Review of the Purina Second Nature Dog Litter Box System

I had previously raised two lhasa apso dogs who spent most of
their lives living in high-rise condominiums. Instead of having
to take them down an elevator to go outdoors to eliminate all
the time, I trained them to use newspapers in a spare bathroom.
Since they were both initially paper trained as puppies anyway,
I chose to continue this method for them. Indoor newspapers
worked quite well for the rest of their lives as my dogs were
able to go to the bathroom whenever they needed to. The only
problem is that the papers tended to get rather messy and
smelly. If plastic liners were not placed underneath the papers,
newsprint ink would be imprinted on the ceramic tiles of my
spare bathroom floors. On some occasions, urine puddles would
flow off the papers as well as the liner resulting in situations
which required immediate cleaning since urine became trapped
between the plastic liner and the floor. Despite these
complications, I was relatively satisfied with the paper method
for my little dogs.

After both of my dogs had passed away after long lives, I took a
break as a dog owner for several years. When it was time to
become dog owner again, I had made up my mind to train my new
pair of lhasa apso puppies to use papers indoors as well. This
time, it turned out that Purina had come out with a new litter
box system called Second Nature designed for specifically for
dogs. It was basically modeled after similar setups for cats but
the dog litter consists of large pellets made up of recycled
newsprint. Purina also introduced a litter box that has one side
cut away lower to facilitate easy entry for dogs. I’m not
totally convinced on the advantage of this particular feature
since my lhasa apsos have no problems stepping into the box from
the side. But for Purina to introduce such a system to the
market, I must not have been the only dog owner who considered
indoor elimination a better alternative to outdoors for smaller
breeds. The product is now very popular especially among small
dog owners living in apartments and high-rise condominiums
without easy access to outdoors.

Purina recommends a slow transition from papers to their Second
Nature system by placing newspapers over their dog litter at
first. The company also suggests crate training at the same time
but instead of taking the dogs outside, they are taken to the
litter box. Newspapers are also placed all around the floor area
of the litter box itself. My puppies needed some time to get use
to the box so while they were being introduced to it, they were
eliminating on both the newspapers on the floors as well as
inside the litter box. Once they got use to the idea of going
inside the box more often to eliminate, paper coverage on the
surrounding floor area was gradually made smaller. When they
started to use the litter box all the time, the newspapers on
the floors were gone for good. The next step was for them to get
use to the actual pellets of the litter. Since there were still
newspapers covering the dog litter, the puppies were still
technically using papers but at least they were getting
accustomed to stepping on the pellets underneath. Papers inside
the box were gradually reduced a bit at a time exposing more dog
litter. Over a few weeks, the puppies gradually saw more dog
litter than newspaper inside the box. Eventually, all newspapers
were totally eliminated as my lhasa apsos finally got used to
the box filled with litter only.

In my mind, the litter box system is less messy since all dog
urine and feces stay inside the box. Actually the Second Nature
pellets absorb urine much better than normal newspapers. The odd
time, one of the puppies may get a bit lazy and have just the
front paws inside the box while the hind legs are still outside
resulting in urination on the floors. In these cases, the
puppies have to be nudged a bit so that they are completely
inside the box. This is part of their training. The only
complication I observed with the pellets is that both puppies
like to chew and eat them at times. Purina claims that ingestion
of the pellets itself is not harmful to the dogs since they are
just compressed papers. This will result in more feces
production until the dogs can stop this habit. The dog litter is
non-clumping so it will not get stuck inside the canine
digestive system unlike normal clumping cat litter. It is
considered unsafe to use clumping cat litter as a substitute for
the Purina dog litter.

Purina Second Nature was launched only in the United States so
as a Canadian resident, I had to go down to the U.S. to purchase
the system. I started out with Purina’s cat and small animal
litter called Yesterday’s News which is basically the same as
Second Nature except the pellets are much smaller. But at least
the Yesterday’s News pellets are non-clumping and therefore safe
to use for dogs. Purina changed their Second Nature pellets to
be around the same size as Yesterday’s News and many users
including myself, found that my dogs ended up tracking the
pellets all over the place. After speaking to a Purina
spokesperson, I was informed that the Second Nature pellets will
be made back in the original larger size soon. This will reduce
the tracking significantly again. Purina will also introduce
Second Nature in the original larger pellet size to the Canadian
market. Naturally, this is good news for me and other owners of
small dogs who would like to use an alternative to going
outdoors for elimination, especially during cold bitter Canadian
winters. I would definitely recommend the Purina Second Nature
dog litter system to other small breed dog owners, especially
when it returns to its original larger pellet size.