If you are assuming that cats take care of all their grooming needs themselves, think again. Your role in your cat's grooming is a little more complicated than simply running a brush through his fur. While keeping thecoat clean, shiny, and untangled is a large part of the job, your cat's toilette is not complete until his claws are trimmed, his eyes and ears cleaned, and his teeth brushed. Your duties may even extend to bathing your pet in some instances: for longhair cats, on occasion, and for older cats no longer flexible enough to completely groom themselves. Not only does all this maintenance keep your cat beautiful, but some of it also serves as preventive medicine. The more hair you remove by brushing, for instance, the less your cat will ingest when he grooms himself, reducing the number of hairballs he throws up and averting a potentially deadly blockage of the intestines by clumps of hair.

Set up a grooming routine at a regular time and in a quiet room; for skittish pets, divide the procedure into short, cat-acceptable sessions. Have all the grooming tools and supplies you may need within ea