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When a person gets dental sealants, they are applied directly to the teeth to help prevent cavities and other forms of dental disease. The teeth have little fissures, or grooves, that trap food residue (often sticky in nature) and pave the way for tooth decay. The sealants keep the grooves covered and may stay in place for a person’s lifetime.

A number of years ago, a survey of half a million cats showed that after receiving vaccinations, only one half of one percent of them had an adverse reaction. And almost all of those reactions — mild ones like lethargy and loss of appetite — were very short lived. No doubt that’s part of the reason that both the American Animal Hospital Association and the American Association of Feline Practitioners jointly state that vaccines are “medically essential” and “a critical component” of a cat’s healthcare plan.

We all know that just about any cat appreciates a tight fit in a cardboard box lined with tissue paper or a soft towel. But there are a number of other free or near-free accouterments you can give to your pet that will brighten her day. Here are five of them.

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• Increase Your Cat’s Clicker Training Success Rate
• Morsels
• Holiday Dangers Awaiting Your Cat That You Haven’t Thought Of
• But Does Your Cat 
Actually Need a Bath?
• How the Cat Nose Knows
• When Your Cat Keeps Eating Things That Aren’t Food
• 4 Ways to Act Proactively for Your Cat
• Dear Doctor

Like dogs, cats can learn tricks with clicker training. The sound of the clicker comes super fast, faster even than the short amount of time it takes for you to get a treat reward from your hand to a cat’s mouth for doing something right. In that way, the clicker lets your pet know that a treat is coming and keeps him motivated. There’s literally no time for his attention to wander. Here are some ways to optimize the training.

The rule of thumb for the number of litter boxes you should have is the number of cats in your home plus one. You’ll truly have a happier cat if you follow that advice. No cat enjoys using a dirty “toilet.” But what if you live in a small apartment or have a larger space but truly have no room for a second litter box?

Like people, cats have taste receptors for sweet, sour, salty, and bitter, and a fifth taste, umami. Their sweet receptors are pretty insensitive (which is why cats aren’t big sugar cravers). But it turns out their receptors for umami — responsible for the savory flavors of foods like meat — are quite sensitive. No surprise, since cats need flesh food to survive.

Your cat has been diagnosed with diabetes, but neither insulin injections nor weight management have been able to keep her blood sugar under control. Why not? Your pet may also have Cushing’s disease, a condition that causes an overproduction of the hormone cortisol. That, in turn, stimulates the production of sugar, working against efforts to keep down your cat’s blood sugar. Sometimes, in fact, Cushing’s disease causes  diabetes.

You know how cats like to knock things off counters and table edges? It’s for that reason that you should never place a holiday snow globe where your cat can get at it. If in her curiosity she keeps batting at the glass globe filled with snow-covered pine trees or Santa in his sleigh, it could fall and break — and she could end up licking the spilled liquid and becoming gravely ill. That’s because some snow globes contain ethylene glycol, the same odorless but sweet-tasting chemical that’s in antifreeze. It doesn’t take a lot to prove fatal.

Contrary to popular belief, there are cats who may actually enjoy being bathed occasionally, says Tufts veterinary dermatologist Ramón Almela, DVM. They like the water if it is applied soothingly. And they like the attention.

It turns out that cats have a much better sense of smell than we do, and not just because they have 40 times more odor sensors in their noses. It’s also about how air makes its way through the feline nose. Scientists have just figured out that when a cat breathes in, the air gets separated into two different flow streams.