Matted fur, best tools for the job?

[HHCrochetDiva]

We’ve recently acquired some new rescue cats. The eldest has a beautiful long coat and I’m having to adjust to daily grooming, not having had a long haired cat in some time. So what’s best for getting mats out and stopping them from developing? Are the furminators too aggressive? She’s pretty good with being groomed but doesn’t settle for long, I’m hoping this will improve with time so at the moment I’m aiming for little and often! She has a couple of mats that I’m slowly working on with fingers but one will have to be cut out (she had an op before we got her and it’s from the adhesive on the dressing).

I just use scissors to cut them out.

i have some lovely flexible brushes that they love being brushed with but you do just have to keep going with little and often.

one of mine really dislikes it so I have brushes scattered around the house so if she is in the mood I can just grab a brush

What a disdainful beauty!

I use scissors, a little at a time, but ours never had the really big mats

You need a metal comb and a tangle teaser. I used cut bad knots out. But be careful. They also had a 3 monthly professional groom. To keep on top of their coats.

@Toddlerteaplease oh I hadn’t considered that, do you mean a human tangle teezer?

@HHCrochetDivayes. A human one. It’s great for daily brushing. Although mine is a Superdrug own brand and has slightly stiffer bristles than a branded one. It does the job perfectly.

@Toddlerteaplease such an obvious idea, it was one of my go to things when DS was small! Thank you 🙂

I used to give them
a going over with the comb about one MCR a week. And brush with the tangle teaser every couple of days. But my girls had quite easy coats, and were very placid Persians. I now have shorthaired Persians as their grooming is much cheaper!

Ps. Be very careful with what she eats. You do not want a long haired cat with loose poo. Ask me how I know😂😂😂

I found a knot remover like this most effective and easiest to use.

You use it parallel to their body, to cut the fur just before the knot. The long bit can be used to tease the fur loose.

I also had clippers and would just shave the really bad ones off. If a knot splinter didn’t work.

Second this…..

Also she is beautiful!!!

Cut all the bad matting out and start again. Honestly it’s the best plan!

Fortunately not too much matting atm, the problem is getting her to hold still for me long enough to get the bad few out. She’s still so new to us, only 5 weeks in, that I’m being cautious with handling as I still don’t know her that well really! Certainly it’ll be a while before I know exactly what she will and won’t tolerate. So I’m also looking to avoid new mats developing.

Totally works and feels relaxing for them. If it's bad, you can get them sedated and shaved at the vet.

I took in a beautiful elderly Persian a few years ago. She was in need of a fair bit of TLC including her fur which was so matted I had to shave her. I did it in stages and bought her a little woolly jumper while it grew back, which she loved (at that stage she wasn't going out). Then I maintained her coat by brushing her everyday after spritzing her with a little Lavendar spray on shampoo. What a groomed and lovely girl she was.

Because of her breed, she was used to all this kind of thing and was so incredibly docile. My tabby girls would tear me apart if I dared even show them a bottle of spray on shampoo.

A rotating comb to defluff & specialist pet clippers to remove the matts very carefully while holding the skin taut. Cat skin is very loose and paper thin so scissors can cut or tear the skin and furminators rip matts out which is very painful

Thanks everyone! All tips gratefully received.

For general maintenance I found the wide toothed metal comb (with rounded ends) worked best. For the mats I found that using kids nail scissors with the rounded ends to cut the mats in half (so you don’t have to get too close to the skin) helped a lot. You can do it without pulling and then it becomes much easier to tease out, one of mine would often get it out himself from there (but the other not so much).