEAVY! Our cat doesn’t have any issues pushing the sand around (a good feline fitness workout!), but because of her odd litterbox habits, it still gets stuck to the bottom of the litterbox, and takes a lot of effort to scrape off. So it appears that we’ll just be spending a lot of time and money on litterbox maintenance, whatever we try. And the wet clumps are super heavy, so taking out the garbage is a weight-bearing exercise. (TIP: we replaced our Litter Genie with the largest size of the OXO compost pail, which has a much larger opening, is so easy to fill and empty, and we can use any sturdy plastic bags to line it — no need to buy those Litter Genie refills. So it quickly pays for itself. And the OXO compost bin also keeps any unpleasant smells from escaping before emptying.)So, to sum up the litterbox saga (seems I’m not alone, as others appear to have epic issues when it comes to dealing with the litterbox situation):• If your cat doesn’t have a problem pushing around a heavier type litter, we found Dr. Elsey’s to be great at clumping if you go really deep when filling the box. But one downside to its hard clumping is that if you have a cat who likes to dig close to the bottom when urinating, the hard clumps adhere like cement to the bottom of the litter box, making it no job for a plastic scooper. So a heavy-duty metal scoop is a must.• Tracking is minimal and the larger granules make it easier to see and sweep up any tracked bits.• So far, the larger granules have eliminated the issue with sand getting stuck between our cat’s toes, so any tracking stays within a close distance to the litterbox, and doesn’t end up on furniture and beds.• Does well at controlling odor provided box is sifted at least once a day.We’ll continue buying the Dr. Elsey’s litter, and though we expect that every bag will be a bit different, we’re hopeful that it will continue to solve some of the problems we had with the finer-grained, lightweight types of litter. There’s likely not a litter on the market that can quickly absorb urine deposited directly on the bottom of the box and not create heavy sludge or really hard clumps that adhere like cement, so for now, this is as close as we’re likely to get to the Holy Grail of litterbox sand.12/20/23 UPDATE: I’ve purchased two 18-lb. bags from Amazon in the past 5 weeks, at a little over $11 per bag. Now the price has increased to over $16. I know we’re in inflationary times, but I can’t help but question the need for this particular increase, other than sheer avarice. Not suggesting the increase is Amazon’s decision — it may well be their supplier, but still… My local pet supply store is still selling it for just over $8 for the 18-lb. bag. While I appreciated the convenience of having it delivered to my door, I’m going to have to stop being lazy and just make the short drive to my nearby pet store, because the Amazon increase to $16+ just breached my annoyance threshold, as well as my budget.

46 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

Money saver AND energy saver! Holy Cow! (Mom of 6 cats)

I have had multiple cats all my life, and tried nearly every brand and type of litter you can find.This stuff is the real deal.I have three XXL industrial storage totes I converted into litter boxes to accommodate 6 cats. I scoop these totes every other morning, and now I realize I was going through a stupid amount of my old litter every week because of poor odor control, poor performance, and very little volume for the price.I decided to try this brand for the price and weight, and set it as a 3 week subscription.I scoop my litter the same frequency, but I’m barely making a dent in the stockpile I’ve accumulated of this stuff! I had to change my subscription setting farther out because this stuff is heavy duty FOR REAL! I can’t smell anything from those litter boxes (unless im scooping, obviously), it doesn’t track nearly as bad, and I can’t find a reason to replace the litter as often?! I baffled?! I have 2 extra bags of this stuff and I only JUST finished my first.This litter is a little dusty- but so is all clay litter.

3 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

I settled on this after a few years trying different litters

I wanted to give a very detailed review because I tried using reviews to choose litter, but it was very hard to do because often the reviews vary wildly in describing the same qualities of the same litter. I’ll start by saying I’ve tried Fresh Step, Tidy Cats, Arm & Hammer, Pretty Litter, and various other silicone litters before settling on this one. I have one short haired, older female kitty who has one litter box.For a long time, I used Arm & Hammer clump and seal litter. I didn’t hate it, but felt like it didn’t clump as well as it could and I wanted to try something else. So I switched to Pretty Litter for a while because I liked the color changing aspect. However, I started to notice that it wasn’t lasting as long as it was supposed to and I didn’t want to keep paying that much for something that wasn’t doing what it was supposed to. I liked the no-clump aspect, but it seemed to irritate my kitty’s toes. She was constantly picking stuff off the hair on her feet (and she doesn’t have long hair at all) and I felt like it tracked a lot. I then tried a few different silicone litters, but the more affordable ones were too hard to find regularly (ie often out of stock).So after all that experimentation, I had a few qualities I was looking for:- low dust- low tracking (I live in a very small apartment where there aren’t many steps between the litter box and the couch or the bed)- low odor- hopefully non-clumpingI ended up compromising on the non-clumping part, because this litter meets my other wish list items so well.- Dust: I haven’t tried some of the “natural” litters like the ones made from corn, wheat, etc. so I can’t speak for those. But otherwise I have used many of the popular litters and I have concluded that there probably isn’t a 100% dust free litter. I think it’s just the nature of such a product. However, this has less dust than any other litter I can think of and I love that.- Tracking: again, not sure if there exists a 100% no track litter. But in my experience, this tracks the least. I did notice after I was sick for a couple weeks (still scooping ofc but not as worried about cleaning up the litter on the floor) it did start to get a little spread out and ground into the carpet. But as long as I was vacuuming regularly I barely noticed any tracking.- Odor: this and the low tracking were probably the main selling points for me. I’ve honestly forgotten to scoop the box a couple times because I. NEVER. SMELL IT! Even when scooping it, it hardly smells. Only towards the end of its life cycle does it tend to stink much, but again, that’s only when scooping. And I use the scent free one! I hate the smell of scented cat litter (it gets too strong for me and in my head it’s a “cover up” smell, like spraying perfume on a dirty shirt or pants lol) I think this is the best quality of this litter. If odor is your sticking point, I’d definitely recommend trying this.- Clumping: as I said above, this was what I compromised on. **This IS a clumping litter.** But it clumps EXTREMELY well. Honestly sometimes it’s a bit like scooping a rock. If it’s a larger clump sometimes I have to put in some effort to break it in half. So because of that and how great the other qualities are, I was fine with switching back to a clumping litter. I have a Litter Genie so it’s not too much of an inconvenience. Actually, my only (very minor) complaint would be that the clumps get too heavy to fill the Litter Genie bag as full as I’d like, but it doesn’t bother me that much.- Price: I haven’t sat down and figured out how this one compares to the others in terms of price, but it’s at least comparable and I think very reasonable for the quality of what you get. The 18lb bag is a little more than enough to fill up the litter box, and has been lasting about a month.So glad I decided to try Dr. Elsey’s! I hope this review is helpful to anyone else shopping around for litter like I was.

1,724 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

Great Litter – but a cloud of dust when you pour it

Cat litter – I love and hate it. I love that I don’t have to take my cat on walks and follow it around with plastic bags to pick up steaming piles of rank, soft poo. So it is great that the cat can go when it wants, indoors. On the other hand, I never want my house to smell like a toilet, so I am very particular about cat litter. I clean the litter box every day; as part of my morning routine, and dump and replace all the litter (and sanitize the box) monthly.I have tried all kinds of litter boxes from simple pans, to expensive automatic self-cleaning boxes, including decorative enclosed boxes (hidden) in nice looking wood furniture. I have a large (14 lb) male cat, and he is assertive with his digging and cover up. He also sometimes pees on the inside wall of the box, so a high wall box is critical for us. We have found that top entry boxes are the best overall for containing waste, smell, and litter spray when digging, as well as minimizing tracking. The basic Amazon one is good, but the PetCo brand is by far the best (pricey, but worth it!) because it has a larger walking area on the top to capture litter. This litter drops back into the box with a neat hinge when you clean it. This model is also the easiest to clean because the hinge top is very, very convenient. With the Amazon box, you have to remove the top and put it aside. If you clean the PetCo box daily (which is very easy to do), it outperforms the expensive self-cleaning units, by far, in mess and odor control. Cleaning daily is much easier if you keep a bag dispensing scoop handy and toss out the daily bag of waste.When it comes to litter, there are 5 critical factors IMO (ranked in order of importance to me, as #1 is the most important):Odor control. If litter doesn’t contain odor, what is the point? That is its #1 job!Hard clumping. Scrapping a mushy litter paste off the bottom or side wall is awful, messy, time consuming, and disgusting. Plus it leaves your scoop all gross.Low tracking. I don’t want litter all over the house. Keep it in the box please!Price. It is a regular purchase, so it adds up. Price matters.Low dust. I don’t want to feel like I am breathing in poison or getting permanent lung damage every time I change the litter box.Here is my breakdown of some of the leading brands. Note the best solution is last.Dr. Elsey’s Ultra (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell waste even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 4444 stars: works pretty good for 15 days, in the second half of the month, I am occasionally scraping pasty off the walls, but not always, it is pretty good for most of the month.Low Tracking: 4444 stars: the granules are large enough that most of them stay in box; however, there is always some that sticks to his feet and gets scattered nearby.Price: 333 stars: not the cheapest, but not really expensive either.Low Dust: 333 stars: always a cloud of dust when I fill the box. It settles quickly, and I don’t see any more until I fill it next month.Arm & Hammer HardBall (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell even even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: fast and hard clumping, pee on the side wall comes off in a clean hard clump without pasty scraping … very nice!Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 22 stars: it is pricey.Low Dust: 55555 stars: no dust when I pour, no dust all month.Fresh Step (total 16 points):Odor Control: 4444 stars: I don’t smell much but odor control starts to fade near the end of the month.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: clumping is not that great plenty of pasty scrapping, especially in the back half of the monthLow Tracking: 333 stars: the granules are smaller, so there is more tracking.Price: 4444 stars: it is cheap and readily available in bulk at places like Sams and Costco.Low Dust: 333 stars: lots of dust when I pour, and some dust when the cat stirs it.Boxie Cat (total 10 points):Odor Control: 1 star: Started good, but in only 3 days I had the very strong odor of cat urine – no odor control after a few days.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: Started good, but daily pasty scrapping after 3 days.Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 1 stars: it is crazy expensive with TONS of marketing you are paying for.Low Dust: 4444 stars: some dust when I pour, not much after that.Mixed! The best solution I have found is to mix ⅓ Arm & Hammer HardBall with ⅔ Dr. Elsey. This way you get all of the benefits of Dr. Elsey with the added hardening from Arm and Hammer. (total 20 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: no smell all month.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: Already good clumping from Dr Elsey, beefed up Arm & Hammer’s HardBall formula.Low Tracking: 333 stars: adding the Arm & Hammer adds a little bit more tracking that you would just get with just Dr. Elsey.Price: 333 stars: not crazy – mixing makes both last longer so pricing is moderate.Low Dust: 4444 stars: less Dr. Elsey means less dust when I pour, not much after that.I hope this helps!

809 people found this helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars

Way too dusty

Did a 25 day test w/ World’s Best Cat Litter Clumping Litter Formula, Nature’s Miracle Just for Cats Corn Cob Litter, and Just the Crystals Premium Crystal Cat Litter. I’ve also previously used Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat Ultra Premium Cat Litter and can offer a comparison with it as well.(#1) World’s Best: Clumps very well and doesn’t track much at all. There is a small amount of dust, but the dust appears to have a large particle size and doesn’t stay airborne, so it settles quickly back into the box instead of getting all over everything. There is a slight odor to the litter which is a little unusual, but it doesn’t smell bad, and it seems to control the cat odor well. It’s also light weight, which makes it easy to scoop. My four cats had no problem w/ World’s Best. Of the four litters, this is the one I’ll probably end up going back to. Some people look at the cost per pound and say it is too expensive, but it is less dense than the clay litters, and as a result it takes less poundage to fill a litter box. While I didn’t measure this precisely, I’d tend to say the 28 lbs bag of World’s Best goes at least as far as a 40 lbs bag of Precious Cat (or other fine clay litter), which makes the costs a lot more comparable (just don’t overpay for the litter – some of the Amazon marketplace resellers gouge on the price).(#2 – tie) Just the Crystals: I tried this litter based on the excellent reviews here on Amazon. It doesn’t track very much at all (and given the large granules, it is easy to vacuum up when it does). It is easier to scoop than the others, as you just scoop out the poop and then stir it – you don’t need to remove the urine. While that sounds a bit gross, it really doesn’t appear to get wet, smelly, or dirty any quicker than the others. I was also really impressed with the manufacturer, who definitely seems to stand behind their brand. All of that said, while Just the Crystals is much less dusty than the clay litters, it did create a small amount of airborne dust while scooping. It wasn’t particularly objectionable, but was more than either Nature’s Miracle (which had none) or World’s Best (which settled before getting very airborne). My cats also used this box less than the others, though they’ve never used a crystal litter before and likely just aren’t used to it, which I can’t hold against Just the Crystals. The verdict? I probably won’t continue with Just the Crystals myself, but if I used an automatic litter box this would probably be my litter of choice. Price does seem a little bit more than other premium litters when measured by volume (not weight), but because you don’t throw out the peed up litter, you still have just as much litter in the box after 3 weeks as you had when you filled it initially (versus the other litters where you’re steadily throwing away litter as it gets peed up), which balances things out a bit.(#2 – tie) Nature’s Miracle: Basically zero dust, very lightweight (so it is really easy to scoop), and it also smells great coming out of the package. It does track a bit more than the others, though that’s only a minor annoyance to me (could be worse depending on where the box is). The real problem though is that it doesn’t clump well, and since the clumps fall apart, small pieces of old, peed up litter gradually build up in the box, which means it starts smelling bad faster. While I used Nature’s Miracle for years, this is eventually what pushed me away from it. If they could fix the clumping issue, this would probably be my favorite litter because of the non-existent dust and light weight. The clumping issue is a fairly big deal to me though, and World’s Best gets me most of the advantages without that major disadvantage. Per unit of volume this seems comparable to other premium litters – perhaps a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystals – but you might need to change it more often to keep it from smelling bad, which could make it less cost effective.(#3) Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat: Clumps extremely well and controls odor quite well. When I had a stray cat and her kittens, this is the litter I picked once they were of age to use a litter box (rather, I used the kitten version of it) because it seemed to control the odor the best for the longest period of time. It does track a bit more than the litters with larger granules (like World’s Best or Just the Crystals), and it’s fairly heavy, which makes it harder to scoop and change. The worst part is the dust though. As the litter ages, the granules seem to break down into smaller pieces that go airborne and make absolutely awful dust. The older it got, the worse it became. Scooping it would set off the smoke alarm in the room, and I had to wipe down everything in the room with a wet rag to remove the thick coating of litter dust. With one box in the past (prior to this test), it eventually got bad enough I felt like I had to cover my mouth while scooping it. I’ve tried their Respiratory Relief version as well, and that wasn’t any better. I’ve also tried mixing it with a less dusty litter like Nature’s Miracle, but that made little difference. Price per unit volume seems a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystal’s (more comparable to Nature’s Miracle – maybe a little less than it too), but I wouldn’t use it anymore even if it were free – can’t stand the dust.As for test methodology… All of the boxes were changed the same day. They were also washed before changing them using fragrance free detergent (I use fragrance free laundry detergent to do the boxes – it’s mild, leaves no odor, and I’m sure won’t irritate my cats). The litter boxes are converted from large Rubbermaid totes (I needed something with high sides as I have one cat that sometimes doesn’t squat and pees over the sides of regular litter boxes). I scoop them once daily at night.While all of the boxes are pretty large (again, they’re Rubbermaid storage totes), one is about 50% larger than the others. Historically, my cats have preferred that box, perhaps because of the extra room. In this test, that box had World’s Best, and, true to form, they used that box more than the others. That said, the box size may factor into that.Also, I did not actually measure volume for the price comparisons. Those are very loose estimates based on how much it felt like I needed to dump into the boxes to fill them. At the end of the day, the price differences between them weren’t so significant as to be the major differentiator between them.

248 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

The good, the bad and the muddy

We recently adopted an adult cat whose litterbox habits have resulted in going through 60 lbs. of litterbox sand in just the four weeks that we’ve had her. We didn’t realize how easy our previous cats (R.I.P.) made litterbox maintenance. For them, we used a lightweight, hard-clumping litter, and they would do their business tidily atop the litter, cover it up and be done, making it easy to just skim the clumps off the surface, leaving dry litterbox sand beneath. So we only needed to wash the box and completely replace the litter about once a month with our former cats. But our new cat’s litterbox habits may break the plastic scooper, as well as our pet-supply budget. Time to buy a sturdier, metal scooper!When she urinates, our new cat likes to scrape away all the litter (even though we fill the box so the litter is quite deep). Then she wees directly onto the bottom of the box, pretty much negating the main function of clumping litter. She then pushes the cat sand OVER the pool of wee, creating a cement-like mess that lurks hidden underneath and practically bonds with the base of the litter box. The box gets sifted several times a day, but after 3-4 days, the entire box needs to be completely emptied, washed and refilled with another massive amount of litterbox sand. Which is where this new litter comes in.Because our cat creates such a muddy mess at the bottom of the box, the much finer granules of the lightweight litter we were using before was getting stuck between her toes, depositing it all over the house, and in the mornings, we’d wake up to our bed covered in clumps of dirty, damp sand. So, out with the finer-grained, lightweight sand, and on to something different. We noticed that the Dr. Elsey’s litter seemed a bit grainier, though still offering clumping properties, and thought we’d give it a try. It tracks a lot less, and what little is tracked is easier to see and sweep up due to the larger size of the granules. And so far, those larger granules haven’t been sticking to our cat’s feet. But this litter is HEAVY! Our cat doesn’t have any issues pushing the sand around (a good feline fitness workout!), but because of her odd litterbox habits, it still gets stuck to the bottom of the litterbox, and takes a lot of effort to scrape off. So it appears that we’ll just be spending a lot of time and money on litterbox maintenance, whatever we try. And the wet clumps are super heavy, so taking out the garbage is a weight-bearing exercise. (TIP: we replaced our Litter Genie with the largest size of the OXO compost pail, which has a much larger opening, is so easy to fill and empty, and we can use any sturdy plastic bags to line it — no need to buy those Litter Genie refills. So it quickly pays for itself. And the OXO compost bin also keeps any unpleasant smells from escaping before emptying.)So, to sum up the litterbox saga (seems I’m not alone, as others appear to have epic issues when it comes to dealing with the litterbox situation):• If your cat doesn’t have a problem pushing around a heavier type litter, we found Dr. Elsey’s to be great at clumping if you go really deep when filling the box. But one downside to its hard clumping is that if you have a cat who likes to dig close to the bottom when urinating, the hard clumps adhere like cement to the bottom of the litter box, making it no job for a plastic scooper. So a heavy-duty metal scoop is a must.• Tracking is minimal and the larger granules make it easier to see and sweep up any tracked bits.• So far, the larger granules have eliminated the issue with sand getting stuck between our cat’s toes, so any tracking stays within a close distance to the litterbox, and doesn’t end up on furniture and beds.• Does well at controlling odor provided box is sifted at least once a day.We’ll continue buying the Dr. Elsey’s litter, and though we expect that every bag will be a bit different, we’re hopeful that it will continue to solve some of the problems we had with the finer-grained, lightweight types of litter. There’s likely not a litter on the market that can quickly absorb urine deposited directly on the bottom of the box and not create heavy sludge or really hard clumps that adhere like cement, so for now, this is as close as we’re likely to get to the Holy Grail of litterbox sand.12/20/23 UPDATE: I’ve purchased two 18-lb. bags from Amazon in the past 5 weeks, at a little over $11 per bag. Now the price has increased to over $16. I know we’re in inflationary times, but I can’t help but question the need for this particular increase, other than sheer avarice. Not suggesting the increase is Amazon’s decision — it may well be their supplier, but still… My local pet supply store is still selling it for just over $8 for the 18-lb. bag. While I appreciated the convenience of having it delivered to my door, I’m going to have to stop being lazy and just make the short drive to my nearby pet store, because the Amazon increase to $16+ just breached my annoyance threshold, as well as my budget.

46 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

Money saver AND energy saver! Holy Cow! (Mom of 6 cats)

I have had multiple cats all my life, and tried nearly every brand and type of litter you can find.This stuff is the real deal.I have three XXL industrial storage totes I converted into litter boxes to accommodate 6 cats. I scoop these totes every other morning, and now I realize I was going through a stupid amount of my old litter every week because of poor odor control, poor performance, and very little volume for the price.I decided to try this brand for the price and weight, and set it as a 3 week subscription.I scoop my litter the same frequency, but I’m barely making a dent in the stockpile I’ve accumulated of this stuff! I had to change my subscription setting farther out because this stuff is heavy duty FOR REAL! I can’t smell anything from those litter boxes (unless im scooping, obviously), it doesn’t track nearly as bad, and I can’t find a reason to replace the litter as often?! I baffled?! I have 2 extra bags of this stuff and I only JUST finished my first.This litter is a little dusty- but so is all clay litter.

3 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

I settled on this after a few years trying different litters

I wanted to give a very detailed review because I tried using reviews to choose litter, but it was very hard to do because often the reviews vary wildly in describing the same qualities of the same litter. I’ll start by saying I’ve tried Fresh Step, Tidy Cats, Arm & Hammer, Pretty Litter, and various other silicone litters before settling on this one. I have one short haired, older female kitty who has one litter box.For a long time, I used Arm & Hammer clump and seal litter. I didn’t hate it, but felt like it didn’t clump as well as it could and I wanted to try something else. So I switched to Pretty Litter for a while because I liked the color changing aspect. However, I started to notice that it wasn’t lasting as long as it was supposed to and I didn’t want to keep paying that much for something that wasn’t doing what it was supposed to. I liked the no-clump aspect, but it seemed to irritate my kitty’s toes. She was constantly picking stuff off the hair on her feet (and she doesn’t have long hair at all) and I felt like it tracked a lot. I then tried a few different silicone litters, but the more affordable ones were too hard to find regularly (ie often out of stock).So after all that experimentation, I had a few qualities I was looking for:- low dust- low tracking (I live in a very small apartment where there aren’t many steps between the litter box and the couch or the bed)- low odor- hopefully non-clumpingI ended up compromising on the non-clumping part, because this litter meets my other wish list items so well.- Dust: I haven’t tried some of the “natural” litters like the ones made from corn, wheat, etc. so I can’t speak for those. But otherwise I have used many of the popular litters and I have concluded that there probably isn’t a 100% dust free litter. I think it’s just the nature of such a product. However, this has less dust than any other litter I can think of and I love that.- Tracking: again, not sure if there exists a 100% no track litter. But in my experience, this tracks the least. I did notice after I was sick for a couple weeks (still scooping ofc but not as worried about cleaning up the litter on the floor) it did start to get a little spread out and ground into the carpet. But as long as I was vacuuming regularly I barely noticed any tracking.- Odor: this and the low tracking were probably the main selling points for me. I’ve honestly forgotten to scoop the box a couple times because I. NEVER. SMELL IT! Even when scooping it, it hardly smells. Only towards the end of its life cycle does it tend to stink much, but again, that’s only when scooping. And I use the scent free one! I hate the smell of scented cat litter (it gets too strong for me and in my head it’s a “cover up” smell, like spraying perfume on a dirty shirt or pants lol) I think this is the best quality of this litter. If odor is your sticking point, I’d definitely recommend trying this.- Clumping: as I said above, this was what I compromised on. **This IS a clumping litter.** But it clumps EXTREMELY well. Honestly sometimes it’s a bit like scooping a rock. If it’s a larger clump sometimes I have to put in some effort to break it in half. So because of that and how great the other qualities are, I was fine with switching back to a clumping litter. I have a Litter Genie so it’s not too much of an inconvenience. Actually, my only (very minor) complaint would be that the clumps get too heavy to fill the Litter Genie bag as full as I’d like, but it doesn’t bother me that much.- Price: I haven’t sat down and figured out how this one compares to the others in terms of price, but it’s at least comparable and I think very reasonable for the quality of what you get. The 18lb bag is a little more than enough to fill up the litter box, and has been lasting about a month.So glad I decided to try Dr. Elsey’s! I hope this review is helpful to anyone else shopping around for litter like I was.

1,724 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

Great Litter – but a cloud of dust when you pour it

Cat litter – I love and hate it. I love that I don’t have to take my cat on walks and follow it around with plastic bags to pick up steaming piles of rank, soft poo. So it is great that the cat can go when it wants, indoors. On the other hand, I never want my house to smell like a toilet, so I am very particular about cat litter. I clean the litter box every day; as part of my morning routine, and dump and replace all the litter (and sanitize the box) monthly.I have tried all kinds of litter boxes from simple pans, to expensive automatic self-cleaning boxes, including decorative enclosed boxes (hidden) in nice looking wood furniture. I have a large (14 lb) male cat, and he is assertive with his digging and cover up. He also sometimes pees on the inside wall of the box, so a high wall box is critical for us. We have found that top entry boxes are the best overall for containing waste, smell, and litter spray when digging, as well as minimizing tracking. The basic Amazon one is good, but the PetCo brand is by far the best (pricey, but worth it!) because it has a larger walking area on the top to capture litter. This litter drops back into the box with a neat hinge when you clean it. This model is also the easiest to clean because the hinge top is very, very convenient. With the Amazon box, you have to remove the top and put it aside. If you clean the PetCo box daily (which is very easy to do), it outperforms the expensive self-cleaning units, by far, in mess and odor control. Cleaning daily is much easier if you keep a bag dispensing scoop handy and toss out the daily bag of waste.When it comes to litter, there are 5 critical factors IMO (ranked in order of importance to me, as #1 is the most important):Odor control. If litter doesn’t contain odor, what is the point? That is its #1 job!Hard clumping. Scrapping a mushy litter paste off the bottom or side wall is awful, messy, time consuming, and disgusting. Plus it leaves your scoop all gross.Low tracking. I don’t want litter all over the house. Keep it in the box please!Price. It is a regular purchase, so it adds up. Price matters.Low dust. I don’t want to feel like I am breathing in poison or getting permanent lung damage every time I change the litter box.Here is my breakdown of some of the leading brands. Note the best solution is last.Dr. Elsey’s Ultra (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell waste even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 4444 stars: works pretty good for 15 days, in the second half of the month, I am occasionally scraping pasty off the walls, but not always, it is pretty good for most of the month.Low Tracking: 4444 stars: the granules are large enough that most of them stay in box; however, there is always some that sticks to his feet and gets scattered nearby.Price: 333 stars: not the cheapest, but not really expensive either.Low Dust: 333 stars: always a cloud of dust when I fill the box. It settles quickly, and I don’t see any more until I fill it next month.Arm & Hammer HardBall (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell even even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: fast and hard clumping, pee on the side wall comes off in a clean hard clump without pasty scraping … very nice!Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 22 stars: it is pricey.Low Dust: 55555 stars: no dust when I pour, no dust all month.Fresh Step (total 16 points):Odor Control: 4444 stars: I don’t smell much but odor control starts to fade near the end of the month.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: clumping is not that great plenty of pasty scrapping, especially in the back half of the monthLow Tracking: 333 stars: the granules are smaller, so there is more tracking.Price: 4444 stars: it is cheap and readily available in bulk at places like Sams and Costco.Low Dust: 333 stars: lots of dust when I pour, and some dust when the cat stirs it.Boxie Cat (total 10 points):Odor Control: 1 star: Started good, but in only 3 days I had the very strong odor of cat urine – no odor control after a few days.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: Started good, but daily pasty scrapping after 3 days.Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 1 stars: it is crazy expensive with TONS of marketing you are paying for.Low Dust: 4444 stars: some dust when I pour, not much after that.Mixed! The best solution I have found is to mix ⅓ Arm & Hammer HardBall with ⅔ Dr. Elsey. This way you get all of the benefits of Dr. Elsey with the added hardening from Arm and Hammer. (total 20 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: no smell all month.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: Already good clumping from Dr Elsey, beefed up Arm & Hammer’s HardBall formula.Low Tracking: 333 stars: adding the Arm & Hammer adds a little bit more tracking that you would just get with just Dr. Elsey.Price: 333 stars: not crazy – mixing makes both last longer so pricing is moderate.Low Dust: 4444 stars: less Dr. Elsey means less dust when I pour, not much after that.I hope this helps!

809 people found this helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars

Way too dusty

Did a 25 day test w/ World’s Best Cat Litter Clumping Litter Formula, Nature’s Miracle Just for Cats Corn Cob Litter, and Just the Crystals Premium Crystal Cat Litter. I’ve also previously used Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat Ultra Premium Cat Litter and can offer a comparison with it as well.(#1) World’s Best: Clumps very well and doesn’t track much at all. There is a small amount of dust, but the dust appears to have a large particle size and doesn’t stay airborne, so it settles quickly back into the box instead of getting all over everything. There is a slight odor to the litter which is a little unusual, but it doesn’t smell bad, and it seems to control the cat odor well. It’s also light weight, which makes it easy to scoop. My four cats had no problem w/ World’s Best. Of the four litters, this is the one I’ll probably end up going back to. Some people look at the cost per pound and say it is too expensive, but it is less dense than the clay litters, and as a result it takes less poundage to fill a litter box. While I didn’t measure this precisely, I’d tend to say the 28 lbs bag of World’s Best goes at least as far as a 40 lbs bag of Precious Cat (or other fine clay litter), which makes the costs a lot more comparable (just don’t overpay for the litter – some of the Amazon marketplace resellers gouge on the price).(#2 – tie) Just the Crystals: I tried this litter based on the excellent reviews here on Amazon. It doesn’t track very much at all (and given the large granules, it is easy to vacuum up when it does). It is easier to scoop than the others, as you just scoop out the poop and then stir it – you don’t need to remove the urine. While that sounds a bit gross, it really doesn’t appear to get wet, smelly, or dirty any quicker than the others. I was also really impressed with the manufacturer, who definitely seems to stand behind their brand. All of that said, while Just the Crystals is much less dusty than the clay litters, it did create a small amount of airborne dust while scooping. It wasn’t particularly objectionable, but was more than either Nature’s Miracle (which had none) or World’s Best (which settled before getting very airborne). My cats also used this box less than the others, though they’ve never used a crystal litter before and likely just aren’t used to it, which I can’t hold against Just the Crystals. The verdict? I probably won’t continue with Just the Crystals myself, but if I used an automatic litter box this would probably be my litter of choice. Price does seem a little bit more than other premium litters when measured by volume (not weight), but because you don’t throw out the peed up litter, you still have just as much litter in the box after 3 weeks as you had when you filled it initially (versus the other litters where you’re steadily throwing away litter as it gets peed up), which balances things out a bit.(#2 – tie) Nature’s Miracle: Basically zero dust, very lightweight (so it is really easy to scoop), and it also smells great coming out of the package. It does track a bit more than the others, though that’s only a minor annoyance to me (could be worse depending on where the box is). The real problem though is that it doesn’t clump well, and since the clumps fall apart, small pieces of old, peed up litter gradually build up in the box, which means it starts smelling bad faster. While I used Nature’s Miracle for years, this is eventually what pushed me away from it. If they could fix the clumping issue, this would probably be my favorite litter because of the non-existent dust and light weight. The clumping issue is a fairly big deal to me though, and World’s Best gets me most of the advantages without that major disadvantage. Per unit of volume this seems comparable to other premium litters – perhaps a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystals – but you might need to change it more often to keep it from smelling bad, which could make it less cost effective.(#3) Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat: Clumps extremely well and controls odor quite well. When I had a stray cat and her kittens, this is the litter I picked once they were of age to use a litter box (rather, I used the kitten version of it) because it seemed to control the odor the best for the longest period of time. It does track a bit more than the litters with larger granules (like World’s Best or Just the Crystals), and it’s fairly heavy, which makes it harder to scoop and change. The worst part is the dust though. As the litter ages, the granules seem to break down into smaller pieces that go airborne and make absolutely awful dust. The older it got, the worse it became. Scooping it would set off the smoke alarm in the room, and I had to wipe down everything in the room with a wet rag to remove the thick coating of litter dust. With one box in the past (prior to this test), it eventually got bad enough I felt like I had to cover my mouth while scooping it. I’ve tried their Respiratory Relief version as well, and that wasn’t any better. I’ve also tried mixing it with a less dusty litter like Nature’s Miracle, but that made little difference. Price per unit volume seems a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystal’s (more comparable to Nature’s Miracle – maybe a little less than it too), but I wouldn’t use it anymore even if it were free – can’t stand the dust.As for test methodology… All of the boxes were changed the same day. They were also washed before changing them using fragrance free detergent (I use fragrance free laundry detergent to do the boxes – it’s mild, leaves no odor, and I’m sure won’t irritate my cats). The litter boxes are converted from large Rubbermaid totes (I needed something with high sides as I have one cat that sometimes doesn’t squat and pees over the sides of regular litter boxes). I scoop them once daily at night.While all of the boxes are pretty large (again, they’re Rubbermaid storage totes), one is about 50% larger than the others. Historically, my cats have preferred that box, perhaps because of the extra room. In this test, that box had World’s Best, and, true to form, they used that box more than the others. That said, the box size may factor into that.Also, I did not actually measure volume for the price comparisons. Those are very loose estimates based on how much it felt like I needed to dump into the boxes to fill them. At the end of the day, the price differences between them weren’t so significant as to be the major differentiator between them.

248 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

The good, the bad and the muddy

We recently adopted an adult cat whose litterbox habits have resulted in going through 60 lbs. of litterbox sand in just the four weeks that we’ve had her. We didn’t realize how easy our previous cats (R.I.P.) made litterbox maintenance. For them, we used a lightweight, hard-clumping litter, and they would do their business tidily atop the litter, cover it up and be done, making it easy to just skim the clumps off the surface, leaving dry litterbox sand beneath. So we only needed to wash the box and completely replace the litter about once a month with our former cats. But our new cat’s litterbox habits may break the plastic scooper, as well as our pet-supply budget. Time to buy a sturdier, metal scooper!When she urinates, our new cat likes to scrape away all the litter (even though we fill the box so the litter is quite deep). Then she wees directly onto the bottom of the box, pretty much negating the main function of clumping litter. She then pushes the cat sand OVER the pool of wee, creating a cement-like mess that lurks hidden underneath and practically bonds with the base of the litter box. The box gets sifted several times a day, but after 3-4 days, the entire box needs to be completely emptied, washed and refilled with another massive amount of litterbox sand. Which is where this new litter comes in.Because our cat creates such a muddy mess at the bottom of the box, the much finer granules of the lightweight litter we were using before was getting stuck between her toes, depositing it all over the house, and in the mornings, we’d wake up to our bed covered in clumps of dirty, damp sand. So, out with the finer-grained, lightweight sand, and on to something different. We noticed that the Dr. Elsey’s litter seemed a bit grainier, though still offering clumping properties, and thought we’d give it a try. It tracks a lot less, and what little is tracked is easier to see and sweep up due to the larger size of the granules. And so far, those larger granules haven’t been sticking to our cat’s feet. But this litter is HEAVY! Our cat doesn’t have any issues pushing the sand around (a good feline fitness workout!), but because of her odd litterbox habits, it still gets stuck to the bottom of the litterbox, and takes a lot of effort to scrape off. So it appears that we’ll just be spending a lot of time and money on litterbox maintenance, whatever we try. And the wet clumps are super heavy, so taking out the garbage is a weight-bearing exercise. (TIP: we replaced our Litter Genie with the largest size of the OXO compost pail, which has a much larger opening, is so easy to fill and empty, and we can use any sturdy plastic bags to line it — no need to buy those Litter Genie refills. So it quickly pays for itself. And the OXO compost bin also keeps any unpleasant smells from escaping before emptying.)So, to sum up the litterbox saga (seems I’m not alone, as others appear to have epic issues when it comes to dealing with the litterbox situation):• If your cat doesn’t have a problem pushing around a heavier type litter, we found Dr. Elsey’s to be great at clumping if you go really deep when filling the box. But one downside to its hard clumping is that if you have a cat who likes to dig close to the bottom when urinating, the hard clumps adhere like cement to the bottom of the litter box, making it no job for a plastic scooper. So a heavy-duty metal scoop is a must.• Tracking is minimal and the larger granules make it easier to see and sweep up any tracked bits.• So far, the larger granules have eliminated the issue with sand getting stuck between our cat’s toes, so any tracking stays within a close distance to the litterbox, and doesn’t end up on furniture and beds.• Does well at controlling odor provided box is sifted at least once a day.We’ll continue buying the Dr. Elsey’s litter, and though we expect that every bag will be a bit different, we’re hopeful that it will continue to solve some of the problems we had with the finer-grained, lightweight types of litter. There’s likely not a litter on the market that can quickly absorb urine deposited directly on the bottom of the box and not create heavy sludge or really hard clumps that adhere like cement, so for now, this is as close as we’re likely to get to the Holy Grail of litterbox sand.12/20/23 UPDATE: I’ve purchased two 18-lb. bags from Amazon in the past 5 weeks, at a little over $11 per bag. Now the price has increased to over $16. I know we’re in inflationary times, but I can’t help but question the need for this particular increase, other than sheer avarice. Not suggesting the increase is Amazon’s decision — it may well be their supplier, but still… My local pet supply store is still selling it for just over $8 for the 18-lb. bag. While I appreciated the convenience of having it delivered to my door, I’m going to have to stop being lazy and just make the short drive to my nearby pet store, because the Amazon increase to $16+ just breached my annoyance threshold, as well as my budget.

46 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

Money saver AND energy saver! Holy Cow! (Mom of 6 cats)

I have had multiple cats all my life, and tried nearly every brand and type of litter you can find.This stuff is the real deal.I have three XXL industrial storage totes I converted into litter boxes to accommodate 6 cats. I scoop these totes every other morning, and now I realize I was going through a stupid amount of my old litter every week because of poor odor control, poor performance, and very little volume for the price.I decided to try this brand for the price and weight, and set it as a 3 week subscription.I scoop my litter the same frequency, but I’m barely making a dent in the stockpile I’ve accumulated of this stuff! I had to change my subscription setting farther out because this stuff is heavy duty FOR REAL! I can’t smell anything from those litter boxes (unless im scooping, obviously), it doesn’t track nearly as bad, and I can’t find a reason to replace the litter as often?! I baffled?! I have 2 extra bags of this stuff and I only JUST finished my first.This litter is a little dusty- but so is all clay litter.

3 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

I settled on this after a few years trying different litters

I wanted to give a very detailed review because I tried using reviews to choose litter, but it was very hard to do because often the reviews vary wildly in describing the same qualities of the same litter. I’ll start by saying I’ve tried Fresh Step, Tidy Cats, Arm & Hammer, Pretty Litter, and various other silicone litters before settling on this one. I have one short haired, older female kitty who has one litter box.For a long time, I used Arm & Hammer clump and seal litter. I didn’t hate it, but felt like it didn’t clump as well as it could and I wanted to try something else. So I switched to Pretty Litter for a while because I liked the color changing aspect. However, I started to notice that it wasn’t lasting as long as it was supposed to and I didn’t want to keep paying that much for something that wasn’t doing what it was supposed to. I liked the no-clump aspect, but it seemed to irritate my kitty’s toes. She was constantly picking stuff off the hair on her feet (and she doesn’t have long hair at all) and I felt like it tracked a lot. I then tried a few different silicone litters, but the more affordable ones were too hard to find regularly (ie often out of stock).So after all that experimentation, I had a few qualities I was looking for:- low dust- low tracking (I live in a very small apartment where there aren’t many steps between the litter box and the couch or the bed)- low odor- hopefully non-clumpingI ended up compromising on the non-clumping part, because this litter meets my other wish list items so well.- Dust: I haven’t tried some of the “natural” litters like the ones made from corn, wheat, etc. so I can’t speak for those. But otherwise I have used many of the popular litters and I have concluded that there probably isn’t a 100% dust free litter. I think it’s just the nature of such a product. However, this has less dust than any other litter I can think of and I love that.- Tracking: again, not sure if there exists a 100% no track litter. But in my experience, this tracks the least. I did notice after I was sick for a couple weeks (still scooping ofc but not as worried about cleaning up the litter on the floor) it did start to get a little spread out and ground into the carpet. But as long as I was vacuuming regularly I barely noticed any tracking.- Odor: this and the low tracking were probably the main selling points for me. I’ve honestly forgotten to scoop the box a couple times because I. NEVER. SMELL IT! Even when scooping it, it hardly smells. Only towards the end of its life cycle does it tend to stink much, but again, that’s only when scooping. And I use the scent free one! I hate the smell of scented cat litter (it gets too strong for me and in my head it’s a “cover up” smell, like spraying perfume on a dirty shirt or pants lol) I think this is the best quality of this litter. If odor is your sticking point, I’d definitely recommend trying this.- Clumping: as I said above, this was what I compromised on. **This IS a clumping litter.** But it clumps EXTREMELY well. Honestly sometimes it’s a bit like scooping a rock. If it’s a larger clump sometimes I have to put in some effort to break it in half. So because of that and how great the other qualities are, I was fine with switching back to a clumping litter. I have a Litter Genie so it’s not too much of an inconvenience. Actually, my only (very minor) complaint would be that the clumps get too heavy to fill the Litter Genie bag as full as I’d like, but it doesn’t bother me that much.- Price: I haven’t sat down and figured out how this one compares to the others in terms of price, but it’s at least comparable and I think very reasonable for the quality of what you get. The 18lb bag is a little more than enough to fill up the litter box, and has been lasting about a month.So glad I decided to try Dr. Elsey’s! I hope this review is helpful to anyone else shopping around for litter like I was.

1,724 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

Great Litter – but a cloud of dust when you pour it

Cat litter – I love and hate it. I love that I don’t have to take my cat on walks and follow it around with plastic bags to pick up steaming piles of rank, soft poo. So it is great that the cat can go when it wants, indoors. On the other hand, I never want my house to smell like a toilet, so I am very particular about cat litter. I clean the litter box every day; as part of my morning routine, and dump and replace all the litter (and sanitize the box) monthly.I have tried all kinds of litter boxes from simple pans, to expensive automatic self-cleaning boxes, including decorative enclosed boxes (hidden) in nice looking wood furniture. I have a large (14 lb) male cat, and he is assertive with his digging and cover up. He also sometimes pees on the inside wall of the box, so a high wall box is critical for us. We have found that top entry boxes are the best overall for containing waste, smell, and litter spray when digging, as well as minimizing tracking. The basic Amazon one is good, but the PetCo brand is by far the best (pricey, but worth it!) because it has a larger walking area on the top to capture litter. This litter drops back into the box with a neat hinge when you clean it. This model is also the easiest to clean because the hinge top is very, very convenient. With the Amazon box, you have to remove the top and put it aside. If you clean the PetCo box daily (which is very easy to do), it outperforms the expensive self-cleaning units, by far, in mess and odor control. Cleaning daily is much easier if you keep a bag dispensing scoop handy and toss out the daily bag of waste.When it comes to litter, there are 5 critical factors IMO (ranked in order of importance to me, as #1 is the most important):Odor control. If litter doesn’t contain odor, what is the point? That is its #1 job!Hard clumping. Scrapping a mushy litter paste off the bottom or side wall is awful, messy, time consuming, and disgusting. Plus it leaves your scoop all gross.Low tracking. I don’t want litter all over the house. Keep it in the box please!Price. It is a regular purchase, so it adds up. Price matters.Low dust. I don’t want to feel like I am breathing in poison or getting permanent lung damage every time I change the litter box.Here is my breakdown of some of the leading brands. Note the best solution is last.Dr. Elsey’s Ultra (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell waste even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 4444 stars: works pretty good for 15 days, in the second half of the month, I am occasionally scraping pasty off the walls, but not always, it is pretty good for most of the month.Low Tracking: 4444 stars: the granules are large enough that most of them stay in box; however, there is always some that sticks to his feet and gets scattered nearby.Price: 333 stars: not the cheapest, but not really expensive either.Low Dust: 333 stars: always a cloud of dust when I fill the box. It settles quickly, and I don’t see any more until I fill it next month.Arm & Hammer HardBall (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell even even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: fast and hard clumping, pee on the side wall comes off in a clean hard clump without pasty scraping … very nice!Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 22 stars: it is pricey.Low Dust: 55555 stars: no dust when I pour, no dust all month.Fresh Step (total 16 points):Odor Control: 4444 stars: I don’t smell much but odor control starts to fade near the end of the month.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: clumping is not that great plenty of pasty scrapping, especially in the back half of the monthLow Tracking: 333 stars: the granules are smaller, so there is more tracking.Price: 4444 stars: it is cheap and readily available in bulk at places like Sams and Costco.Low Dust: 333 stars: lots of dust when I pour, and some dust when the cat stirs it.Boxie Cat (total 10 points):Odor Control: 1 star: Started good, but in only 3 days I had the very strong odor of cat urine – no odor control after a few days.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: Started good, but daily pasty scrapping after 3 days.Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 1 stars: it is crazy expensive with TONS of marketing you are paying for.Low Dust: 4444 stars: some dust when I pour, not much after that.Mixed! The best solution I have found is to mix ⅓ Arm & Hammer HardBall with ⅔ Dr. Elsey. This way you get all of the benefits of Dr. Elsey with the added hardening from Arm and Hammer. (total 20 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: no smell all month.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: Already good clumping from Dr Elsey, beefed up Arm & Hammer’s HardBall formula.Low Tracking: 333 stars: adding the Arm & Hammer adds a little bit more tracking that you would just get with just Dr. Elsey.Price: 333 stars: not crazy – mixing makes both last longer so pricing is moderate.Low Dust: 4444 stars: less Dr. Elsey means less dust when I pour, not much after that.I hope this helps!

809 people found this helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars

Way too dusty

Did a 25 day test w/ World’s Best Cat Litter Clumping Litter Formula, Nature’s Miracle Just for Cats Corn Cob Litter, and Just the Crystals Premium Crystal Cat Litter. I’ve also previously used Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat Ultra Premium Cat Litter and can offer a comparison with it as well.(#1) World’s Best: Clumps very well and doesn’t track much at all. There is a small amount of dust, but the dust appears to have a large particle size and doesn’t stay airborne, so it settles quickly back into the box instead of getting all over everything. There is a slight odor to the litter which is a little unusual, but it doesn’t smell bad, and it seems to control the cat odor well. It’s also light weight, which makes it easy to scoop. My four cats had no problem w/ World’s Best. Of the four litters, this is the one I’ll probably end up going back to. Some people look at the cost per pound and say it is too expensive, but it is less dense than the clay litters, and as a result it takes less poundage to fill a litter box. While I didn’t measure this precisely, I’d tend to say the 28 lbs bag of World’s Best goes at least as far as a 40 lbs bag of Precious Cat (or other fine clay litter), which makes the costs a lot more comparable (just don’t overpay for the litter – some of the Amazon marketplace resellers gouge on the price).(#2 – tie) Just the Crystals: I tried this litter based on the excellent reviews here on Amazon. It doesn’t track very much at all (and given the large granules, it is easy to vacuum up when it does). It is easier to scoop than the others, as you just scoop out the poop and then stir it – you don’t need to remove the urine. While that sounds a bit gross, it really doesn’t appear to get wet, smelly, or dirty any quicker than the others. I was also really impressed with the manufacturer, who definitely seems to stand behind their brand. All of that said, while Just the Crystals is much less dusty than the clay litters, it did create a small amount of airborne dust while scooping. It wasn’t particularly objectionable, but was more than either Nature’s Miracle (which had none) or World’s Best (which settled before getting very airborne). My cats also used this box less than the others, though they’ve never used a crystal litter before and likely just aren’t used to it, which I can’t hold against Just the Crystals. The verdict? I probably won’t continue with Just the Crystals myself, but if I used an automatic litter box this would probably be my litter of choice. Price does seem a little bit more than other premium litters when measured by volume (not weight), but because you don’t throw out the peed up litter, you still have just as much litter in the box after 3 weeks as you had when you filled it initially (versus the other litters where you’re steadily throwing away litter as it gets peed up), which balances things out a bit.(#2 – tie) Nature’s Miracle: Basically zero dust, very lightweight (so it is really easy to scoop), and it also smells great coming out of the package. It does track a bit more than the others, though that’s only a minor annoyance to me (could be worse depending on where the box is). The real problem though is that it doesn’t clump well, and since the clumps fall apart, small pieces of old, peed up litter gradually build up in the box, which means it starts smelling bad faster. While I used Nature’s Miracle for years, this is eventually what pushed me away from it. If they could fix the clumping issue, this would probably be my favorite litter because of the non-existent dust and light weight. The clumping issue is a fairly big deal to me though, and World’s Best gets me most of the advantages without that major disadvantage. Per unit of volume this seems comparable to other premium litters – perhaps a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystals – but you might need to change it more often to keep it from smelling bad, which could make it less cost effective.(#3) Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat: Clumps extremely well and controls odor quite well. When I had a stray cat and her kittens, this is the litter I picked once they were of age to use a litter box (rather, I used the kitten version of it) because it seemed to control the odor the best for the longest period of time. It does track a bit more than the litters with larger granules (like World’s Best or Just the Crystals), and it’s fairly heavy, which makes it harder to scoop and change. The worst part is the dust though. As the litter ages, the granules seem to break down into smaller pieces that go airborne and make absolutely awful dust. The older it got, the worse it became. Scooping it would set off the smoke alarm in the room, and I had to wipe down everything in the room with a wet rag to remove the thick coating of litter dust. With one box in the past (prior to this test), it eventually got bad enough I felt like I had to cover my mouth while scooping it. I’ve tried their Respiratory Relief version as well, and that wasn’t any better. I’ve also tried mixing it with a less dusty litter like Nature’s Miracle, but that made little difference. Price per unit volume seems a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystal’s (more comparable to Nature’s Miracle – maybe a little less than it too), but I wouldn’t use it anymore even if it were free – can’t stand the dust.As for test methodology… All of the boxes were changed the same day. They were also washed before changing them using fragrance free detergent (I use fragrance free laundry detergent to do the boxes – it’s mild, leaves no odor, and I’m sure won’t irritate my cats). The litter boxes are converted from large Rubbermaid totes (I needed something with high sides as I have one cat that sometimes doesn’t squat and pees over the sides of regular litter boxes). I scoop them once daily at night.While all of the boxes are pretty large (again, they’re Rubbermaid storage totes), one is about 50% larger than the others. Historically, my cats have preferred that box, perhaps because of the extra room. In this test, that box had World’s Best, and, true to form, they used that box more than the others. That said, the box size may factor into that.Also, I did not actually measure volume for the price comparisons. Those are very loose estimates based on how much it felt like I needed to dump into the boxes to fill them. At the end of the day, the price differences between them weren’t so significant as to be the major differentiator between them.

248 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

The good, the bad and the muddy

We recently adopted an adult cat whose litterbox habits have resulted in going through 60 lbs. of litterbox sand in just the four weeks that we’ve had her. We didn’t realize how easy our previous cats (R.I.P.) made litterbox maintenance. For them, we used a lightweight, hard-clumping litter, and they would do their business tidily atop the litter, cover it up and be done, making it easy to just skim the clumps off the surface, leaving dry litterbox sand beneath. So we only needed to wash the box and completely replace the litter about once a month with our former cats. But our new cat’s litterbox habits may break the plastic scooper, as well as our pet-supply budget. Time to buy a sturdier, metal scooper!When she urinates, our new cat likes to scrape away all the litter (even though we fill the box so the litter is quite deep). Then she wees directly onto the bottom of the box, pretty much negating the main function of clumping litter. She then pushes the cat sand OVER the pool of wee, creating a cement-like mess that lurks hidden underneath and practically bonds with the base of the litter box. The box gets sifted several times a day, but after 3-4 days, the entire box needs to be completely emptied, washed and refilled with another massive amount of litterbox sand. Which is where this new litter comes in.Because our cat creates such a muddy mess at the bottom of the box, the much finer granules of the lightweight litter we were using before was getting stuck between her toes, depositing it all over the house, and in the mornings, we’d wake up to our bed covered in clumps of dirty, damp sand. So, out with the finer-grained, lightweight sand, and on to something different. We noticed that the Dr. Elsey’s litter seemed a bit grainier, though still offering clumping properties, and thought we’d give it a try. It tracks a lot less, and what little is tracked is easier to see and sweep up due to the larger size of the granules. And so far, those larger granules haven’t been sticking to our cat’s feet. But this litter is HEAVY! Our cat doesn’t have any issues pushing the sand around (a good feline fitness workout!), but because of her odd litterbox habits, it still gets stuck to the bottom of the litterbox, and takes a lot of effort to scrape off. So it appears that we’ll just be spending a lot of time and money on litterbox maintenance, whatever we try. And the wet clumps are super heavy, so taking out the garbage is a weight-bearing exercise. (TIP: we replaced our Litter Genie with the largest size of the OXO compost pail, which has a much larger opening, is so easy to fill and empty, and we can use any sturdy plastic bags to line it — no need to buy those Litter Genie refills. So it quickly pays for itself. And the OXO compost bin also keeps any unpleasant smells from escaping before emptying.)So, to sum up the litterbox saga (seems I’m not alone, as others appear to have epic issues when it comes to dealing with the litterbox situation):• If your cat doesn’t have a problem pushing around a heavier type litter, we found Dr. Elsey’s to be great at clumping if you go really deep when filling the box. But one downside to its hard clumping is that if you have a cat who likes to dig close to the bottom when urinating, the hard clumps adhere like cement to the bottom of the litter box, making it no job for a plastic scooper. So a heavy-duty metal scoop is a must.• Tracking is minimal and the larger granules make it easier to see and sweep up any tracked bits.• So far, the larger granules have eliminated the issue with sand getting stuck between our cat’s toes, so any tracking stays within a close distance to the litterbox, and doesn’t end up on furniture and beds.• Does well at controlling odor provided box is sifted at least once a day.We’ll continue buying the Dr. Elsey’s litter, and though we expect that every bag will be a bit different, we’re hopeful that it will continue to solve some of the problems we had with the finer-grained, lightweight types of litter. There’s likely not a litter on the market that can quickly absorb urine deposited directly on the bottom of the box and not create heavy sludge or really hard clumps that adhere like cement, so for now, this is as close as we’re likely to get to the Holy Grail of litterbox sand.12/20/23 UPDATE: I’ve purchased two 18-lb. bags from Amazon in the past 5 weeks, at a little over $11 per bag. Now the price has increased to over $16. I know we’re in inflationary times, but I can’t help but question the need for this particular increase, other than sheer avarice. Not suggesting the increase is Amazon’s decision — it may well be their supplier, but still… My local pet supply store is still selling it for just over $8 for the 18-lb. bag. While I appreciated the convenience of having it delivered to my door, I’m going to have to stop being lazy and just make the short drive to my nearby pet store, because the Amazon increase to $16+ just breached my annoyance threshold, as well as my budget.

46 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

Money saver AND energy saver! Holy Cow! (Mom of 6 cats)

I have had multiple cats all my life, and tried nearly every brand and type of litter you can find.This stuff is the real deal.I have three XXL industrial storage totes I converted into litter boxes to accommodate 6 cats. I scoop these totes every other morning, and now I realize I was going through a stupid amount of my old litter every week because of poor odor control, poor performance, and very little volume for the price.I decided to try this brand for the price and weight, and set it as a 3 week subscription.I scoop my litter the same frequency, but I’m barely making a dent in the stockpile I’ve accumulated of this stuff! I had to change my subscription setting farther out because this stuff is heavy duty FOR REAL! I can’t smell anything from those litter boxes (unless im scooping, obviously), it doesn’t track nearly as bad, and I can’t find a reason to replace the litter as often?! I baffled?! I have 2 extra bags of this stuff and I only JUST finished my first.This litter is a little dusty- but so is all clay litter.

3 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

I settled on this after a few years trying different litters

I wanted to give a very detailed review because I tried using reviews to choose litter, but it was very hard to do because often the reviews vary wildly in describing the same qualities of the same litter. I’ll start by saying I’ve tried Fresh Step, Tidy Cats, Arm & Hammer, Pretty Litter, and various other silicone litters before settling on this one. I have one short haired, older female kitty who has one litter box.For a long time, I used Arm & Hammer clump and seal litter. I didn’t hate it, but felt like it didn’t clump as well as it could and I wanted to try something else. So I switched to Pretty Litter for a while because I liked the color changing aspect. However, I started to notice that it wasn’t lasting as long as it was supposed to and I didn’t want to keep paying that much for something that wasn’t doing what it was supposed to. I liked the no-clump aspect, but it seemed to irritate my kitty’s toes. She was constantly picking stuff off the hair on her feet (and she doesn’t have long hair at all) and I felt like it tracked a lot. I then tried a few different silicone litters, but the more affordable ones were too hard to find regularly (ie often out of stock).So after all that experimentation, I had a few qualities I was looking for:- low dust- low tracking (I live in a very small apartment where there aren’t many steps between the litter box and the couch or the bed)- low odor- hopefully non-clumpingI ended up compromising on the non-clumping part, because this litter meets my other wish list items so well.- Dust: I haven’t tried some of the “natural” litters like the ones made from corn, wheat, etc. so I can’t speak for those. But otherwise I have used many of the popular litters and I have concluded that there probably isn’t a 100% dust free litter. I think it’s just the nature of such a product. However, this has less dust than any other litter I can think of and I love that.- Tracking: again, not sure if there exists a 100% no track litter. But in my experience, this tracks the least. I did notice after I was sick for a couple weeks (still scooping ofc but not as worried about cleaning up the litter on the floor) it did start to get a little spread out and ground into the carpet. But as long as I was vacuuming regularly I barely noticed any tracking.- Odor: this and the low tracking were probably the main selling points for me. I’ve honestly forgotten to scoop the box a couple times because I. NEVER. SMELL IT! Even when scooping it, it hardly smells. Only towards the end of its life cycle does it tend to stink much, but again, that’s only when scooping. And I use the scent free one! I hate the smell of scented cat litter (it gets too strong for me and in my head it’s a “cover up” smell, like spraying perfume on a dirty shirt or pants lol) I think this is the best quality of this litter. If odor is your sticking point, I’d definitely recommend trying this.- Clumping: as I said above, this was what I compromised on. **This IS a clumping litter.** But it clumps EXTREMELY well. Honestly sometimes it’s a bit like scooping a rock. If it’s a larger clump sometimes I have to put in some effort to break it in half. So because of that and how great the other qualities are, I was fine with switching back to a clumping litter. I have a Litter Genie so it’s not too much of an inconvenience. Actually, my only (very minor) complaint would be that the clumps get too heavy to fill the Litter Genie bag as full as I’d like, but it doesn’t bother me that much.- Price: I haven’t sat down and figured out how this one compares to the others in terms of price, but it’s at least comparable and I think very reasonable for the quality of what you get. The 18lb bag is a little more than enough to fill up the litter box, and has been lasting about a month.So glad I decided to try Dr. Elsey’s! I hope this review is helpful to anyone else shopping around for litter like I was.

1,724 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

Great Litter – but a cloud of dust when you pour it

Cat litter – I love and hate it. I love that I don’t have to take my cat on walks and follow it around with plastic bags to pick up steaming piles of rank, soft poo. So it is great that the cat can go when it wants, indoors. On the other hand, I never want my house to smell like a toilet, so I am very particular about cat litter. I clean the litter box every day; as part of my morning routine, and dump and replace all the litter (and sanitize the box) monthly.I have tried all kinds of litter boxes from simple pans, to expensive automatic self-cleaning boxes, including decorative enclosed boxes (hidden) in nice looking wood furniture. I have a large (14 lb) male cat, and he is assertive with his digging and cover up. He also sometimes pees on the inside wall of the box, so a high wall box is critical for us. We have found that top entry boxes are the best overall for containing waste, smell, and litter spray when digging, as well as minimizing tracking. The basic Amazon one is good, but the PetCo brand is by far the best (pricey, but worth it!) because it has a larger walking area on the top to capture litter. This litter drops back into the box with a neat hinge when you clean it. This model is also the easiest to clean because the hinge top is very, very convenient. With the Amazon box, you have to remove the top and put it aside. If you clean the PetCo box daily (which is very easy to do), it outperforms the expensive self-cleaning units, by far, in mess and odor control. Cleaning daily is much easier if you keep a bag dispensing scoop handy and toss out the daily bag of waste.When it comes to litter, there are 5 critical factors IMO (ranked in order of importance to me, as #1 is the most important):Odor control. If litter doesn’t contain odor, what is the point? That is its #1 job!Hard clumping. Scrapping a mushy litter paste off the bottom or side wall is awful, messy, time consuming, and disgusting. Plus it leaves your scoop all gross.Low tracking. I don’t want litter all over the house. Keep it in the box please!Price. It is a regular purchase, so it adds up. Price matters.Low dust. I don’t want to feel like I am breathing in poison or getting permanent lung damage every time I change the litter box.Here is my breakdown of some of the leading brands. Note the best solution is last.Dr. Elsey’s Ultra (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell waste even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 4444 stars: works pretty good for 15 days, in the second half of the month, I am occasionally scraping pasty off the walls, but not always, it is pretty good for most of the month.Low Tracking: 4444 stars: the granules are large enough that most of them stay in box; however, there is always some that sticks to his feet and gets scattered nearby.Price: 333 stars: not the cheapest, but not really expensive either.Low Dust: 333 stars: always a cloud of dust when I fill the box. It settles quickly, and I don’t see any more until I fill it next month.Arm & Hammer HardBall (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell even even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: fast and hard clumping, pee on the side wall comes off in a clean hard clump without pasty scraping … very nice!Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 22 stars: it is pricey.Low Dust: 55555 stars: no dust when I pour, no dust all month.Fresh Step (total 16 points):Odor Control: 4444 stars: I don’t smell much but odor control starts to fade near the end of the month.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: clumping is not that great plenty of pasty scrapping, especially in the back half of the monthLow Tracking: 333 stars: the granules are smaller, so there is more tracking.Price: 4444 stars: it is cheap and readily available in bulk at places like Sams and Costco.Low Dust: 333 stars: lots of dust when I pour, and some dust when the cat stirs it.Boxie Cat (total 10 points):Odor Control: 1 star: Started good, but in only 3 days I had the very strong odor of cat urine – no odor control after a few days.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: Started good, but daily pasty scrapping after 3 days.Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 1 stars: it is crazy expensive with TONS of marketing you are paying for.Low Dust: 4444 stars: some dust when I pour, not much after that.Mixed! The best solution I have found is to mix ⅓ Arm & Hammer HardBall with ⅔ Dr. Elsey. This way you get all of the benefits of Dr. Elsey with the added hardening from Arm and Hammer. (total 20 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: no smell all month.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: Already good clumping from Dr Elsey, beefed up Arm & Hammer’s HardBall formula.Low Tracking: 333 stars: adding the Arm & Hammer adds a little bit more tracking that you would just get with just Dr. Elsey.Price: 333 stars: not crazy – mixing makes both last longer so pricing is moderate.Low Dust: 4444 stars: less Dr. Elsey means less dust when I pour, not much after that.I hope this helps!

809 people found this helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars

Way too dusty

Did a 25 day test w/ World’s Best Cat Litter Clumping Litter Formula, Nature’s Miracle Just for Cats Corn Cob Litter, and Just the Crystals Premium Crystal Cat Litter. I’ve also previously used Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat Ultra Premium Cat Litter and can offer a comparison with it as well.(#1) World’s Best: Clumps very well and doesn’t track much at all. There is a small amount of dust, but the dust appears to have a large particle size and doesn’t stay airborne, so it settles quickly back into the box instead of getting all over everything. There is a slight odor to the litter which is a little unusual, but it doesn’t smell bad, and it seems to control the cat odor well. It’s also light weight, which makes it easy to scoop. My four cats had no problem w/ World’s Best. Of the four litters, this is the one I’ll probably end up going back to. Some people look at the cost per pound and say it is too expensive, but it is less dense than the clay litters, and as a result it takes less poundage to fill a litter box. While I didn’t measure this precisely, I’d tend to say the 28 lbs bag of World’s Best goes at least as far as a 40 lbs bag of Precious Cat (or other fine clay litter), which makes the costs a lot more comparable (just don’t overpay for the litter – some of the Amazon marketplace resellers gouge on the price).(#2 – tie) Just the Crystals: I tried this litter based on the excellent reviews here on Amazon. It doesn’t track very much at all (and given the large granules, it is easy to vacuum up when it does). It is easier to scoop than the others, as you just scoop out the poop and then stir it – you don’t need to remove the urine. While that sounds a bit gross, it really doesn’t appear to get wet, smelly, or dirty any quicker than the others. I was also really impressed with the manufacturer, who definitely seems to stand behind their brand. All of that said, while Just the Crystals is much less dusty than the clay litters, it did create a small amount of airborne dust while scooping. It wasn’t particularly objectionable, but was more than either Nature’s Miracle (which had none) or World’s Best (which settled before getting very airborne). My cats also used this box less than the others, though they’ve never used a crystal litter before and likely just aren’t used to it, which I can’t hold against Just the Crystals. The verdict? I probably won’t continue with Just the Crystals myself, but if I used an automatic litter box this would probably be my litter of choice. Price does seem a little bit more than other premium litters when measured by volume (not weight), but because you don’t throw out the peed up litter, you still have just as much litter in the box after 3 weeks as you had when you filled it initially (versus the other litters where you’re steadily throwing away litter as it gets peed up), which balances things out a bit.(#2 – tie) Nature’s Miracle: Basically zero dust, very lightweight (so it is really easy to scoop), and it also smells great coming out of the package. It does track a bit more than the others, though that’s only a minor annoyance to me (could be worse depending on where the box is). The real problem though is that it doesn’t clump well, and since the clumps fall apart, small pieces of old, peed up litter gradually build up in the box, which means it starts smelling bad faster. While I used Nature’s Miracle for years, this is eventually what pushed me away from it. If they could fix the clumping issue, this would probably be my favorite litter because of the non-existent dust and light weight. The clumping issue is a fairly big deal to me though, and World’s Best gets me most of the advantages without that major disadvantage. Per unit of volume this seems comparable to other premium litters – perhaps a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystals – but you might need to change it more often to keep it from smelling bad, which could make it less cost effective.(#3) Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat: Clumps extremely well and controls odor quite well. When I had a stray cat and her kittens, this is the litter I picked once they were of age to use a litter box (rather, I used the kitten version of it) because it seemed to control the odor the best for the longest period of time. It does track a bit more than the litters with larger granules (like World’s Best or Just the Crystals), and it’s fairly heavy, which makes it harder to scoop and change. The worst part is the dust though. As the litter ages, the granules seem to break down into smaller pieces that go airborne and make absolutely awful dust. The older it got, the worse it became. Scooping it would set off the smoke alarm in the room, and I had to wipe down everything in the room with a wet rag to remove the thick coating of litter dust. With one box in the past (prior to this test), it eventually got bad enough I felt like I had to cover my mouth while scooping it. I’ve tried their Respiratory Relief version as well, and that wasn’t any better. I’ve also tried mixing it with a less dusty litter like Nature’s Miracle, but that made little difference. Price per unit volume seems a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystal’s (more comparable to Nature’s Miracle – maybe a little less than it too), but I wouldn’t use it anymore even if it were free – can’t stand the dust.As for test methodology… All of the boxes were changed the same day. They were also washed before changing them using fragrance free detergent (I use fragrance free laundry detergent to do the boxes – it’s mild, leaves no odor, and I’m sure won’t irritate my cats). The litter boxes are converted from large Rubbermaid totes (I needed something with high sides as I have one cat that sometimes doesn’t squat and pees over the sides of regular litter boxes). I scoop them once daily at night.While all of the boxes are pretty large (again, they’re Rubbermaid storage totes), one is about 50% larger than the others. Historically, my cats have preferred that box, perhaps because of the extra room. In this test, that box had World’s Best, and, true to form, they used that box more than the others. That said, the box size may factor into that.Also, I did not actually measure volume for the price comparisons. Those are very loose estimates based on how much it felt like I needed to dump into the boxes to fill them. At the end of the day, the price differences between them weren’t so significant as to be the major differentiator between them.

248 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

The good, the bad and the muddy

We recently adopted an adult cat whose litterbox habits have resulted in going through 60 lbs. of litterbox sand in just the four weeks that we’ve had her. We didn’t realize how easy our previous cats (R.I.P.) made litterbox maintenance. For them, we used a lightweight, hard-clumping litter, and they would do their business tidily atop the litter, cover it up and be done, making it easy to just skim the clumps off the surface, leaving dry litterbox sand beneath. So we only needed to wash the box and completely replace the litter about once a month with our former cats. But our new cat’s litterbox habits may break the plastic scooper, as well as our pet-supply budget. Time to buy a sturdier, metal scooper!When she urinates, our new cat likes to scrape away all the litter (even though we fill the box so the litter is quite deep). Then she wees directly onto the bottom of the box, pretty much negating the main function of clumping litter. She then pushes the cat sand OVER the pool of wee, creating a cement-like mess that lurks hidden underneath and practically bonds with the base of the litter box. The box gets sifted several times a day, but after 3-4 days, the entire box needs to be completely emptied, washed and refilled with another massive amount of litterbox sand. Which is where this new litter comes in.Because our cat creates such a muddy mess at the bottom of the box, the much finer granules of the lightweight litter we were using before was getting stuck between her toes, depositing it all over the house, and in the mornings, we’d wake up to our bed covered in clumps of dirty, damp sand. So, out with the finer-grained, lightweight sand, and on to something different. We noticed that the Dr. Elsey’s litter seemed a bit grainier, though still offering clumping properties, and thought we’d give it a try. It tracks a lot less, and what little is tracked is easier to see and sweep up due to the larger size of the granules. And so far, those larger granules haven’t been sticking to our cat’s feet. But this litter is HEAVY! Our cat doesn’t have any issues pushing the sand around (a good feline fitness workout!), but because of her odd litterbox habits, it still gets stuck to the bottom of the litterbox, and takes a lot of effort to scrape off. So it appears that we’ll just be spending a lot of time and money on litterbox maintenance, whatever we try. And the wet clumps are super heavy, so taking out the garbage is a weight-bearing exercise. (TIP: we replaced our Litter Genie with the largest size of the OXO compost pail, which has a much larger opening, is so easy to fill and empty, and we can use any sturdy plastic bags to line it — no need to buy those Litter Genie refills. So it quickly pays for itself. And the OXO compost bin also keeps any unpleasant smells from escaping before emptying.)So, to sum up the litterbox saga (seems I’m not alone, as others appear to have epic issues when it comes to dealing with the litterbox situation):• If your cat doesn’t have a problem pushing around a heavier type litter, we found Dr. Elsey’s to be great at clumping if you go really deep when filling the box. But one downside to its hard clumping is that if you have a cat who likes to dig close to the bottom when urinating, the hard clumps adhere like cement to the bottom of the litter box, making it no job for a plastic scooper. So a heavy-duty metal scoop is a must.• Tracking is minimal and the larger granules make it easier to see and sweep up any tracked bits.• So far, the larger granules have eliminated the issue with sand getting stuck between our cat’s toes, so any tracking stays within a close distance to the litterbox, and doesn’t end up on furniture and beds.• Does well at controlling odor provided box is sifted at least once a day.We’ll continue buying the Dr. Elsey’s litter, and though we expect that every bag will be a bit different, we’re hopeful that it will continue to solve some of the problems we had with the finer-grained, lightweight types of litter. There’s likely not a litter on the market that can quickly absorb urine deposited directly on the bottom of the box and not create heavy sludge or really hard clumps that adhere like cement, so for now, this is as close as we’re likely to get to the Holy Grail of litterbox sand.12/20/23 UPDATE: I’ve purchased two 18-lb. bags from Amazon in the past 5 weeks, at a little over $11 per bag. Now the price has increased to over $16. I know we’re in inflationary times, but I can’t help but question the need for this particular increase, other than sheer avarice. Not suggesting the increase is Amazon’s decision — it may well be their supplier, but still… My local pet supply store is still selling it for just over $8 for the 18-lb. bag. While I appreciated the convenience of having it delivered to my door, I’m going to have to stop being lazy and just make the short drive to my nearby pet store, because the Amazon increase to $16+ just breached my annoyance threshold, as well as my budget.

46 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

Money saver AND energy saver! Holy Cow! (Mom of 6 cats)

I have had multiple cats all my life, and tried nearly every brand and type of litter you can find.This stuff is the real deal.I have three XXL industrial storage totes I converted into litter boxes to accommodate 6 cats. I scoop these totes every other morning, and now I realize I was going through a stupid amount of my old litter every week because of poor odor control, poor performance, and very little volume for the price.I decided to try this brand for the price and weight, and set it as a 3 week subscription.I scoop my litter the same frequency, but I’m barely making a dent in the stockpile I’ve accumulated of this stuff! I had to change my subscription setting farther out because this stuff is heavy duty FOR REAL! I can’t smell anything from those litter boxes (unless im scooping, obviously), it doesn’t track nearly as bad, and I can’t find a reason to replace the litter as often?! I baffled?! I have 2 extra bags of this stuff and I only JUST finished my first.This litter is a little dusty- but so is all clay litter.

3 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

I settled on this after a few years trying different litters

I wanted to give a very detailed review because I tried using reviews to choose litter, but it was very hard to do because often the reviews vary wildly in describing the same qualities of the same litter. I’ll start by saying I’ve tried Fresh Step, Tidy Cats, Arm & Hammer, Pretty Litter, and various other silicone litters before settling on this one. I have one short haired, older female kitty who has one litter box.For a long time, I used Arm & Hammer clump and seal litter. I didn’t hate it, but felt like it didn’t clump as well as it could and I wanted to try something else. So I switched to Pretty Litter for a while because I liked the color changing aspect. However, I started to notice that it wasn’t lasting as long as it was supposed to and I didn’t want to keep paying that much for something that wasn’t doing what it was supposed to. I liked the no-clump aspect, but it seemed to irritate my kitty’s toes. She was constantly picking stuff off the hair on her feet (and she doesn’t have long hair at all) and I felt like it tracked a lot. I then tried a few different silicone litters, but the more affordable ones were too hard to find regularly (ie often out of stock).So after all that experimentation, I had a few qualities I was looking for:- low dust- low tracking (I live in a very small apartment where there aren’t many steps between the litter box and the couch or the bed)- low odor- hopefully non-clumpingI ended up compromising on the non-clumping part, because this litter meets my other wish list items so well.- Dust: I haven’t tried some of the “natural” litters like the ones made from corn, wheat, etc. so I can’t speak for those. But otherwise I have used many of the popular litters and I have concluded that there probably isn’t a 100% dust free litter. I think it’s just the nature of such a product. However, this has less dust than any other litter I can think of and I love that.- Tracking: again, not sure if there exists a 100% no track litter. But in my experience, this tracks the least. I did notice after I was sick for a couple weeks (still scooping ofc but not as worried about cleaning up the litter on the floor) it did start to get a little spread out and ground into the carpet. But as long as I was vacuuming regularly I barely noticed any tracking.- Odor: this and the low tracking were probably the main selling points for me. I’ve honestly forgotten to scoop the box a couple times because I. NEVER. SMELL IT! Even when scooping it, it hardly smells. Only towards the end of its life cycle does it tend to stink much, but again, that’s only when scooping. And I use the scent free one! I hate the smell of scented cat litter (it gets too strong for me and in my head it’s a “cover up” smell, like spraying perfume on a dirty shirt or pants lol) I think this is the best quality of this litter. If odor is your sticking point, I’d definitely recommend trying this.- Clumping: as I said above, this was what I compromised on. **This IS a clumping litter.** But it clumps EXTREMELY well. Honestly sometimes it’s a bit like scooping a rock. If it’s a larger clump sometimes I have to put in some effort to break it in half. So because of that and how great the other qualities are, I was fine with switching back to a clumping litter. I have a Litter Genie so it’s not too much of an inconvenience. Actually, my only (very minor) complaint would be that the clumps get too heavy to fill the Litter Genie bag as full as I’d like, but it doesn’t bother me that much.- Price: I haven’t sat down and figured out how this one compares to the others in terms of price, but it’s at least comparable and I think very reasonable for the quality of what you get. The 18lb bag is a little more than enough to fill up the litter box, and has been lasting about a month.So glad I decided to try Dr. Elsey’s! I hope this review is helpful to anyone else shopping around for litter like I was.

1,724 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

Great Litter – but a cloud of dust when you pour it

Cat litter – I love and hate it. I love that I don’t have to take my cat on walks and follow it around with plastic bags to pick up steaming piles of rank, soft poo. So it is great that the cat can go when it wants, indoors. On the other hand, I never want my house to smell like a toilet, so I am very particular about cat litter. I clean the litter box every day; as part of my morning routine, and dump and replace all the litter (and sanitize the box) monthly.I have tried all kinds of litter boxes from simple pans, to expensive automatic self-cleaning boxes, including decorative enclosed boxes (hidden) in nice looking wood furniture. I have a large (14 lb) male cat, and he is assertive with his digging and cover up. He also sometimes pees on the inside wall of the box, so a high wall box is critical for us. We have found that top entry boxes are the best overall for containing waste, smell, and litter spray when digging, as well as minimizing tracking. The basic Amazon one is good, but the PetCo brand is by far the best (pricey, but worth it!) because it has a larger walking area on the top to capture litter. This litter drops back into the box with a neat hinge when you clean it. This model is also the easiest to clean because the hinge top is very, very convenient. With the Amazon box, you have to remove the top and put it aside. If you clean the PetCo box daily (which is very easy to do), it outperforms the expensive self-cleaning units, by far, in mess and odor control. Cleaning daily is much easier if you keep a bag dispensing scoop handy and toss out the daily bag of waste.When it comes to litter, there are 5 critical factors IMO (ranked in order of importance to me, as #1 is the most important):Odor control. If litter doesn’t contain odor, what is the point? That is its #1 job!Hard clumping. Scrapping a mushy litter paste off the bottom or side wall is awful, messy, time consuming, and disgusting. Plus it leaves your scoop all gross.Low tracking. I don’t want litter all over the house. Keep it in the box please!Price. It is a regular purchase, so it adds up. Price matters.Low dust. I don’t want to feel like I am breathing in poison or getting permanent lung damage every time I change the litter box.Here is my breakdown of some of the leading brands. Note the best solution is last.Dr. Elsey’s Ultra (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell waste even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 4444 stars: works pretty good for 15 days, in the second half of the month, I am occasionally scraping pasty off the walls, but not always, it is pretty good for most of the month.Low Tracking: 4444 stars: the granules are large enough that most of them stay in box; however, there is always some that sticks to his feet and gets scattered nearby.Price: 333 stars: not the cheapest, but not really expensive either.Low Dust: 333 stars: always a cloud of dust when I fill the box. It settles quickly, and I don’t see any more until I fill it next month.Arm & Hammer HardBall (total 19 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: I never smell even even after 30 days of use.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: fast and hard clumping, pee on the side wall comes off in a clean hard clump without pasty scraping … very nice!Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 22 stars: it is pricey.Low Dust: 55555 stars: no dust when I pour, no dust all month.Fresh Step (total 16 points):Odor Control: 4444 stars: I don’t smell much but odor control starts to fade near the end of the month.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: clumping is not that great plenty of pasty scrapping, especially in the back half of the monthLow Tracking: 333 stars: the granules are smaller, so there is more tracking.Price: 4444 stars: it is cheap and readily available in bulk at places like Sams and Costco.Low Dust: 333 stars: lots of dust when I pour, and some dust when the cat stirs it.Boxie Cat (total 10 points):Odor Control: 1 star: Started good, but in only 3 days I had the very strong odor of cat urine – no odor control after a few days.Hard Clumping: 22 stars: Started good, but daily pasty scrapping after 3 days.Low Tracking: 22 stars: the granules are very small, so there is alot more tracking.Price: 1 stars: it is crazy expensive with TONS of marketing you are paying for.Low Dust: 4444 stars: some dust when I pour, not much after that.Mixed! The best solution I have found is to mix ⅓ Arm & Hammer HardBall with ⅔ Dr. Elsey. This way you get all of the benefits of Dr. Elsey with the added hardening from Arm and Hammer. (total 20 points):Odor Control: 55555 stars: no smell all month.Hard Clumping: 55555 stars: Already good clumping from Dr Elsey, beefed up Arm & Hammer’s HardBall formula.Low Tracking: 333 stars: adding the Arm & Hammer adds a little bit more tracking that you would just get with just Dr. Elsey.Price: 333 stars: not crazy – mixing makes both last longer so pricing is moderate.Low Dust: 4444 stars: less Dr. Elsey means less dust when I pour, not much after that.I hope this helps!

809 people found this helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars

Way too dusty

Did a 25 day test w/ World’s Best Cat Litter Clumping Litter Formula, Nature’s Miracle Just for Cats Corn Cob Litter, and Just the Crystals Premium Crystal Cat Litter. I’ve also previously used Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat Ultra Premium Cat Litter and can offer a comparison with it as well.(#1) World’s Best: Clumps very well and doesn’t track much at all. There is a small amount of dust, but the dust appears to have a large particle size and doesn’t stay airborne, so it settles quickly back into the box instead of getting all over everything. There is a slight odor to the litter which is a little unusual, but it doesn’t smell bad, and it seems to control the cat odor well. It’s also light weight, which makes it easy to scoop. My four cats had no problem w/ World’s Best. Of the four litters, this is the one I’ll probably end up going back to. Some people look at the cost per pound and say it is too expensive, but it is less dense than the clay litters, and as a result it takes less poundage to fill a litter box. While I didn’t measure this precisely, I’d tend to say the 28 lbs bag of World’s Best goes at least as far as a 40 lbs bag of Precious Cat (or other fine clay litter), which makes the costs a lot more comparable (just don’t overpay for the litter – some of the Amazon marketplace resellers gouge on the price).(#2 – tie) Just the Crystals: I tried this litter based on the excellent reviews here on Amazon. It doesn’t track very much at all (and given the large granules, it is easy to vacuum up when it does). It is easier to scoop than the others, as you just scoop out the poop and then stir it – you don’t need to remove the urine. While that sounds a bit gross, it really doesn’t appear to get wet, smelly, or dirty any quicker than the others. I was also really impressed with the manufacturer, who definitely seems to stand behind their brand. All of that said, while Just the Crystals is much less dusty than the clay litters, it did create a small amount of airborne dust while scooping. It wasn’t particularly objectionable, but was more than either Nature’s Miracle (which had none) or World’s Best (which settled before getting very airborne). My cats also used this box less than the others, though they’ve never used a crystal litter before and likely just aren’t used to it, which I can’t hold against Just the Crystals. The verdict? I probably won’t continue with Just the Crystals myself, but if I used an automatic litter box this would probably be my litter of choice. Price does seem a little bit more than other premium litters when measured by volume (not weight), but because you don’t throw out the peed up litter, you still have just as much litter in the box after 3 weeks as you had when you filled it initially (versus the other litters where you’re steadily throwing away litter as it gets peed up), which balances things out a bit.(#2 – tie) Nature’s Miracle: Basically zero dust, very lightweight (so it is really easy to scoop), and it also smells great coming out of the package. It does track a bit more than the others, though that’s only a minor annoyance to me (could be worse depending on where the box is). The real problem though is that it doesn’t clump well, and since the clumps fall apart, small pieces of old, peed up litter gradually build up in the box, which means it starts smelling bad faster. While I used Nature’s Miracle for years, this is eventually what pushed me away from it. If they could fix the clumping issue, this would probably be my favorite litter because of the non-existent dust and light weight. The clumping issue is a fairly big deal to me though, and World’s Best gets me most of the advantages without that major disadvantage. Per unit of volume this seems comparable to other premium litters – perhaps a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystals – but you might need to change it more often to keep it from smelling bad, which could make it less cost effective.(#3) Dr. Elsy’s Precious Cat: Clumps extremely well and controls odor quite well. When I had a stray cat and her kittens, this is the litter I picked once they were of age to use a litter box (rather, I used the kitten version of it) because it seemed to control the odor the best for the longest period of time. It does track a bit more than the litters with larger granules (like World’s Best or Just the Crystals), and it’s fairly heavy, which makes it harder to scoop and change. The worst part is the dust though. As the litter ages, the granules seem to break down into smaller pieces that go airborne and make absolutely awful dust. The older it got, the worse it became. Scooping it would set off the smoke alarm in the room, and I had to wipe down everything in the room with a wet rag to remove the thick coating of litter dust. With one box in the past (prior to this test), it eventually got bad enough I felt like I had to cover my mouth while scooping it. I’ve tried their Respiratory Relief version as well, and that wasn’t any better. I’ve also tried mixing it with a less dusty litter like Nature’s Miracle, but that made little difference. Price per unit volume seems a bit less than World’s Best or Just the Crystal’s (more comparable to Nature’s Miracle – maybe a little less than it too), but I wouldn’t use it anymore even if it were free – can’t stand the dust.As for test methodology… All of the boxes were changed the same day. They were also washed before changing them using fragrance free detergent (I use fragrance free laundry detergent to do the boxes – it’s mild, leaves no odor, and I’m sure won’t irritate my cats). The litter boxes are converted from large Rubbermaid totes (I needed something with high sides as I have one cat that sometimes doesn’t squat and pees over the sides of regular litter boxes). I scoop them once daily at night.While all of the boxes are pretty large (again, they’re Rubbermaid storage totes), one is about 50% larger than the others. Historically, my cats have preferred that box, perhaps because of the extra room. In this test, that box had World’s Best, and, true to form, they used that box more than the others. That said, the box size may factor into that.Also, I did not actually measure volume for the price comparisons. Those are very loose estimates based on how much it felt like I needed to dump into the boxes to fill them. At the end of the day, the price differences between them weren’t so significant as to be the major differentiator between them.

248 people found this helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars

The good, the bad and the muddy

We recently adopted an adult cat whose litterbox habits have resulted in going through 60 lbs. of litterbox sand in just the four weeks that we’ve had her. We didn’t realize how easy our previous cats (R.I.P.) made litterbox maintenance. For them, we used a lightweight, hard-clumping litter, and they would do their business tidily atop the litter, cover it up and be done, making it easy to just skim the clumps off the surface, leaving dry litterbox sand beneath. So we only needed to wash the box and completely replace the litter about once a month with our former cats. But our new cat’s litterbox habits may break the plastic scooper, as well as our pet-supply budget. Time to buy a sturdier, metal scooper!When she urinates, our new cat likes to scrape away all the litter (even though we fill the box so the litter is quite deep). Then she wees directly onto the bottom of the box, pretty much negating the main function of clumping litter. She then pushes the cat sand OVER the pool of wee, creating a cement-like mess that lurks hidden underneath and practically bonds with the base of the litter box. The box gets sifted several times a day, but after 3-4 days, the entire box needs to be completely emptied, washed and refilled with another massive amount of litterbox sand. Which is where this new litter comes in.Because our cat creates such a muddy mess at the bottom of the box, the much finer granules of the lightweight litter we were using before was getting stuck between her toes, depositing it all over the house, and in the mornings, we’d wake up to our bed covered in clumps of dirty, damp sand. So, out with the finer-grained, lightweight sand, and on to something different. We noticed that the Dr. Elsey’s litter seemed a bit grainier, though still offering clumping properties, and thought we’d give it a try. It tracks a lot less, and what little is tracked is easier to see and sweep up due to the larger size of the granules. And so far, those larger granules haven’t been sticking to our cat’s feet. But this litter is HEAVY! Our cat doesn’t have any issues pushing the sand around (a good feline fitness workout!), but because of her odd litterbox habits, it still gets stuck to the bottom of the litterbox, and takes a lot of effort to scrape off. So it appears that we’ll just be spending a lot of time and money on litterbox maintenance, whatever we try. And the wet clumps are super heavy, so taking out the garbage is a weight-bearing exercise. (TIP: we replaced our Litter Genie with the largest size of the OXO compost pail, which has a much larger opening, is so easy to fill and empty, and we can use any sturdy plastic bags to line it — no need to buy those Litter Genie refills. So it quickly pays for itself. And the OXO compost bin also keeps any unpleasant smells from escaping before emptying.)So, to sum up the litterbox saga (seems I’m not alone, as others appear to have epic issues when it comes to dealing with the litterbox situation):• If your cat doesn’t have a problem pushing around a heavier type litter, we found Dr. Elsey’s to be great at clumping if you go really deep when filling the box. But one downside to its hard clumping is that if you have a cat who likes to dig close to the bottom when urinating, the hard clumps adhere like cement to the bottom of the litter box, making it no job for a plastic scooper. So a heavy-duty metal scoop is a must.• Tracking is minimal and the larger granules make it easier to see and sweep up any tracked bits.• So far, the larger granules have eliminated the issue with sand getting stuck between our cat’s toes, so any tracking stays within a close distance to the litterbox, and doesn’t end up on furniture and beds.• Does well at controlling odor provided box is sifted at least once a day.We’ll continue buying the Dr. Elsey’s litter, and though we expect that every bag will be a bit different, we’re hopeful that it will continue to solve some of the problems we had with the finer-grained, lightweight types of litter. There’s likely not a litter on the market that can quickly absorb urine deposited directly on the bottom of the box and not create heavy sludge or really hard clumps that adhere like cement, so for now, this is as close as we’re likely to get to the Holy Grail of litterbox sand.12/20/23 UPDATE: I’ve purchased two 18-lb. bags from Amazon in the past 5 weeks, at a little over $11 per bag. Now the price has increased to over $16. I know we’re in inflationary times, but I can’t help but question the need for this particular increase, other than sheer avarice. Not suggesting the increase is Amazon’s decision — it may well be their supplier, but still… My local pet supply store is still selling it for just over $8 for the 18-lb. bag. While I appreciated the convenience of having it delivered to my door, I’m going to have to stop being lazy and just make the short drive to my nearby pet store, because the Amazon increase to $16+ just breached my annoyance threshold, as well as my budget.

46 people found this helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars

Money saver AND energy saver! Holy Cow! (Mom of 6 cats)

I have had multiple cats all my life, and tried nearly every brand and type of litter you can find.This stuff is the real deal.I have three XXL industrial storage totes I converted into litter boxes to accommodate 6 cats. I scoop these totes every other morning, and now I realize I was going through a stupid amount of my old litter every week because of poor odor control, poor performance, and very little volume for the price.I decided to try this brand for the price and weight, and set it as a 3 week subscription.I scoop my litter the same frequency, but I’m barely making a dent in the stockpile I’ve accumulated of this stuff! I had to change my subscription setting farther out because this stuff is heavy duty FOR REAL! I can’t smell anything from those litter boxes (unless im scooping, obviously), it doesn’t track nearly as bad, and I can’t find a reason to replace the litter as often?! I baffled?! I have 2 extra bags of this stuff and I only JUST finished my first.This litter is a little dusty- but so is all clay litter.

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