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A house with cats can smell amazing, but it does require an extra effort into cleaning and extra cash for better litter.
What's physically completely impossible is to have a house without fur. Just learn to live with the fact that there will be fur between your ass cheeks, sandwich, computer, eye balls.
Very very true.
If you just regularly clean the litter box and use decent litter, smell is not an issue at all.
But no matter how often or thoroughly I brush and deshed my cats, there will always be hair everywhere.
It's amazing what a roomba on a daily schedule can do for the fur problem.
Have Roombas gotten better? Last time I had one it was loud and just bumped into things. Are they smarter now?
Better? Yes. Perfect? No.
I had one of the first models and they were not good.
Now, I have the i7 and it is great at dodging items I leave out (shoes, random boxes, cat toys), but it obviously performs better when the floor is free of obstruction. I do not replace the bag as recommended and disabled the setting that prevents the tower thing from becoming overfilled. There are probably cheaper options around, but the official roomba works great these days. I have it do a deep clean (every room once and the heavy traction areas twice) on Monday and Thursday and then a quick clean every day. I haven't had to spot clean since I got the schedule started, but I do occasionally randomly run a schedule if I have guests over. I even have a very long step it can fall off of but it hasn't even fallen off once... well not completely true, it's wheel has got stuck off the cliff a few times.
Tldr; it's great. Much better than before. Get one.
Well, they supposedly come with shit detection now.
I have a j7+ and it is great. Never had a single issue. Covers the area I need it to (whole first floor) and self empties.
That's the reason I can't have a kitty. Allergic to cat fur for some reason.
Check out Purina liveclear food and shampoo, I just moved in with a cat and have pretty bad cat allergies, but feeding the cat that food and occasionally rubbing on some of the dry shampoo seems to have mostly eliminated the issue. I can rub my face in the kitty's belly no problem.
Its actually a misconception, its not the fur thats causing the allergic reaction, its actually a protein the cats produce that can be found in their saliva. So when they groom themselves, the protein gets onto their fur.
Interesting fact, intact males produce more of this protein compared to female and neutered males.
Also, you can buy certain cat food that will help manage the protein (it doesn't eliminate or stop it being produced, it just deactivates the protein). So thats one possible solution for people with allergies. Though if you're super sensitive, it mightn't help much.
EDIT: here's the source
Interesting. Why did I become allergic though? I used to not be.
I think most doctors and researchers would love an answer to that question as well - allergies are weird
That I'm not really sure. I do know however that early exposure (from childhood) to allergens helps prevent allergies from developing later in life.
So people who had a cat when they were a child are much less likely to develop cat allergies when adults, and similarly children who eat nuts are less likely to develop nut allergies
We were fur free with regular vacuuming and a roomba.reallt depends on the type of cats
Daily scooping, silica gel litter. Unless you see them you can’t tell I have cats. Even my mom doesn’t complain. Silica gel litter is god’s gift to cat parents.
What would better litter be? I’ve tried about every brand I’ve seen in the past 5 years and the ones that have worked best are just regular brand. Maybe faster clumping is helpful (currently using Tidy Cats Instant Action), but I’ve never seen a noticeable improvement on smell.
I'm Brazilian, so I can't really help you with brand names or even availability.
But mine is made out of lemon grass, corn and cassava. It smells like lemon grass, urine forms almost perfect spheres, and you can clean it super easily. Nice bonus: you can flush it without issues, and if your cat eats for some reason, it's actually helpful fiber.
Avoid silica based ones like the plague.
Another user recommended silica, what's wrong with it?
There are quite a few. To begin with, the manufacturing process can be harmful to the workers, and for the same reason, it can actually worsen some cat's respiratory issues. The silica also likes to flake into sharper and smaller points when exposed to liquid, which often can cause bruises or skin irritation on paws, mouth or even eyes. Plus, it actually does start to smell quite fast compared to several other kinds of litter (though it's usually better than the wood based ones, if they're not properly designed they smell horrible).