Reply #: My daughter's cat Stanley, who'll be five this year

[MrsMatt]

has TERRIBLE teeth. He's been in our home since he was 4 months old (his mother was in foster care when he was born) and he's always had good food. We brought him in last December for teeth cleaning and extraction of one decayed tooth. The vet ended up extracting five teeth, because they started to come out while they were being cleaned. It appears that for this cat, genetics was the culprit - the vet said he'd never seen anything quite like it (and he's been our vet for over 16 years).

My vet figures that he'll end up losing most of his teeth by age 10 (hoping to save the canines, as that keeps the tongue in the mouth). But, he says that toothless cats are quite able to handle dry food.

Good luck with Jewel!