“I love trimming my cat’s nails!” -Said no owner ever
Ask a cat owner about clipping their cats’ nails. You’ll hear a moan about how awful it is. Some people have to wrap their cats in a towel. Some need a partner to help hold their cat. Some people outsource the work to their groomer or vet. And some people flat out don’t do it.
Yet, the horrors of cat nail trims have not been a part of my life. Some may think my cats are well-behaved for a nail trim only because I’m a professional animal trainer. It makes the process easier, but it’s not a requirement. In fact, I trained my first two cats for nail trims years before I got my first job as an animal trainer. The methods I use allow me to trim my cat’s nails without upset. Dare I say it, they get excited when they see me get ready for a nail trim session.
Take a moment to see how we do nail trims in my home.
What’s going on?
The mighty hunter
First, let’s consider why cats wouldn’t want their nails trimmed. For the most part, it’s not pain. A properly done nail trim doesn’t hurt your cat any more than clipping your own nails hurts you. If you use dull clippers or accidentally hit the quick (the pink area at the nail base containing nerves and blood vessels), it can hurt your cat. Otherwise, it’s an ouch-free procedure. But even young kittens who’ve never experienced a nail trim tend to pull their paws away when you try to hold them.
Take a moment to think of this from an evolutionary perspective. Cats evolved these amazing retractable claws. These claws stay sharp and are used to catch prey.
Have you ever had the “pleasure” of a sharp cat nail against your skin? If so, you’ve felt how easy it is to pierce flesh with even the lightest pressure. Below, watch a video of a caracal (another member of the subfamily Felinae) catching a bird. You can see the caracal doesn’t grab the bird with both paws, but rather the nails from a single paw snag the bird. Even the momentum of flight isn’t enough to escape those claws. Thus, the caracal gets some “fast food.”
Our cats don’t consider that kibble is rock hard. If they swat their bowl of pate and gravy, all they will get is a wet paw. They don’t starve if they fail to catch a toy mouse with their dull claws. Our cats no longer need paw daggers to stay alive.
Still, the instinct to protect paw and claw remains. When we come along and reach for our cats’ paws with our grabby primate hands and metal snappers, our cats perceive a threat to their survival. A threat outdated by 12,000 years or so, but our cats don’t know that.
To have cats that behave well for nail trims, they have to learn A) nail trims won’t kill them and B) they’re actually pretty great.
How I do it
My process for training my cats for nail trims is simple — I minimize the bad while I maximize the good. Once the cats understand the game, I allow them to say “no” to encourage them to say “yes.” That last part might seem confusing, but it will make sense when we get there.
Minimizing the bad
For this, I try to make the bad stuff (holding the cat, trimming the claw) as brief as possible. For my latest two cats, I restrained them just long enough to get a single nail clipped.
This is the only step I’ve changed from my pre-professional trainer days. Previously, I used to do all the nails on one paw, then release and treat. It still worked, but my cats back then were never as relaxed for nail trims as my current boys.
Maximize the good
Once I’ve done the bad thing, I give my cats the good stuff. For my boys, it’s freeze-dried turkey liver. They get turkey liver only for nail trims or other extra-tough training. For fun training, we use treats they enjoy but aren’t the crème de la crème of treats.
Let my cats say “no”
Once my cats show relaxed behavior during nail trims, I allow them to say “no.” I do this by letting them take their paw out of my hand and walk away if they choose. It might seem like this would result in cats who walk away every time, but I’ve never experienced that problem. A cat who has learned nail trims are a good thing wants to stick around.
The reason I allow my cats to say “no” is two-fold. First, if I trim a nail, they get a liver treat. If I trim their nails when they’re fussy, they learn fussing during a nail trim earns them their liver. I don’t want to train my cats to fuss during nail trims. Instead, if they fuss, I let them go. They learn that they lose out on that opportunity for a piece of liver.
I take a moment to trim a nail on the other cat, then return to the fussy cat. Now he’s better behaved. In this way, I’m rewarding only the moments when my cats are staying relaxed. The number of times my cats relax for nail trims increases, and all of us are happier.
The other reason is that choice is a reinforcer. Reinforcers increase behavior. If my cats can choose to say “yes” or “no” in a nail trim session, that reinforces, or encourages, my cats to participate in the session. That’s exactly what I want.
The concept of letting animals say “no” is still evolving. While my cats don’t get a reinforcement (treat) when they say “no,” some trainers do reinforce the “no” behavior. You’d think these animals would do nothing but say “no,” especially when the alternative is to perform a challenging behavior. That’s not the case. To learn more about how allowing animals to say “no” results in better-trained animals, read this review of Ken Ramirez’s “Dr. No” presentation.
Final thoughts
While this training makes nail trims easier for the three of us, I still don’t love doing them. I’d rather be doing fun training like hi-fives and jumping over a prop. But I am very glad to have two cats who love nail trims. It makes the chore more pleasant.
