It's National Hairball Awareness Day!

Here it is upon us again, and I haven't gotten the first card sent! What? You don't have a celebration planned? I'm shocked! But I suppose it's understandable; between the royal wedding and the NFL draft, perhaps this momentous occasion had slipped your mind.

Every cat owner has had to clean up hairballs when kitty has thrown them up on the carpet. When I got my first cat, I'd never seen one hack up a hairball before, and the first time he did it, I thought he was having some kind of seizure! He was incredibly prone to them. Even regular grooming didn't help much.

But daily grooming does help most cats. The photo here is of one day's grooming on little Vixen. Can you imagine if she'd tried to swallow all that hair? (Or if the only way you had to comb your hair was to lick it with your tongue?) Yikes! Although she still washes her face after eating, Vixen doesn't groom the rest of her coat at age 23. I suppose it's too painful for her to try and reach all those spots she used to keep so neat when she was younger. So it's up to me to groom her. I use a variety of grooming tools to keep her hair combed and free of mats. A few we carry that I'd recommend for grooming a cat prone to hairballs are the famous Furminator (and yes, this is the authentic one, not an imitation), the comfy rubber cat-shaped Zoom Groom, a wood-handled shedding comb, a grooming blade, or perhaps a versatile 4-way grooming tool that contains a slicker, bristle brush, flea and fine combs in one. You'll find all these and many more in our Grooming Time section.

If grooming alone doesn't keep your kitty free of hairballs, there are all sorts of remedies to help. The original pastes and gels, most based on petroleum jelly, work for some. Kittymalt, Laxatone (regular or catnip flavored), Excel sugar free (great for diabetic cats), Defurr-UM, and Miracle Malt are the ones we carry here at Old Maid Cat Lady. If you don't like the idea of feeding your cat petrolatum, Laxatone also makes a natural formula with chamomile that doesn't contain it.

Kitty doesn't like gels? Not to worry! Anti-hairball treats are available from Petromalt, Defurr-UM, and Pet Greens (in 3 flavors!).

Perhaps your cat prefers to just eat the natural grass instead of having it in a treat. Several companies make cat grass you can grow indoors instead of letting kitty outside to eat the pesticide-and-chemical-laden lawn grass. Or if you don't have a lawn! We carry them from Cat Grass Plus, Vita-Greens, Cosmic Kitty, and Pet Greens.

So, you have a very difficult cat who won't cotton to any of these? Help is still available! Try the tablet supplements from Vet's Best, or the Furball Dr. capsules from PetAlive.

If nothing works and your little fur baby regularly hocks up nasty hairballs on your carpet, Nature's Miracle has just the thing to take out the stains. It's specially formulated to break down the proteins in cat vomit, hair and food that stain your carpet whenever kitty makes a little "present" for you.

So what are you waiting for? Get out there and celebrate!