Yeah that's great and all but I've tried that. 3 litter boxes. All cleaned twice a day, and he still shits on the carpet 2 feet away from the box. Lid on, lid off, big sidewalls, different cat litter. I've tried it all. The little shit just likes shitting on carpet I guess. And putting the fear of god into him does nothing.
Your cat might have a bladder or kidney stone which is causing extreme pain when pooping. Please take your cat to the vet and have that checked out.
I ran into the same thing: Cat pooped in exotic, awkward places, but never the litter box. Never looked like she was in pain -- just being stubborn, I figured. Turned out to be a bladder stone brought on by the ingredients in modern cat food (put in place to help other feline health issues, but which causes stones in a small subset of cats). After the stones were cleared up, all litter box issues disappeared.
..but they do love some simple pebbles, which are, fortunately, dirt-cheap (or pebble-cheap :) ) although a little messier to clean than the above alternatives. I think they'd like sand as well (I live in Uruguay and those pebbles are from Argentina, so I don't know what alternatives are in the U.S.).
"Yeah that's great and all but I've tried that. 3 litter boxes. All cleaned twice a day, and he still shits on the carpet 2 feet away from the box. Lid on, lid off, big sidewalls, different cat litter. I've tried it all. The little shit just likes shitting on carpet I guess. And putting the fear of god into him does nothing."
I had a similar problem but with peeing, despite three litter boxes and regular cleaning. He'd go in the same room, five feet away. It go so bad that the carpet started developing some sort of fungal growth, which was gross. I read up on it and apparently some cats develop a "texture preference," especially for carpet.
So in the utility room I used for the litter boxes, I replaced the carpet with some cheap engineered wood flooring (Pergo or some similar knockoff brand). Problem went away. I think it is very weird/uncomfortable for them to go on a smooth hard surface, and carpet is a rougher surface that sort of could feel like dirt or grass.
He's completely normal. Has done this for about a year. Multiple costly vet visits for them to say "What have no fucking clue". I think he just likes leaving me presents to come home to at this point.
Otherwise normal cats who go outside of their litter box are usually upset about something in their environment. Are the boxes near something noisy or surprising? Are they in a private spot where he's not going to get approached while he's using them?
If there's a regular spot where he goes, maybe try putting a box on that exact spot. We had a similar problem a few months ago, where our cat was peeing in the basement on a stack of paper he found. We moved everything away from that spot and put a box there and now he's happy as a clam.
