Aqua Articles

By Rona Limsy

A cat”s main defense and protection comes from its claws. However, it is now becoming increasingly convenient and popular for cat owners to declaw their cats. This is usually done to prevent the cat from destroying furniture, curtains and scratching humans.

Are these reasons strong enough for you to decide to declaw your cat? It is indeed a convenience for the cat owner but many cats suffer after the surgery and many will end up with a biting habit as this has become the only defense it has. Even well meaning and reputed vets do not always do a good job of declawing.

Do you know that the declawing procedure is not merely a “nail removing” process? It is a surgical process which requires anesthesia. Your cat”s first joint of every digit on your cat”s forefeet is surgically amputated. It also involves the vet surgically separating entirely the distant finger bone (distal phalanx) from the middle finger bone.

Here are some possible situations you will see after your cat has been declawed:

Phantom Pain Throughout Its Life
Because a declawing surgery is basically a mutilation process which causes much post-operative pain to your cat, your cat may experience “phantom pain” during its life, even years after the surgery.

Biting To Defend Itself
As it has lost its only natural defense and protection, your cat may resort to biting you or your stuff to issue a warning or to show aggression. If you react to this by scolding him (which is a natural reaction), this will only aggravate the situation as your cat feels it needs to bite more to defend itself against your anger.

Unsafe To Go Outdoors
Your cat will no longer be able to defend itself if it should face any dangers outdoors. So it would mean you must take extra precautions to keep it indoors at all times.

Post-Operative Complications
Many vets are not trained to do the declawing surgery properly. Most of them use dog”s nail trimmers, when they should really be using a scalpel blade. A dog”s nail trimmer merely cuts the end and middle bone but does not separate them properly. It leaves germinal tissue which may eventually grow into an abnormal claw, causing a piece of bone to stick out through the skin. It can go on to turn into bone infection and permanent problems with your cat”s foot.

Given the pain that your cat will suffer from a declawing surgery, declawing should really be an absolute last resort. However, there are some instances where I personally feel that declawing may be truly justified:

An Untrainable Cat

Each cat has its own character but most can be trained to use a cat scratch post. If however, even after engaging the services of a cat behaviorist, your cat is still unwilling to be trained, then you may have to resort to declawing to save your home!

To Protect Your Family

If you have elderly living with you and if your cat can”t be trained, then you may need to declaw it. The skin of the elderly is more fragile and may tear more easily. Because of their age, the skin may also take more time to heal.

Likewise, if you have family living with you who are terminally ill, a cat”s scratch can cause a severe negative reaction to the body. For example, a cat”s scratch on a person who suffers from an advanced stage of diabetes may lead to infection as wounds are difficult to heal. In serious cases, a simple cut on a diabetic person”s foot can even lead to amputation if it doesn”t heal in time.

Children are another reason why you may want to resort to declawing. Very young children do not understand how to handle a cat properly. A cat who experiences rough or improper handling will scratch to defend itself.

If you do decide to declaw your cat, do seek out the best vet you can find for the surgery. It is true that no matter how good the vet is, your cat will definitely suffer pain after the surgery. However, a good vet trained in declawing, makes all the difference to the degree of how much your cat will suffer in the post-operative days.

If you know of someone who has sent their cat for declawing and their cat suffered no complications, ask for a referral.

Don”t be shy to ask the vet questions such as whether he is using dog”s nail trimmers or the more sophisticated scalpel blade method (which is approved by The American Animal Hospital Association) and to ask him what you must do for post-surgery care.

About The Author

For more information on declawing and how to take care of your cat, visit http://www.My-Pet-Cat.com

By Ken Charnely

As you begin to read through this informative article, give each point a chance to sink in before you move on to the next. Cats are born with claws, the same way that humans are born with fingernails and toe nails.

Cats need claws in order to mark or scratch a specific place or territory that they have been in. Humans need finger nails to, scratch themselves or others, or for opening a letter envelope. Cats basically stretch their agile bodies in order to prepare their muscles when they dig their claws deeply into wood perhaps or a tree, and then they pull back from their hold. Scratching is a basic physiological need of cats. To claw or declaw, that is the question!

So do cats need to be declawed? If cat owners truly care for the welfare of their cats, they would have to think twice on declawing their cats.

Declawing, what is it?

Declawing is done by taking away all the front claws of a cat. In a way this procedure is equal to the amputation of all the finger tips of a human being. For cats this surgery is painful and, for someone who is walking on all fours, terribly unnecessary.

Though the recovery of declawed cats may only take a few weeks or so, its physical and psychological effects could last a cat”s lifetime.

The following are the possible results once a cat has been declawed.

Ouch, ouch and ouch:

Immediately after surgery, declawed cats suffer severe pain, though it is quite impossible to gauge how much pain they are experiencing. Declawed cats could be considered as amputees. Cats usually try to go on with their cat lives even with pain unless the pain eventually becomes unbearable. Although they may look and act normal does not mean they are free from
aches.

Complications after the surgery:

After the surgery, declawed cats usually experience one of the following post-surgery effects: presence of abscess, feelings of lameness, claw re-growth. Based on studies performed on declawed cats, it has been found that twenty five percent of them develop various complications. The same result has been found on cats who went under tenectomy. This is also a form of surgery that is currently being offered as an alternative to declawing. It is called this because only the tendons extended on the toes are the ones amputated.

Stiffness of the joints:

Cats that are declawed experience stiffness of the joints since the tendons that manipulate the toes retract because of the surgery. As time goes by, these same joints freeze and ultimately they will no longer be able to extend their toes.

It has been thought though that cats really do not miss their claws since they also “scratch” continually even if they no longer have anything to scratch with. However, this act is really the cats” way to stretch those frozen joints.

Catarthritis:

Believe it or not, research shows that declawed cats immediately shift the weight of their bodies to the back and onto the larger pad in the front of their feet, away from their toes. The result is still evident despite giving these cats strong anti-pain relievers. If such an effect continues after declawing, the cat will ultimately stress its own joints in the leg, its spine and eventually suffer from arthritis.

Cats who cannot claw, bite:

Since the natural instinct of cats is to claw especially when threatened or scared, in the absence of claws cats are forced to resort to another form of defense – their teeth. Declawed cats that are aggressive naturally are more prone to biting.

Declawed cats have no “nine lives”.

There is a serious risk of death for cats that are declawed. Death could be brought on by the anesthesia they received, or any complications in surgery or hemorrhage.

Declawed cats that resort to biting run the risk of being abandoned by their owners. These cats could then be put in a shelter, and since they turn to biting, the probability of being adopted becomes slim. Usually un-adoptable cats are put to sleep or they are used to train dogs to fight usually as bait.

In summary, cats are extremely and highly trainable to be taught to use a post for scratching instead of common household furniture, rugs or curtains. Though declawing cats is one of the options a cat owner can take, it is basically an unkind and a very animal-unfriendly thing to do.

It all depends on the cat owner whether Kitty is more (or less than) valuable than that expensive Italian rug – the choice is theirs. Understanding this article is a good way to fully appreciate the complexity of this subject.

About The Author

Ken Charnely is webmaster at two of Internet”s popular article directories. For more articles on this topic and for free content for your website
visit ArticleTeller.com and ContentWOW.com