Cat Teeth

Pico was sleeping and I was looking at his teeth and noticed a very tiny tooth behind his canine teeth:

He is just now 9 months old and I wondered if it was a new tooth coming in - so I decided to look it up. And it is a normal size adult tooth called a premolar.

Cats have two sets of teeth during their lifetime. Their first set is called "milk teeth". These come in when kitten is about four weeks old and by six weeks they have the full set of 26 teeth. At about six months of age, these milk teeth will begin to fall out and be replaced by 30 permanent teeth.

Only about 10% of cats will go their whole lives without experiencing dental problems. It is a good idea to brush your cat's teeth to help prevent the build-up of tartar.

If you notice, the cat's molars are not flat and wide like ours. That's because a cat's teeth are designed for ripping meat; they don't do much chewing.