After a lifetime of hearing that declawing cats is tantamount to having flaming bamboo shoved under your fingernails – that it’s basically surgically removing the tips of cats “fingers” and it causes them pain for the rest of their lives, I recently went to a friend’s apartment. They had a declawed kitten, maybe 7 or 8 months old, and the cat seemed everything but pained. She ran around and frolicked like all kittens do, and when she went to bat at me with her paw (playfully, no attacking involved), there were no claws involved.
Is declawing a strictly-indoor cat REALLY as bad as the activists want you to think it is? Or is it a painful operation that heals and which won’t affect the cat longer than a week or so.
I’ve got 3 cats, and no, I’m not going to declaw them (they’re far too old now), but I would like to know if my scratched furniture is a byproduct of being a decent human being, or if I’ve been a sucker for extremist marketing.
I’m afraid you’re not going to be able to get a firm General Questions yes or no on this one. At least until someone devises a method of interviewing cats.
All I (or anyone else) can do is give you anecdotal evidence -- the declawed cats that I've known haven't appeared in any way abnormal or even handicapped by the lack of claws. My current cat was declawed when I got her and she seems pretty normal (for a cat).
I would note that a declawed cat that escaped into the wild and was never found or re-pet-ized would be a huge problem. Not having claws in a jungle full of them is bad. Thus, to those people that do get their cats declawed, I hope they keep them securely locked indoors.
(I had a friend who had her cats declawed and then two escaped one day. She never found them. She worried and fretted constantly about them. She swore off declawing that day.)
I agree with Finagle. You won’t likely get a factual answer. Getting surgery can hurt regardless of type of surgery. The recouping period could be rough on a cat. The other cats will laugh at them. That’s about all the facts I can squeeze out right now.
The descriptions of what the surgery is are generally accurate, and yes, it sounds absolutely brutal. To be fair, though, most surgeries sound pretty damn brutal when you describe them in graphic detail. Surgery is brutal. It’s just the nature of the beast.
Most cats seem a bit sore for a week or so afterward, and some cats seem to still be a bit tender two weeks afterward. Occasionally one will get infected from improper follow-up care, and that’s got to hurt like a bitch till it clears up and heals. I’ve never seen a cat that appeared to have long-term pain from it, though. At least, they’ve never shown any clinical symptoms of pain. They all walk normally, have normal respiration and heart rates, and don’t object any more to having their front paws handled than their back paws. (Most of them really hate having either set touched. Of course, a lot of them hate having their ears, tails, backs, sides, and chins touched, too. They’re so cute when they’re pissy, though.)
A truly barbaric practice… compared to cat de-clawing.
Draw your conclusions from that.
…and if not… weep for us.
There’s nothing wrong with de-clawing a cat if:
a) You’ll know they will be strictly an indoor cat
and
b) the cat’s cool with the fact that it will be an indoor cat (i.e. not someone who has tasted the freedom… so to speak)
I suspect that this “conversation” will end up in another forum… but it is the truth.
Depends on who’s doing it, and how, actually. The old method did indeed consist of cutting the tips of the cats toes off. Nowadays, the technique has been develoved in which the claw is cut from the nail bed in such a way that the nail follicle is destroyed and doesn’t grow back. The toe is left intact. Both my cats were declawed this way. Conan, being rather high-strung, chewed his stitches and had to be taken back to the vet to have the toe re-stitched. Schrodinger, being very much the mellow, had zero problems. Both kitties are fine now, and neither one seemed the worse for wear a few days after the surgery. The both have full paw dexterity, and the loss of paw dexterity is a big issue with the anti-declawing crowd.
Unfortunately, there are many vets who haven’t bothered to keep up with the developments in animal care, especially in declawing technique, and still do it the , erp, old fashioned way.
If you must declaw, shop around for a vet who knows how to do it without cutting the tips of the cat’s toes off.
I’ve had two cats declawed. The first was bouncing around normally within a week. The second was showing signs of pain and sensitivity in her front paws two months after, so much so that I never continued to have the rear claws removed. I brought her to a different vet and had her examined and x-rayed, but there was no evidence of any problems.
Finally after about 3 months she stopped showing signs of pain, but I won’t be having any cats declawed again.
We have three cats. Two are declawed (front claws only), one is not. The one that isn’t just never clawed up or destroyed things, thus never needed to be declawed. As other posters have stated, they all behave exactly the same when it comes to their paws. No discomfort or pain or change in activity for the ones who are declawed. They still “scratch” on things with their front paws occaisionally, it just doesn’t produce the destructive results.
Sometimes the youngest cat (with no front claws) will get in a “boxing match” with the cat who still has his claws. The claws don’t seem to help in any way, and he usually ends up running away from the younger, smaller cat.
Although all three are indoors only cats, occaisionally one or two will escape. So far, never any problems. We used to have another cat who lived to almost 20 years old. He was also declawed. He always tried to get out when he had a chance, and succeeded three or four times over the last 10 years. Even if he was gone all night, his lack of claws never seemed to be a problem (although he refused to answer any questions about his adventures, so we’ll never know for sure).
By all means try the alternatives. There is no reason for any surgery if it is not needed. But if the alternatives do not work (for us, for example, our cat with SoftPaws just ripped much larger holes!) then declaing is a viable alternative. If you don’t want your cat to be declawed, then fine. Since it is your cat it is your choice to make. It just seems to me that those who claim that all declawing should be outlawed do not have the best interests of all cats at heart (although they mistakenly believe they do).
Yes it is surgery and the cat will have some discomfort for a couple of days or perhaps a week (but modern pain medication such as Fentanyl Patches do wonders in alleviating pain), but for the cat whose owner needs to do this, the cat will have a much happier, better and reduced-stressed life than if the declaw were not done and the cat was constantly yelled at, scolded and chased by it’s owner for scratching the furniture and ripping the curtains. The human-animal bond is important to cats, and their life is much better once that stress is removed.
Our white cat insisted on being an outdoor cat although we tried our hardest to keep him indoors. Thus, to save our furniture, we would trim his nails. Whenever he escaped and it rained, he would come home all muddy and beat/bit up. When one day, trimming his nails, we drew blood we declined to trim his nails for a while. When he next he escaped and it was raining, we waited with the towel and expected catfight/catbath. Surprisingly, he returned early, emaculately clean and nip free. We never cut his nails again and resigned ourselves to replaceable slipcovers.
Both of mine were done this way, too. My vet used a new laser method, and all that was removed was the claw. He pops out the claw and lasers it off, and it doesn’t grow back.
They only stayed overnight one night (and that was to monitor them from the effects of the anesthesia), and when we brought them home, they had no bandages or stitches. They were just fine the next day, and were running around and jumping off furniture as usual. They still “claw” the doorframes and the table legs, but nothing is damaged.
I would not have done it the older way. That was indeed cruel.
Neither of my cats are declawed. Seems like a waste of money to me. The only problem we have is when the little one wants to jump on our shoulders and then feels he needs to hang on. They don’t use the claws on each other, though they tussle all the time.
Anecdotally, a friend of mine had a cat that was declawed young and still (many years later) has pain and limps. That vet went out of business, iirc.
I believe it was about $250-ish per cat. That included anesthesia and a full blood work-up, too. And mine are done on the fronts only; they still have their back claws.
We only paid for one cat, though. We worked out a trade thing with our vet - my husband did some plumbing work for him and he did one cat for free.
That new procedure sounds interesting. Is there an age limit for the cats at which point it can’t be done?
As for going outside, we’ve had one cat escape once, years ago. The next time he tried, we yelled at him BIG TIME, and he’s never tried it since. Then again, we live in coyote country – claws don’t help the little kitties who go outside here. :eek:
The only difference btwn declawing with a scalpel and declawing with a laser is in the tool the surgeon holds. True, cutting with laser has far less post operative pain, but the surgical technique is the same regardless of what tool is implemented.
I have done thousands of declaws. Back in the day, it was not unusual for every cat being desexed to also be declawed. Nowadays, people look at it much differently and I do maybe a declaw a month. Before I declaw a cat the owner must come for presurgical “counselling” during which alternatives are discussed by my technician.
Maybe a European Doper will drop in. In parts of Europe declawing is against the law. When I chat with European veterinarians, the fact that declawing is so common in the USA is somehow always mentioned. Many feel that the surgery is barbaric.
Personally, I use a Fentanyl Patch for post operative pain. This adds significantly to the cost. Ten years ago I charged $55 or so to declaw a cat. I now charge $225. Laser declaws cost even more.
Also…the reason lasers are being marketed to the veterinary profession is largely due to saturation of the human market. Lasers have been around a long time in medicine.
I’m pretty sure I’m not. I had several discussions with my vet before it was done, and I was against it initially because all I knew about were the older operations where the first bone was removed. Obviously, I thought that was cruel and inhumane. He showed me what he would do, popping out the claw and lasering it off at the nail bed. He assured me that no bone would be removed, and that the cats would not even need stitches or bandages. When I realized it could be done with practically no pain and without removing bone, I decided to go ahead with it. I took them in one day in the morning, it was done that afternoon, I went to see them that evening (and they were fine, no bandages or stitches) and they came home the next day around noon.
Actually, it is basically the same operation. I asked the vet who declawed my guys if she did laser declawing, and she said no, and explained the technique. Neither of the guys seemed to have any pain, but Conan seemed irrtated by the stitches. Another cat we had declawed this way had to be kept sedated for a few days because not only did he chew the stitches, but he also kept managing to get the bandages the vet put on him off. We basically had to keep him mellow until he was healed enough for the stitches to come out.
Both situations, I actually got quite angry with my mother. I carefully monitored the cats’ paws while they were healing, and I noticed that Conan’s toe seemed to be split, but my mother swore she didn’t notice anything wrong. It took me two days to convine her to take him back to the vet. I was afraid it would be too late, but the toe healed fine. With Gamma ( stray we took in then adopted out) it only took me until the next day to take him back to have his toes taken care of.
With a high-strung cat, you should probably ask the vet to bandage the paws so they can’t chew the stitches.
Well, I’m from the Land of the Teabag (albeit currently living in the land of the doughnut). Before I came over here, I’d never even heard of a declaw. I don’t know if the surgery is actually illegal in the UK, but it certainly not carried out as an elective procedure.
Yes, I think the surgery is barbaric.
Anyway, some hopefully objective comments:
A declaw is fundamentally bad because you are subjecting the cat to an unnecessary and painful surgery.
Cats are digitigrade animals (i.e., they walk on their toes). When their toes are removed, as in a declaw, then their biomechanics are altered. This might lead to problems such as pain in the joints due to the changed, unnatural walking action. Having said that, I am not aware of any research that has directly addressed this point.
After surgery, the cat’s paws will be painful. Given that cats dig in their litterbox, it is possible for them to come to associate pain with elimination. This can lead to inappropriate elimination problems. However (again!), based on survey data, Patronek et al. (1996; J Vet Med Am Assoc 209: 582-588) found that declaw was not associated with increased inappropriate elimination.
Given the loss of one of their primary defences, a cat might become a ‘biter’, or just more nervous / withdrawn. Again, this is anecdotal.
Related to the above: If a declawed cat is let out of doors (accidentally or on purpose), then they lack one of their main methods of defence or escape.
Less objectively, seems to me that a declaw ignores the fact that claws are beautifully designed and very aesthetic parts of a cat. One of my cats gently flexes his claws in and out when he’s happy, and this is, in its own tiny way, a beautiful thing.
In the end (IMO), if you need to unnecessarily remove bits of your pet to tailor it to your lifestyle, then perhaps a goldfish would be a better pet for you. As a hunter, claws are part of the cat’s evolution and are not optional extras.
First of all, what’s tha Land of The Doughnut? The Land of the Teabag is England, right?
Back to the topic…
My cats came home with no pain meds and certainly did not seem to be in pain. I asked if they were in pain or if they needed something for pain and was told they didn’t need drugs. They were running around and jumping as usual. My female kneaded on me the very next day.
As I said, doing it by laser means no bone is removed. They still have their entire toe. My cats get around just fine.
Again, I was given no pain meds for them, because they weren’t in any pain.The vet told me to use a type of litter called Yesterday’s News which is made from recycled newspapers for a couple of weeks to guard against infection from the open nail bed, but that was it. My cats use their litter boxes without fail, and are quite vigorous diggers. They still “scratch” on everything. One loves the big intake vent in the hall. He starts on that and just goes nuts. My female cat scratches everything; table legs, chair legs, door frames, the edges of the walls, whatever she sees. I don’t think their paws hurt them.
My cats are normal cats. No behavior problems whatsoever. (Well, they’re cats, so you know … they’re nuts ), but they’re just normal goofy cats.
They’re strictly indoor cats. Personally, I think letting cats roam around outside borders on cruel, depending on where you live. I’m on a fairly busy street, for one thing. We also have racoons and foxes in the area, and I’m sure they wouldn’t be the best playmates for housecats.
It’s against county regulations where I live to let pets (dogs and cats, FWIW) roam free anyway. I got both my cats from the shelter, and when I signed the adoption papers, I signed one that said I promised to keep them indoor-only.
), but they’re just normal goofy cats.