Dr. Tony Buffington: Okay, Heidi, let's just talk about how we trim cats claws, cause we
want both you and Boo to have a good experience with it.
It's an easy thing to do, the only trick is that you don't want to do too much too quick
because you want to make sure that both you and Boo are comfortable with what's going
on.
Because if you get nervous, he's gonna read that and so the way you do this is the simplest
thing, you find a quiet place and cat are often most interested in us before feeding,
so then you can use food as a reward, so that works, or you can use a couple of treats.
The first thing you do is just ask him if you can touch his paws, just a little bit
while you're petting him and doing the rest of it.
Then, once you are both real comfortable with touching paws then, you can just push on his
pad and extract a toenail, just like that.
Then, that's it, stop and give him a treat, take a deep breath, relax yourself, come back
the next day and once you can touch his feet and once you can extrude his claws then it's
time to start thinking about clipping one a little bit.
So, the clippers that I like, are these (referring to clippers in video) there's a lot of different
brands of them, but they're like a cigar cutter or a guillotine kind of clipper because cats
claws are round and you want to make sure you've got something that cuts it, and you
want to make sure they're sharp.
If you've had some for awhile, as soon as they start to fray the nail, throw them away
and get another pair.
Where in contrast, we often use these kinds of nail clippers (referring to clippers in
video) for our own nails but our nails are flat and so are these, but this would just
break his nail so you don't want to use these.
Flat clippers for flat nails and round clippers for round nails.
Then, once you've got all of that so you're real comfortable with everything else you
just pick his paw up, extrude a claw, and you just clip off just that much (see in video)
that's it, let him go, take a deep breath, relax until you're real comfortable with that.
Now, he's so good about this I can show you that when you extrude it, you can see a little
pink spot down here, of course you want to stay well away from that because that'll bleed
a little bit, if it does, just put a little corn starch on it or if you have styptic powder
or something like that, that'll be fine.
Sometimes people think they have to clip them all at one time.
If you do one a day, it's going to take you a couple weeks to get around and by then it's
time to go around again, and now you have a game you can play together and that's it.
The only thing is to go at whatever speed both you and Boo are comfortable with and
you'll both have a good time with it, any questions?
Heidi: Are the back nails harder than the front nails to do?
Dr. Buffington: No, not really, that's an excellent question, because you're going to
work on all four paws and see he's just a little less comfortable with that (referring
to touching his hind leg) so now I can extrude one and see (referring to Boo's reaction)
you don't want to get him to that point, but if I had taken a week to play with his paws
a little bit and got him as comfortable with the back as he is with the front, then it
would be just as easy.
Now, from a practical point of view, they tend to scratch more with their front ones
so that's a good place to start to get that done.
So, this is a clipnosis clip (referring to clippers) and the idea is that it mimics the
way the mother picks up the kitten by the back of the neck and there's some very interesting
research that shows that the nerves in the back of the neck there are connected to the
motor system and they just slow the animals reaction down.
Completely different from an animal freezing because it's scared, these just calm him so
it relaxes.
Now, the way we usually use the clips is while I'm petting him, I'm just going to grab the
scruff like that and I'm just going to start squeezing and you see how he's starting to
relax a little bit, well that's good, because what I'm going to do is put that (referring
to clip) on him, see he's okay, he's just calmed down a little bit, and then, we see
how he's slowed down just enough that that's easy to do (referring to clipping the back
claw).
That's it, he just thinks his mom's holding him in the air okay.
And watch what happens when you take it off, nothing, see, he's just as relaxed and calm
as he ever was.
What we've found is, the more often you do that, the better it works.
It's just part of you know, playing with the cat and enjoying its company and that's just
all part of making him and you comfortable with handling his whole body.
Okay?
Okay, good!