Fun with Super Glue

[fenchurch]

Zoe is quite fond of her claws... in particular, she's quite fond of using her (apparently Adamantium) claws to gouge out the woodwork in the house. Not a good thing.

Our goal has always been to avoid having her declawed -- our vet actually brought the idea up, which sort of surprised me because it didn't seem like the sort of thing he'd do. His reasoning was sound though: indoor cats live longer and healthier lives than outdoor cats, ergo if the only way to keep the cat in the house is to declaw it, he'd rather do that than see a cat get punted outside. Still, not the sort of thing we want to do if we don't have to.

So, we're using SoftPaws on her with great success... not only are they helping protect the things she scratches, but she's also a lot less likely to try scratching in the first place. The big problem is that the claw caps are applied to the claws with a type of Super Glue... and, invariably, I wind up with some on my fingers. Tonight I did the thing I'd been dreading since we started this routine... I glued my thumb and forefinger together. Ouch.

Note to self: If you suspect you've gotten Super Glue on your fingers, *resist* the urge to "rub it off." It doesn't lead anywhere good.

And yeah, there are ways of getting the stuff off (which is good, because I didn't want to go through the rest of my life making the "OK" sign), but it mostly entails an acetone based fingernail polish remover, which we didn't have in the house... we do now!

In other cat news, we're still slowly working to get Polly back into the house... She'll now stay in the house for hours, though she mostly just sits on the little catbed next to my computer desk, and she adamantly refuses to use the litterbox in the house (she'll just hold it until we put her back in the garage). She doesn't seem to be freaking out nearly as much when Zoe is around, though she's still hissing a lot.. but at least she's no longer losing bowel and bladder control. I've also managed to get her to spend some time with me upstairs, and she even ventured up the stairs on her own once. Small steps, but progress nonetheless.

Comments

[rosiewook.livejournal.com]

Wow. I've come close to gluing my fingers together, but have never actually pulled it off. Congratulations!

And I'm glad that Polly is slowly starting to work herself back inside. She'll settle down, eventually.

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

Small steps are good steps. I've thought of the Soft Paws but Miss Pelle is such a squirmer I know that the only way to get them on her would be to knock her out cold. It takes three of us to hold her down just to get her nails trimmed. She's a devil.

[wildrider.livejournal.com]

Good to hear Polly's progressing. I need to figure out how to hold Cairo down long enough to apply SoftPaws to his back claws-- he'll let me trim his front ones, but if I touch his back feet he turns into Cat Of Steel and won't let me near. They're so long he clicks on the tiles and leaves gouges in anything he jumps off (including people).

[fenchurche.livejournal.com]

Well, if you can't clip them, you really won't be able to do SoftPaws on them either... because that requires some serious clipping first. Plus you've definitely got to be able to hold the cat still for long enough to get the caps on. We do it with Rackham holding her to keep her from bolting, and I grab her paw to get the claws extended. And we still have a hard time if she starts to get wiggly.

[wildrider.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a "no way" on Cairo. I believe his middle name is "wiggly brat." :)

[adjrun.livejournal.com]

How often do you have to put them on? And how difficult is it? Our cats don't demolish wood, per se, but there's some upholstered items that have clearly suffered the wrath. I have moral objections to both outdoor kittiness and to declawing, so SofPaws seems the most viable alternative.

[fenchurche.livejournal.com]

How often do you have to put them on?

It really depends on the claws... it can be anywhere from two to six weeks. The nice part is that once you put them on, you don't have to replace them all at once. It's just a matter of watching to see when they fall off (the cat will grow new claws under the old ones, at the covered ones will eventually just fall off).

And how difficult is it?

It can be pretty tough. We didn't have too many problems at first, but Zoe is catching on and struggles a LOT now. It's definitely a two-person operation, though. One person to hold the cat and the other person to hold the paw and to apply the cap.

Our cats don't demolish wood, per se, but there's some upholstered items that have clearly suffered the wrath.

We've found that when Zoe has got the SoftPaws on, she doesn't tend to scratch at much except her scratching posts and pads (obviously just doing it for the feel of it and to scent-mark it), but when the caps begin coming off, she'll start going after things she shouldn't. So far, no furniture and she seems to be laying off the doorframes, but she's more prone to doing things like attacking the curtains and tablecloths at that point.

I have moral objections to both outdoor kittiness and to declawing, so SofPaws seems the most viable alternative.

We had our previous two cats declawed, but back in those days there weren't any alternatives... and there were times when it really helped us when finding a place to rent (we found that even landlords with a No Pets policy would consider us once we told them the cats were both declawed), something that's not an issue anymore.