How common is poop stuck to Maine Coon butt fur?

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How often do Maine Coon cat owners have to deal with poop stuck to their fur? Faeces stuck to the fur on the backside of a Maine Coon cat appears to be an issue which is not talked about much, but I have bumped into it on a social media website and would therefore like to mention it here. Ideally, I'd like to hear from people living with Maine Coons and other longhaired cats too.

Maine Coon backside
I can see the problem! This is a Maine Coon rear end. The photo comes from the Mütyür & Pindúr website on tumblr.

The reason why I am mentioning it is because it appears to be quite a common problem for Maine Coon cat caregivers. How big a problem? I think I have an answer. 

On a page of the Reddit.com website there are 35 comments to the question: "How often do you guys have to deal with poop stuck to fur?" And the question is asked on the Maine Coon channel of the website.

Mini survey

The comments act as a kind of survey. Only two out of the 35 commenters said that they had never had this problem. This means that on this mini, informal 'survey', 94% of Maine Coon cat owners have to deal with the problem from time to time.

How bad? Plus, pee!

There are varying degrees of severity as you would expect. In the best scenario it might happen once or twice a year and in the worst 2-3 times a month. And sometimes pee is an issue. In one instance, the commenter says that "They like to dip their ass in pee so now they get their butts trimmed".

Diet and diarrhoea?

It depends of course on the consistency of the poop and the length of the hair around the back end. It appears that many Maine Coon cat caregivers trim the fur on the backside which is also to be expected.

Diet is obviously a factor in minimising diarrhoea because diarrhoea is going to certainly create some problems for a long-haired cat. And some MCs have more sensitive stomachs than others.

Litter tray size?

Another problem is that Maine Coon cats seem to walk in their poop quite a lot in the litter tray and therefore walk it around the home. This I am sure is a problem with all cats, but I wonder if it is a greater problem with Maine Coon cats. It might be because MCs are the largest cat breed, and they have to use litter trays which are too small for them which forces them to walk in their poop. Just a wild thought.

RELATED: How big should my cat’s litter box be?

All longhaired cats?

I would expect that this poop-stuck-to-fur problem is the same across all longhaired domestic cats. The Maine Coon is described as a semi-longhaired cat. The hair is shaggy to make the cat look more natural because this cat comes from a natural background i.e., barn cats and the cat fancy like that and they are proud of the fact.

Shorthair

I live with a shorthair cat and there is never any issue of poop sticking to the fur around his backside. It simply never happens, and it has never occurred to me that it might happen. Another advantage perhaps of living with a shorthaired cat.

Another upside is that there is no need to constantly groom a shorthaired cat but if you do you can get a flea comb through all the fur without a problem. This is what I do every day. I don't think anybody tries that with a Maine Coon cat.

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