Poor Fudge

She's been minus a fang for some time now and yesterday I thought I spotted blood on the right side of her bottom lip, but like all cats, she wasn't best pleased at my attempts to examine her mouth.

I caught her yawning this afternoon and yes, another fang was hanging by a thread and I tried to pull it free as it looked so funny just sticking out, but no chance. I left her eating and I dare say it's been swallowed by now but I won't be able to check till she comes in again.

It's probably a bit late at her age to worry too much about gum disease so I'm not thinking about a vet visit just yet, and if I do, I can't see them believing her gums have always been discoloured. This is something I've just put down to pigmentation, tho' I don't recall ever seeing it on another cat before, at least not like her gums.

Ian

Joseph lost all of his fangs by the age of 17 - one had to be removed under anesthetic coz was bad, the other 3 we suspect were swallowed at some point - to no detriment to Joseph. We called him 'gummy' in his later years. Bonnie, on the otherhand, does have gum problems, but not much the vets can do about it really, apart from prescribe the anti-biotics when it gets really bad. Bonnie also has 'too many teeth' ie. it looks like some of her adult teeth have grown whilst the equivalent milk teeth have remained in place. When we looked it up on tinternet - it would appear that some cats just have gum disease all of their lives - with no real reason why, and no obvious cure. Bonnie's breath can sometimes stink to high heaven and I would have thought that would be a clue to gum disease as opposed to necessarily gum colour.

Joanne

Thanks Joanne,

It could well be Fudge has had gum disease all her life then, tho' in that case she's done well to have only lost two teeth. I've never seen her pawing at her mouth, barring when she's got food stuck in her teeth, so I don't think there's any pain and she's still eating as well as ever, even if that is much less than the others.

Ian

Sam had gum disease and he needed to get a tooth out, we were totally oblivious of this until the vet gave him a general health check. If she appears otherwise fine Ian, I wiuld leave her be, a vet trip maybe too stressful for her. Moto has pigmentation on his bottom lip, little brown marks that are slowly spreading, nothing to worry about so they say.

She seems fine Kath, tho' said tooth is still there but now sticking at such a funny angle she must be able to feel it and it's annoying her a bit at times. A quick pull from me and it'd be out..........but will she let me?

It must be getting on for 2 years now since she lost the other fang, if there were a big problem with her gums I would have expected a lot more trouble with her teeth.

Ian

And the tooth is still there she does look comical when she yawns/opens her mouth

Ian

You would think that would really annoy her.

If it did, it won't anymore Kath, finally it's gone

Ian

haha down the hatch no doubt.

She looks better without it, her mouth isn't as lop sided now

Ian

She might be minus two fangs, but this didn't stop her making very short work of some raw smoked bacon earlier. As both missing fangs are from the left side of her mouth, it took her a while to figure out that she couldn't pick food up from that side anymore, but now there's no stopping her

Ian

Amazing how they adapt, bet she enjoyed that treat.

She could only have enjoyed the smell as none of it was in her mouth long enough to really taste

Watching her trying to piick food up on her toothless side was and in equal measure tbh.

Ian

Oh bless her, you probably feel worse about it than she does. usual story where their favourite food is concerned, never touches the sides.

True, she'll just be glad it's gone as it must have been annoying just hanging on like that

Stupid ? of the day tho' do cats, and dogs come to that, get toothache like we do?

Ian

Yes they do only they're very good at hiding it. I read that if they show weakness of any kind they make themselves vunerable to stronger cats/dogs, must all have something to do with instinct.

That makes sense, showing a weakness is probably a big no-no for most, if not all, animals.

Ian