how to litter (re)train?

Blackpitts

as you might now, I have a small and youg kitten (6-7 weeks old) with me and she is my first pet so the learing curve is huge here
At the moment we have placed the litter near her bed and she is doing her "job" in it without problems.
it is placed in the living room (I live in an apt) so it is close to where I and my OH have dinner, i mean...sometimes it's not pleasant to smell something funny when you are eating. So we have bought a big litter box like this

for when she will be a little bit bigger (4 or 5 weeks from now)
The question is: how should i retrain her to do her needs in it considering that this litter tray has a sliding door? i'd like to put this into another room, do you think she will find her way to it?
any help is appreciated, thanks

The Sweeper

Sliding door isn't a good idea.

If the kitten gets caught in it, or gets a slap on the arse from the door on its way in or out, it can get a terrible fright. The fright can create a bad association with the litter tray and the kitten could stop using it altogether.

You're better off thinking longer-term about where you want the tray to be and move it gradually to that spot (the bathroom is a good spot). Pick poos out of it as soon as they happen and the odour problem will be less of an issue.

Quiet_thought

Take off the top part and let him use it like that for a while, when he gets used to that put on the top, but clip the door back to it's always open. After a while he'll get used to that and you can let the door close.
They are very smart and he'll figure it out. Cat's prefer to use a litter tray. Once when my cat was a bit sick he tried to get to the litter tray, but didn't make it.
He made a little mess on the floor and looked so ashamed!

seamus

Yep, what quiet thought says there is the way to do it. My sister in law has two cats in an apartment with one of these covered trays, and apart from occasionally having litter kicked out the door onto the floor, both cats use it without issue.

MsFifers

I got my cats used to the hooded part by leaving it (top part only) on the floor with some treats just inside the door for them to get to. They figured it out pretty quickly! After a while then we stopped that game & put the hood on top of the tray. However, one cat grew too huge to fit comfortably into the hooded litter tray so in the end I had to just leave the top off - he is a monster kitty!

You can move your current litter tray in a stage by stage basis out of the living room & into the bathroom or hall or wherever - ie a few feet at a time - and then your kitten won't get confused.

BTW - it can be handy to have 2 trays if you have room. Sometimes a cat will use 1 tray for pee & another for poo.