Getting a cat

[El Diablo]

All,

FWIW my little sister has little claw protector thingies for her cats that seem to work well.

[AceLuby]

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All,

FWIW my little sister has little claw protector thingies for her cats that seem to work well.

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Pics? I've never heard of this? How does it work and what does it do?

[emmpee]

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All,

FWIW my little sister has little claw protector thingies for her cats that seem to work well.

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Pics? I've never heard of this? How does it work and what does it do?

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Soft Paws

I've talked to a few vets about them and everyone has said they're great... haven't heard a negative word about them. Relatively cheap too (~$20 for 4-6 month supply).

EDIT: oh and the obnoxious colors are obv optional. Plenty of white/clear/'natural' too.

[JennFox]

get a dog.



dogs>cats in every way.

[Doc]

1. The softpaws things do work if you keep the nails trimmed properly and you keep putting the softpaws on. Most people get tired of putting them on after a while.

2. Dogs generally are not declawed. Some dogs have their dewclaws removed as a breed standard or hunting dogs will get them removed so they aren't torn off as they are tromping through brush.

3. The website Soulman references quotes a lot of articles that have since been refuted or disscusses things which are no longer common practice.

a) Complications: Infections are far and away the most common complication. In our practice about 10% of declaws will get infected. Lameness is the second most common problem (probably 2-3%), and will typically resolve within 30 days. If regrowth occurs (and yes I have seen it occur, but not with any of my declaws), it means simply the surgeon screwed up and probably is not using proper technique. This can be fixed, but it does require a second surgery.

b)Joint stiffness and arthritis - There is absolutely no proof that declawing causes these problems. I believe I have read journal articles looking at this, but can't recall where right now.

c)Litter box problems is the new scare tactic being used by the anti-declaw tribe. Again there is ABSOLUTELY NO SCIENTIFIC PROOF of long term litter box issues. The local no kill shelter tells people this in St. Louis and it is absolute crap. Probably this came about because it is generally recommended that for the first week after declawing that people use a pelleted newspaper product (Yesterday's News) or shredded paper in the litterbox for litter. Cat's don't like this stuff nearly as much as regular litter, so there may be problems until you can change back to normal litter (usually at one week post surgery)

d)Biting might be true, haven't seen anything on it, but if a cat is biting you, there are underlying problems that need to be addressed, declawed or not.

e)Pain: Pain is much better managed now in animals compared to even 5 years ago. For anyone considering this procedure, I strongly urge you to discuss pain control with your veterinarian. Personally I think 2-3 different methods should be used to control pain with this procedure. If your veterinarian can't tell you what is done in surgery and after surgery to help control pain, I suggest you get a second opinion.

I know I sound like the declaw every cat guy on this board, but I would prefer people have the truth to make an informed decision rather than a bunch of stretched thin ideas.

Personal Soapbox: Declawing is better than death. If declawing is outlawed, I THINK (not sure) that many fewer cats would be placed in homes and many more euthanized at shelters. I also THINK that many more cats/kittens after taken home by owners would be sent outside where cats live a dramatically more dangerous life.

/off soapbox

Again, declawing is a personal decison best made by an owner with informed consent knowing the pros and cons of the decision.

Doc

[MicroBob]

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Personal Soapbox: Declawing is better than death. If declawing is outlawed, I THINK (not sure) that many fewer cats would be placed in homes and many more euthanized at shelters. I also THINK that many more cats/kittens after taken home by owners would be sent outside where cats live a dramatically more dangerous life.


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Doc, interesting stuff. Thanks again for contributing.

I just got back from visiting my family. Didn't see my sis this time around (probably will in a week or two) but chatted with my Mom about this who is far more knowledgeable than I am.


She mentioned how incredibly upset my sister got when they learned of some town in California a couple years ago that outlawed all vets from declawing cats. Just made the entire procedure illegal.

What my mom reported as my sister's reaction is almost identical to the part I quoted from Doc. That REALLY jumped out at me because it was creepy seeing the position repeated almost verbatim like that in his post.
Sis's belief is that the town that made declawing illegal has no idea that they are leading to more cat deaths and miserable existences in many many situations for the different reasons Doc mentioned.

In other news, my Mom confirmed for me that the reason we got our first cat declawed was because she had already scratched my (at the time) 3 or 4 year old sister's face a couple times while we were in the process of taking her into our home.
Affectionate cat that would occasionally lash-out as expected.

I believe the vet informed my Mom of the risk of "cat-scratch fever" which my Mom says mostly comes when the scratch from the cat also infects the human because the claws aren't clean probably due to its pawing action in the litter-box typically.

Sounds to me like it is a definite health-risk if there is scratching potential, especially to children and seniors. But perhaps my Mom is exaggerating the danger. I don't really know and will have to ask my sis if she shares the same degree of concern on this one.


My Mom later adopted a different stray cat and didn't get it declawed at first because the cat was already 18 months and it's a more painful procedure when it's not a little kitten anymore.

Then my Mom got scratched on the back of her hand and it wouldn't stop itching for 3 months. Basically it was infected. Vet or doctor or someone said my Mom had the "cat-scratch fever" except without the fever part so it really wasn't so bad.
Still infected though and it was immediately recommended to her that she needed to get that cat declawed because next time it could end up being worse.


I don't think it's entirely correct to think that those who get a cat declawed do so because they don't care about the cat's well-being and only care about themselves.
I feel like nobody cares more about cats than my Mom and my sister. My sister does so much that she made caring for them her career (although she works with dogs too of course).

This cat of my Mom's that scratched her has asthma pretty badly and gets sick a lot and my Mom has probably spent $1000's caring for its health not to mention carpet cleaning and replacement from various diarhhea/vomit episodes (recently this cat was so sick he left about 40 to 50 different marks coming out of both ends all around her white carpet).

It's also an incredibly happy and affectionate cat in spite of its illnesses.

[Soulman]

Doc,

thanks for the info. Like I said in my post, I didn't check for validity of the site since doing this properly is a royal pain.

That being said, I can kind of understand the 'declawing is better than death' argument. However, if we agree that declawing in general is unnecessary and that the goal should be no declawing, how does one go about achieving this?

Comparing to Norway where I live (or indeed most of Europe), where declawing is illegal, I don't think most people have even heard of declawing. On asking a couple of friends, their immediate reactions were something like 'wtf, why would you do that?' I think outlawing the practice is the first step towards changing people's attitudes.

I also feel it's a defeatist attitude that declawing prevents deaths. If the alternative simply isn't there, I doubt people will go 'well I won't adapt this cat, since they'll scratch my furniture'. This is obviously my personal guess, I doubt any research has been done in this area.

As a side point, with the 'declawing prevents death' argument, this should only apply to cats from shelters and not bred cats that will be sold anyway.

[Soulman]

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Sounds to me like it is a definite health-risk if there is scratching potential, especially to children and seniors. But perhaps my Mom is exaggerating the danger. I don't really know and will have to ask my sis if she shares the same degree of concern on this one.


Then my Mom got scratched on the back of her hand and it wouldn't stop itching for 3 months. Basically it was infected. Vet or doctor or someone said my Mom had the "cat-scratch fever" except without the fever part so it really wasn't so bad.

Still infected though and it was immediately recommended to her that she needed to get that cat declawed because next time it could end up being worse.

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I'm no vet/doctor, sounds like your mom might be allergic and/or particularly sensitive or the cat in question produces especially painful scratches. My brother and gf are both allergic and neither responds this extremely to cat scratches. Whatever the cause, your mom's reaction doesn't sound normal at all.

After reading a bit further, it seems cats can have bacteria on their claws (from a variety of sources) which can cause infection, tetanus and possibly other troubles. From what I understood though, this only happens if the scratch/bite is deep, otherwise cleaning with a normal disinfectant is plenty good enough. Both my and my gf have been scratched numerous times by our cats (from play fighting, and a couple of times when they've panicked) and neither has experienced something besides a small swelling.

So in your mom's case, seems like it's rather rare to have this happen.

[MicroBob]

I've been scratched by cats too and never had anything like this.
I have no idea how rare it is and would be more interested in my sister's opinion on it since she will be more knowledgeable than my Mom.

It wouldn't have been an allergy in my Mom's case though. Clearly an infection I believe and yes, the scratch was probably deeper than normal I suspect.

Regardless of how often you keep your cat's claws clean it can still get dirty. It goes to the litter-box, it comes and scratches you with dirty-claws. They can't be clean 100% of the time.
But I really don't know how much of a concern something like that really should be for kids, elderly, people with some other types of diseases, etc.


Also, somebody earlier in the thread mentioned a declawed cat not liking to have it's paws handled.
I very much think this is just cat-finnickyness although I guess could be related to declawing.

Our first three cats that were all declawed 1 of them hated to have her paws touched and the other 2 were dandy with it.

My last cat that was NOT declawed definitely did NOT like to have her paws touched and you better be careful of the major-league scratch-attempt to come if you crossed her on this issue.

[soah]

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Comparing to Norway where I live (or indeed most of Europe), where declawing is illegal, I don't think most people have even heard of declawing. On asking a couple of friends, their immediate reactions were something like 'wtf, why would you do that?'

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I brought up this topic completely at random on irc and got this exact reaction.