Are domestic cat lion cuts ever justified?

I don’t believe lion cuts can be justified and I explain why. Look at this poor cat’s face and demeanour and tell me her owner has done the right thing in putting her through a lion cut….

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Cat looks sad and anxious after a lion cut

The only justification for putting your cat through a lion cut is for strict medical and health reasons. However, a lion cut entails removing fur from almost all of the cat’s body, which can only be justified if all the fur is badly matted throughout the body and on the legs and tail etc. and/or the fur on the legs needs removing for medical reasons. This hardly ever or never happens. There was a recent, very rare case, of a badly neglected traditional Persian cat being shorn or all his fur but that was, on the face of it, justified on medical grounds.

I feel strongly that the example in the video below was not justified. The cat owner and video maker states:

“Cat haircuts justified only when the animal’s hair matted and, in some places, has turned into a ball that can not be combed….”

However, this does not explain why all the fur had to be removed in a lion cut and it does not explain why the fur became matted in the first place.

One can’t be too hard on cat owners because sometimes, despite a person’s best efforts, fur can become matted in places. When that happens the fur can be removed in those places. It isn’t as interesting or as fashionable as a lion cut but it is a medical process and the shearing is kept down to a minimum.

In this instance the owner decided to video her cat after the cut indicating, dare I say it, cat exploitation. She sidesteps the true reason why she put her cat through a lion cut.

It is pretty traumatic for a cat to be shorn of her hair like that and sometimes the cat is given an aesthetic – general aesthetic perhaps or sedation. Anaesthetics are potentially dangerous to health.

Andrea Soares a commentator on the YouTube page sums it up quite nicely:

She try to “justify” what she does, but if it was really something she had to do, why is she laughing and showing this video to everybody… When I have to do something with my pets because they NEED (like give them medicines) and there’s no other way, I don’t think it’s funny and I feel sad like they feel. She’s trying to use excuses, but the way she laugh make it clear that she is having fun with the poor cat. Probably this is not the first time she did this and that’s why she decided to make a video, knowing how can would behave after. I have been having cats my entire life, all the types of cats, and I’ve never seen a single theory that some cats need to have their hair removed… This is ridiculous!!

My general conclusion is that a lion cut can hardly ever be justified because fur does not mat on legs and tail. A lion cut removes fur from these areas. Therefore if an owner gives her a cat a lion cut she is doing it for her pleasure even if there was a need to shear some fur off for medical reasons.