Instinctive immediate response: FUCK NO!!! Ew ew ew ewwww yuck yuck ew! Stay away from my dishwasher!!
Slightly more reasoned response: Ok, seriously, ew. Even if there’s no bits left over (and there usually are…) why on earth do you need your litter box that clean? I would be worried about my dishes forever afterwards, and I don’t need those thoughts, thanks.
I’m not even pet- or germ-phobic! I let my cats wander around on the counters, they occasionally lick my food (which I then eat) and I’ve been ‘doggie kissed’ by so many animals at the shelter that I can’t even begin to think about how many germs I’m picking up from them, but *that *idea is just a whole 'nother level of icky.
Gross. For the same reason I also don’t pee in the sink, nor bring food or dishes into the bathroom.
Also, having washed a litter box in the bathtub, and subsequently clogging the drain from the “residue” (clumping litter, mostly dust with some dirty pee stains), I expect it would actually completely mess up the plumbing in the dishwasher. The stuff is designed to clump when wet, and there’s an awful lot of wet in a dishwasher cycle.
I thought seriously about doing it once. And for all that my rationalist, materialist mind knew that I could clean out the filter and that nothing would be harmful or unsanitary or even unsavory about it, I decided that everyone in this thread is right. It still would be gross.
I wouldn’t do it because it seems like more trouble than it’s worth. My catbox is big and my dishwasher is small. When I lived in an apartment without easy access to the hose-outside-bleach-soak method I used to use the bathtub. Usually in the same apartment cleaning frenzy weekend where I’d scrub the tub too.
That said, in principle the idea of catbox in the dishwasher alone without other dishes really doesn’t bother me. I’d want to be extra sure all the bits of litter were out so as not to clog the drain, and I’d put bleach in too. I wouldn’t do it if I had a pregnant woman, little kid or immunocompromised person in the house, but there’s lots of things I do regularly that I wouldn’t do under said circumstances.
Why not use disposable catbox liners? Then you don’t have to deal with The Wrath of Dopers, all of whom seem to be up in arms about the dishwasher use and are ready to tear down your house.
Well, people seem quite passionate about the issue. Very few fence-sitters here.
Thanks to all commenters. I would say that there are two main grounds for objection: practical germophobia, and the psychological, “ew that’s gross” (ETG) reflex.
Interesting to note, the former does not predict the latter - you can be germophobic and pro-dishwasher, as long as your ETG response is low, if you consider the pathogenies festating in an open poo box to be resistant to normal hosing and scrubbing. This may be a semi-rational course, assuming your machine is up to the task, but most people here seem to have a low ETG threshold.
I have passed this data to the interested party, who actually does practice litter box dishwashing - she is skeptical of the validity of the poll, but thanks you all the same.
About three times a year I empty the oft-refilled dregs of cat litter and throw the entire mass out. Then I put the empty box in the tub, pour about a cup of bleach into it and fill to the brim with hot water. Let it sit for a couple of hours, then use the an scrub brush to get around the top edge of it. Empty out, let dry for an hour or two, then put back and refill with litter.