# Pee Rock Garden [Experiment]



## Millie & Daisy (Mar 7, 2015)

I know a lot of people use pee rocks. I notice my girls kind of like to do their "go" on tile. I wonder if it would be possible to use aspen in my litterbox and use some of those river rocks from the dollar tree in there and make a sort of poop/pee rock garden that has slightly more aesthetic appeal...? Maybe it's silly, but I really wish their litter box looked less like...a litter box. Maybe if it was prettier that would help. I mean, hey...humans have decoratively designed toilets, don't they? I'm still trying to get them to use their box again, so I think this might help. 

I've used the river stones from dollar tree in an aquarium before, so I know they're pet-safe. I will try it and let you all know with results and pictures when I do.


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## Amph (Apr 14, 2015)

I came here just because of the tittle LOL..;D You can use any container you like as a litter box.. I'm sure you could come up with something decorative.  I don't find poop to smell all that much and I even considered replacing the litter with those glass pebbles that you can get to decorate bowls with to add some nice color. My tray has a grate on it anyway so they couldn't get at them.. Just be creative and see what works out.


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## FallDeere (Sep 29, 2011)

That's a brilliant idea. All of my rats WERE litter trained until I added Mu and Daisy into the main cage... They like to destroy litter boxes. Seriously, they chewed one up and they pull the litter out of the box. Fun. =/

I'm going to try the idea of a rock garden in the place of litter boxes. It'll help keep their nails down and make a cool litter box.


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## Mojojuju (Nov 15, 2014)

Waiting to see how this turns out!


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## Millie & Daisy (Mar 7, 2015)

I got the rocks last night...it's somewhat of a success. Pricing was the best part, really. It was only $1 for a bag of natural river stones. There were also glass floral rocks (like the little balls for the fishtank, flat marbles) that I thought might look pretty, but I turned them down in favor of just starting small. The rocks are great because they are real, they are easy, a good size (no fear of them eating them) and can be reused. That meant a $1 investment for me once instead of $10.99 for carefresh every month. (I also used aspen between the rocks, but there I had already gotten a huge bag of it for less than $5. I haven't even made a dent in it and it's been a week and a half). The only downside to the river rocks is that they're a little dirty when you get them. Just like I freeze my aspen chips, I also decided I needed to clean the rocks. It was pretty easy.

Here's how I prepared them:

Soaked them in vinegar and water when I brought them home from the store. They were so icky! But, after about five minutes of soaking and rinsing, most of the residue was gone and I boiled a kettle of water and poured it over the rocks. I let them cool for a couple of minutes (I was tempted to use them for a hot rock back massage, because they felt so good on my sore hands)! Took them upstairs, where I'm putting together their new CN and filled the empty litter box with a small amount of aspen. Then, I took the rocks (now cool) and assembled them all over the box evenly, like a sort of cobblestone slab in the corner of the cage.

The girls loved it! I also introduced them to the CN for the first time yesterday so they were very excited. Daisy walked all over it and immediately started nesting with the rocks. They've sort of lost interest in it now, but I'm still hoping this helps. I just can't get them to poop exclusively in it. I never have! I put it on the opposite side of the cage, because it always seemed like there was a pile of turd adjacent to the litter box. Well, now they've put the turd pile adjacent to the now adjacent litter box. I will outsmart you, little rats! However, they have peed less on the liner, so I assume they're peeing on the rocks : ) That's a plus. It also looks prettier than litter and was great enrichment for them in the beginning. I would recommend it to using conventional litter. I think that the rocks in the aspen encourage them to do their "do" there instead of use it as a digging box.

I will be posting pictures soon!


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## Mojojuju (Nov 15, 2014)

Sounds like a neat idea! I can't wait to see the result. I, too, hate the cost of carefresh litter, and though it comes in pretty colors, the brown is cheapest.  So I'm interested to see what the new boxes look like!

All six of my kiddos spent their first night in the new CN, and I only found two stray poops the first morning. (I suspect I know who the rogue pooper is, too, and he's never been perfectly trained.) What I did was put in three litter boxes--small, medium, and large, and positioned them, pee rock and all, at the foot of the ladders. For some reason, there is some weird instinct to go under and around the ladders. 

Like I said, so far, so good. Might be worth a try for your girls in their new environment.

Did you stay up late watching them play in the cage? I must have watched them for two hours last night.  They were so happy! For the first time ever, none of them want to come out. I had to hunt em down to get em out for play time, lol.


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## FallDeere (Sep 29, 2011)

I bought a bunch of rocks, bigger ones than you got, so we'll see how my concept for this works out. I didn't want to get small rocks because I didn't want them moving them around.


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## kksrats (Jul 25, 2014)

I have actually been using medium landscaping rocks (about half the size of my fist) for a while now on top of the grates of litter boxes, just one or two to keep at least a little pee off the fleece. After reading this, I filled a small basket with rocks and plopped it into the girls' cage. It's cleaning day and I'm a bit surprised at what I found. Literally 80% of the poop in the cage has been done in the rock box! And this is coming from girls who range from potty trained to "you really want me to go in one place, yeah right"...so I'm excited! It's a little icky separating the rocks from all the poo lol but I'll take that over having poop everywhere. I'm going to run to home depot and pick up a bag of landscaping rocks that actually look decent and fill their three litter boxes with them and take the grates off. I'm really hoping that this little turn of events will continue and they won't just get bored with pooping on rocks


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## raindear (Mar 3, 2015)

kksrats said:


> I have actually been using medium landscaping rocks (about half the size of my fist) for a while now on top of the grates of litter boxes, just one or two to keep at least a little pee off the fleece. After reading this, I filled a small basket with rocks and plopped it into the girls' cage. It's cleaning day and I'm a bit surprised at what I found. Literally 80% of the poop in the cage has been done in the rock box! And this is coming from girls who range from potty trained to "you really want me to go in one place, yeah right"...so I'm excited! It's a little icky separating the rocks from all the poo lol but I'll take that over having poop everywhere. I'm going to run to home depot and pick up a bag of landscaping rocks that actually look decent and fill their three litter boxes with them and take the grates off. I'm really hoping that this little turn of events will continue and they won't just get bored with pooping on rocks


If this works, putting the rocks on top of the grate in a grated litter box should separate poo from rocks really easily. I'm going to put my mind to figuring out a way to make a grate for all my litter boxes. Then I might try it.


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## kksrats (Jul 25, 2014)

raindear said:


> If this works, putting the rocks on top of the grate in a grated litter box should separate poo from rocks really easily. I'm going to put my mind to figuring out a way to make a grate for all my litter boxes. Then I might try it.


That's what I had been doing and it works with my boys. My girls are a little more obstinate about potty training and only a few picked up on using the litter box that way. I might leave one of their litter boxes the way it's always been since there is still poop going into it and I don't want to throw off whoever is using that box.


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