Customer Reviews

Arm & Hammer Odor Alert Clumping Litter - 12 lb

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We have been using Arm & Hammer Multi-Cat and other Arm & Hammer cat litters for years and we absolutely love them. However, when we moved to NYC, the only Arm & Hammer litter we found in nearby stores was the Odor Alert version, which we had not tried before. We bought it and figured that it would be fine, given our previous experience with the Arm & Hammer brand. However, once we started using it, we realized that it smells absolutely horrible. It is VERY odoriferous, and honestly, the one thing that comes to mind when I smell it is "fruity vomit." The color-changing technology doesn't appear to us to be anything impressive, and certainly nothing to justify living with the smell. It clumps well and does the job, but I will not be using it ever again due to the horrible odor.

This product has a strong artificial scent that permeated several rooms of our house. I personally found it nauseating. No one here liked the odor. In my opinion, it was worse than a dirty cat box.
I'll go back to my old standby of Arm&Hammer Unscented.

If you like strong artificial scents, you might not mind it.

We've been trying new litters in our rolling boxes to find one that clumps well and controls odor without too much artificial scent (as I am allergic to the heavy fragrances).

We're never buying Odor Alert again. The entire box goes "blue" within one use. While there is no overpowering fragrance, it's as if there is no odor control within the litter at all. Instead, I get this nasty "worse than full litter box" stench that wafts up my stairs if the box is not cleaned twice a day and more "clean" litter added to the box. It is so bad, I do not need to see the inside of the box in order to know it needs to be cleaned.

We will continue on our quest to find a "good litter". This one, however, is not it.

I use Fresh Step clumping litter for my cat until we ran out one day and my wife picked up Arm and Hammer litter at convenience store. It does not clump nearly as well, absorb odors nearly as well and costs much more than Fresh Step scoopable car litter. It's a day and night difference. Stay away from Arm and Hammer.

Our newest addition, a crazy with so-called "crazy eyes" meant some new purchases, as well. Since I haven't owned a cat in years and have never owned one by myself, I solicited some advice about products. I opted to go with Arm and Hammer Odor Alert because it has a friendly price and was a trusted name.

It seemed interesting with crystal which turn colour when wet to alert you to the clumps, hence the name: Odor Alert. I haven't been knocked off my feet by this "feature," yet. Although the crystals are easy to identify, they seem to be easily triggered. As we keep the litter box in the bathroom, near the shower, where moisture runs rampant, I think the crystals tend to change colour because of that. In retrospect, I should have thought about that when buying Arm and Hammer Odor Alert cat litter. But so should they when making it. Bathrooms are a popular place for litter boxes.

My other beef with the colour changing crystals in this cat litter is that sometimes they don't alert you to clumps. Sometimes they are wet but don't clump. I think that this cat litter clumps decently so it's just an issue of the crystals turning colour prematurely. Needless to say, I've never actually used the blue crystals to my advantage when scooping out the litter.

Many people seem to be offended by the scent of this cat litter. I cannot say the Odor Alert is odorless but it doesn't phase me. It simply smells a little fruity or flowery like many cat litters and when mixed with the scent of cat matter, it isn't wonderful but it won't kill me either. You can tell when a cat has used the potty because it 'increases' the scent. In the future, I may try and odorless litter instead.

I am happy to say that my kitty had no adverse reaction to Odor Alert cat litter by Arm and Hammer. We did buy a litter box mat because my cat does track some of the litter into the bathroom and, when wet, it sort of melts into the floor and takes a lot of scrubbing to get off.

Overall, this is a decent cat litter and I'm glad I purchased it at Wal-mart rather than Petsmart where it was much more expensive. I would probably look for something higher quality in the future, though.