How Do The Experts Do Dental And Gum Care And Cat Grooming

Your veterinarian should check your cat’s mouth on her yearly physical and will usually clean her teeth.

In the meantime, you should regularly check her teeth and gums for soreness, tartar or diseased or broken teeth.

You can help ward off gum infection and tooth decay by cleaning your cat’s teeth on a regular basis. It is easiest to do this if you start the practice when she is a kitten as she will quickly become accustomed to it.

Begin by wrapping a small bit of gauze around your finger and then gently rubbing on and around the teeth and along the gums. Then you can graduate to an actual cat toothbrush (make sure you use one made expressly for cats) and cat toothpaste.

For cat grooming, even with daily combing, though, her coat may be of such a consistency that she will sweat on her tummy area and mats will form. To remove these, use blunt tipped scissors.

Separate the mat as much as you can with your fingers. Then, place one of your fingers against her skin so that you will not stab her as you cut off the mat. If for some reason you have not kept up with her daily grooming and she develops severe mats that you are unable to remove, you must seek professional help from a cat groomer or your veterinarian right away.

If not taken care of, the mats will twist into such a snarl that they will pinch her skin quite painfully. You will need to use a soft brush for her ruff (the hair framing her neck) as this should stand out away from her body.

And pay special attention to her toes. Longhaired cats grow toe tufts that are beautiful to see but can tangle just as her body hair does. Finish off her longhaired coat by brushing or combing her hair the wrong way so that it stands out from her body.