Story/Question for the cat lovers...

tjlovesthepokes · December 2010

A couple weekends ago, my sister stopped in Tulsa on her way home from Stillwater to fill up with gas. After she pulled out of the gas station and started driving down the road, she said she heard this 'screaming' noise coming from inside her car. So, she pulled over, got out, lifted her hood and found a kitten inside her engine. She pulled him out, and brought him to my parents'. The next day, she asked me if I'd go pick up her dog from the vet after she'd gotten spayed and take the cat in to have the vet make sure it was okay - so I did, and the little guy was perfectly fine after his tramatic adventure in the engine.

Anyway, all that to say this: my parents have (strangely) become attached to this kitten and have decided to keep him as opposed to taking him to the Animal Rescue Foundation. The last cat my parents had at their house shredded their leather furniture. Since then, they have gotten new leather furniture, but are not keen on the idea of it getting shredded. Mom doesn't want the cat declawed because 1) if the cat gets outside, she doesn't want it to be defenseless and 2) it's mean... and probably hurts. ANYWAY, I had seen somewhere that there were little rubber (?) tips you can put on the end of the cat's nails so they can't do damage when they scratch. Have you ever heard of these things? Or seen them? Do they work? Do you know where to get them? They seem humane and a MUCH better alternative to declawing, from what I remember...

fuzzylogic · December 2010

We actually just saw those little tips at Petsmart last Saturday! I'm sure if you ask a sales associate they will direct you to the right item.

Boundary spray works reasonably well to keep them away. We don't have any issues at all with any of our three cats tearing up the leather furniture; on the contrary, it's the furniture that is made of cloth that they like to shred! Strange? Likely.

Lots of places for them to scratch helps, as well. Scratching posts that are plenty tall enough for them to stretch against help, as well as those round things with the cardboard rolls inside (Extra loves that thing).

Hope this helps!

tjlovesthepokes · December 2010

For the added "awwwwww" effect...

pinklabel · December 2010

I have several friends who use those tip things and they've said that other than they pop off sometimes they are great. You can get them in colors too so it looks like the cats nails are painted. Petsmart has them and I think Amazon does too. I think they're pretty easy to use, put a drop of glue inside the tip and place it on the nail and hold for a second or two and its good to go.

stripesandspots · December 2010

Kitty, kitty!!! I am so glad your parents decided to take him in - poor little baby!!!! He must have crawled in to keep warm - that's what kitties usually do. Kudos to your parents for NOT getting their new baby declawed. We use double sided tape - I got ours at wal-mart. Our cats like to scratch on the corners of our furniture - we put a little bit of tape there - and we don't have problems with them scratching there or elsewhere on our furniture.

Keep us posted - preferably with pictures!!

IPmama · December 2010

It is a kitten, so just train it not too. But the paw caps do work, just like fake nails you glue on. Need to start ASAP putting them on to train the kitten to accept its paws being messed with etc. That way it wont be a struggle later on in life. Provide plenty of scratching posts, at least two, and can even put attracting spray onto them to make the cat want to scratch them