Why You Shouldn’t Declaw Your Cat
As a cat, I have a pretty strong opinion on the whole declawing thing. There are also a lot of vets who have the same strong opinion. That opinion?
Don’t declaw your cat!
One more time, just in case you might have misread:
Do. Not. Declaw. Your. Cat.
Okay, now aside from the fact that my claws are luxurious and *amazing*, and those are two very good reasons you shouldn’t declaw me, let’s talk about the main reason declawing is a terrible, horrible, very bad, no good idea.
Ready?
Declawing is *amputation*. That’s right. Amputation. Take a minute to hold up your hand. Doesn’t matter which one, because I don’t know which is which anyways. The top of your finger? The part that has the nail on it? Imagine getting that chopped off. Not only would you be missing your nail, but you’d also be missing the tip of your finger! How awkward would that make your life? You can’t scratch yourself, opening a can of soda would not work at all, your fingers would be oddly short…catch my drift here? Amputation = bad. So don’t amputate my claws!
But I get it. People think hey, I declaw my cat, I solve some problems, right? No more scratching? Yeah, here’s the thing. Scratching is totally normal, because it lets me stretch, and give myself a manicure, and mark territory. You can deal with it by getting me a scratching post that doesn’t suck. But if you decide to amputate my claws instead, you’re actually creating more problems.
If I don’t have claws, and you do something that I don’t like, guess what I’m gonna do? I’m gonna bite you. And you’re gonna deserve it, because you amputated my claws!
You know what else might happen? I might decide I don’t wanna use the litterbox anymore, because in the days that follow the amputation, you have to put newspaper in my litterbox, because that’s less irritating. Only I don’t like peeing on newspaper, because it smells weird, and I can’t bury my pee very well in it. Oh, and trying to bury stuff hurts, because amputation! So put those together and you end up with a cat who doesn’t really dig the litterbox anymore, and might find other places to pee.
But claws are annoying! And they can be scratchy!
Well, suck it up, buttercup. I’m a cat. That’s what I do. As a human, you can learn to trim my claws, which will help, and you can get me lots of awesome scratching posts to use. You can also get me cool toys to play with, and reward me when I’m good and play with them, and that’ll help me learn not to claw stuff I shouldn’t.
As a review…
Declawing = amputation.
If you want your hands intact, you better leave mine alone!
~Coco.
