Why Cats Bite Their Toenails

Your cat can still nibble and play smack you with a soft paw and enjoy a kitty correct game without drawing blood.

Why cats bite their toenails. Nail biting is a pretty normal grooming behavior in cats. With the exception of momo my cats chew their toenails. When it comes to cats biting and chewing fingers there are quite a lot of reasons that do a good job explaining away this common feline behaviour. You must have noticed that some people start biting nails when they are suddenly stopped of doing a particular task like on red light signal some people bite their nails because they want to move but compulsively they have to stop which shows the conflict and they displace into grooming this is called compulsive.

The same is technically true of why cats bite feet they do it for a variety of reasons but to me there s a massive difference in terms of explaining away why cats chomp on fingers versus why cats chomp on toes. To get through kitten teething kittens will bite just about anything. Cats do not chew their nails all the time they do it more or less continuously. Yes cats chew their nails as a part of normal grooming.

Here s how to keep your fingers and toes off the menu. Because cats mouth and paw objects to explore their world it s natural for them to bite. Essentially a cat s finger and toenails are a bit like an onion. On the outside there s the old used up sometimes broken or chipped and often quite dull layer worn due to use.

However if the chewing becomes excessive it could be indicative of other issues. But in some cases nail biting can have an underlying medical cause or be a manifestation of a compulsive behaviour. Learn more about normal nail chewing and maintenance in cats as well as causes of abnormal nail chewing. Cats also chew on their claws at times to help them remove their nails outer layer.