scratching wallpaper

[Julie84]

My boys (luckily) haven't touched the wallpaper yet but I do find when their nails start to get a bit long or sharp they start using them on the sofa (they normally exclusively use their scratching posts). Trimming their nails (or indeed just taking the sharp tip off) completely stops this and to date they haven't actually damaged anything in the house. Might be worth trying?

[Donna]

Originally Posted by Julie84

Trimming their nails (or indeed just taking the sharp tip off) completely stops this and to date they haven't actually damaged anything in the house. Might be worth trying?

There is NO WAY my cats would ever let me trim their nails

[andrew021]

I would doubt if Jet would sit long enough to let me near her nails. She is OK to let me touch her front paws but I am not allowed to go near the back legs at all, she is always pulling them away if I try to pet them or check them out.

[Julie84]

I think because I started doing my boys nails (or just fiddling with their feet lots just to get them used to having their feet touched/held) when they first moved in, they are fairly used to it - although they are still wrigglers when they feel like it.

Thomas will lie on his back on my lap and just let me snip snip snip all of them (and then gets his favourite cat nip drop treats!). Murphy isn't quite so laid back; I wait until he has had his evening meal and is having a doze on the sofa. He rarely wakes up because he has a full tummy and is dreaming but even if he does he normally just lets me get on with it as he knows he will get a Chewy Chicken treat when he is done which he loves (bribery is brilliant!)

And also don't concentrate on trying to get all nails done at once. It doens't matter if you just get one nail done the first time, the cat will get used to it and you will become more confident and quicker each time. When I first showed one of my rats it took me a week to manage 13 of her nails as she was a wriggly bum - now I can do four rats the night before a show without thinking about it too much.

[andrew021]

What do you use to clip the nails, ordinary nail clippers or is there special ones for animals to use.

[Julie84]

http://www.puddlepetcare.co.uk/acata..._grooming.html

I have the small Mikki Deluxe Nail Clippers on this page (about a third of the way down). They have a guard so you can't cut 'too much' off the nail and a rounded inside (like the shape of a cat's nail) to the 'blades' so it makes a nice clean cut. Human nails scissors often slip off the nails because of the straight blades and although I like human nail clippers, I found them to become less useful as the cats grew older and their nails grew thicker (although I do have 'baby' nail clippers so it might just be me!)