What you should know before declawing your cat

I've received, since I've started with petwellbeing.com a lot of questions in regards to declawing cats. Although I can understand the purpose, before making an educated decision, like with anything else regarding your cat, there are a few things to consider before walking into the vet's office for the procedure.

Claw is not like a toe nail, it is actually a moveable digit, therefore, clawing will be moving an essential body part used for daily tasks, much like how our toes work. By declawing half their "toe" you're also cutting off motor nerves which makes tasks such as walking, running, sprinting and even stretching difficult.

Since a cats pain receptors are more sensitive than humans, many pain killing drugs do not agree with cats and can make them exceptionally or ill. Declawing can also lead to infection.

Most declaw for the purpose of preserving their furniture, however, cats scratch furniture to self clean their claws. A healthier investment is a scratching post in conjunction with appropriate training, through books and manuals, the cat to use a scratch post for said cleaning.

One method of post training found on-line is that if the cat scratches furniture, clap hands loudly and say, "NO" and physically move the cat to the scratching post. If you need to take drastic measures, keep a squirt bottle on hand and squirt the cat gently each time he/she attempts to scratch the furniture. Praise the cat when it does use the post for positive r-enforcement.

In a learning channel documentary back in July back in '95 showed the declawing procedure and how the practice is a North American trend and that veterinarians in other countries to this day, to my knowledge, refuse to do the procedure.

For the record I am not for or against declawing I just want my readers to have all the information before making any lifestyle or educated decisions before going forward with such costly procedure.

I welcome comments from every spectrum.

Luv Sheila & Freedom, my black lab