Cat Baths - How to Bath Your Cat at Home

Bathing tips

The dreaded bath is perhaps the most difficult act of love for any cat owner to make. By now, you will probably respect the long standing hatred of water that most cats harbour and unfortunately for you, there might be a time when you have to give your cat a bath anyway. Really, there should only be a few circumstances that require you to bath your cat and these are:

• To treat fleas 

• To clean a particularly dirty cat after a day's exploring 

• To remove a potentially dangerous substance from their fur/skin 

• To treat a skin condition

On the whole, cats tend to keep themselves very clean so make sure you have a good reason to bath them.

How to bath your cat

If you have decided your cat could definitely benefit from a wash then make sure you use some of these tips to make the whole process go as smoothly and as successfully as possible.

Get ready

The last thing you want is to be mid wash and not have something within arm's reach because as soon as you let go of that cat, it will be gone and it will be sometime before you get another chance. Instead, make sure you have all your products near the sink including towel, shampoo, scissors and associated brushes. Next, run the water before putting the cat in, this will ensure that the water a nice tepid temperature and the noise of flowing water won't agitate them. Lastly, but perhaps most importantly, wear clothes you don't mind ruining or wear a protective apron. You are going to get wet.

Know what you're about to do

Make sure you actually know what the plan of attack is once the cat is in the sink. The best way to hold the cat is gently yet firmly at the base of the neck or scruff but make sure you know how you're going to hold them if you need to change angles. If you don't know what you're going to do, the cat will beat you as your scratching your head in confusion.

Begin

Slowly start to wet your cat from head to tail applying the shampoo in the same way you would to yourself. Slowly lather the shampoo over the cat, particularly into any areas that require more attention but make sure you read the labels of the bottle for specific advice as some shampoos need certain methods.

Rinse

Possibly the most important step of all is making sure you rinse all of the shampoo off before drying. Not only can dry shampoo clump hair together (probably the thing you were trying to avoid in the first place) but it can also irritate skin and is prone to being consumed when the cat licks itself. When taking the cat out of the sink once finished, ensure that you wash their feet again so there are no suds that would cause such problems

Drying

This is the final part and you have done well to make it this far. Drying a cat is a very tenuous activity that requires a lot of care. Usually just placing the towels over the cat and 'hugging' them with a bit of rubbing is the safest option. However, after already going to the ordeal of being bathed, sometimes the last thing the cat wants is to be encased in a towel. If they are not up for a towel dry, it is possible to try a blow drier which some cats even enjoy.