If anyones not sure ifyou should or should not Declaw your cat

Well take a look at these photos. http://declaw.lisaviolet.com/

At the risk of being flamed (and I'm sure I will be), it's nice to see how the information on that site is all how terrible and cruel declawing is, and how it's a mutilation of the cat's paws. Except for one thing: the vet tech's write-up is exclusively given from the perspective of everything being the worst possible way for things to happen. Not every vet performs the surgery in the clip-and-glue manner. Not every owner is flippant about an animal undergoing surgery. Not every vet (or tech) is incompetent enough to start surgery without basic tests for pain response for the proper amount of anesthesia.

I work at a humane society. We are strongly anti-declawing, but we cannot deny adoptions to adopters who express a desire to declaw. We encourage them to find an already declawed cat; we go through the possible behavior issues that may arise from declawing; we go through the disadvantages to the cat of being denied their primary defenses.

I've come to a realization that most people who are so strongly against declawing are those that have seen surgeries that were botched, or done hastily, or badly, or the healing went wrong. Our staff veterinarian said she has seen good vets and bad vets do the surgery, and the mutilation comes in when they do the clip-n-glue and remove the entire toe. Good vets will actually do surgery and just remove the nail. They don't clip the bone, they don't remove more than absolutely necessary.

Before you start screaming, realize that I'm not pro-declawing. In a perfect world, declawing wouldn't happen. Everyone would be understanding and accepting of the occasional scratch. Then again, in a perfect world, claws wouldn't be necessary because no cat would ever need to defend itself. No animal would be homeless. No animals would be euthanized because people still let their cats out and don't bother to look for them when they've been gone for five days.

Face it. There's a lot of shit wrong in the world, and while declawing is rarely ever a necessary thing (frankly, I would rather someone adopt a cat and declaw it and keep it than adopt it and bring it back because it's scratching her kids), it will continue to happen until people smarten up and realize that they shouldn't have a goddamned animal unless they have the time to deal with whatever arises, be it health-related or behavior-related.

The same goes for children, though that should go without saying.

End Rant.

This disclaimer does not save you.

I've come to a realization that most people who are so strongly against declawing are those that have seen surgeries that were botched, or done hastily, or badly, or the healing went wrong.

No. The basic reason is that the procedure is *unnecessary*. It has *no* - zip, nil, nada, absoposilutively ZERO - benefit to the cat. That makes it inhumane, regardless of how 'competently' it might be done.

Our staff veterinarian said she has seen good vets and bad vets do the surgery, and the mutilation comes in when they do the clip-n-glue and remove the entire toe. Good vets will actually do surgery and just remove the nail.

Either your staff vet needs to go back to vet school, or you misheard what was said.

They don't clip the bone, they don't remove more than absolutely necessary.

Absolute nonsense. It is *necessary* to remove bone in declawing. The procedure to 'scrape out' just the claw DOES NOT WORK. The claw grows back, often deformed, requiring *more* surgery later. The only way to stop claw (re)growth is to remove the distal phalanx.

Before you start screaming, realize that I'm not pro-declawing.

Try getting a clue first.
http://www.stopdeclawing.com/

I also apologize for not getting the little > things in there. *scratches head* I'm really not sure how to do that properly.

Arjun? The link in that last message came up a 'cannot display.'

Arjun,

I noticed that this link does not open. You posted 'stopdeclawing.' Did you mean 'stopdeclaw' instead? That is: http://www.stopdeclaw.com

Try here: http://www.stopdeclaw.com

I noticed that this link does not open. You posted 'stopdeclawing.' Did you mean 'stopdeclaw' instead? That is: http://www.stopdeclaw.com

Indeed I did. Thank you for posting the correct link!