Onychectomy, popularly known as declawing, is an operation to surgically remove an animal's claws by amputating all or part of the distal phalanges, the end bones of the animal's toes. Because the claw develops from germinal tissue within the third phalanx, amputation of the bone itself is necessary to fully remove the claw, so a more anatomically accurate description would be phalangectomy, excision of the toe bone.
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Onychectomy (Wikipedia)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onychectomy, lead sectionQuote, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onychectomy, lead section
Onychectomy, popularly known as declawing, is an operation to remove an animal's claws surgically by means of the amputation of all or part of the distal phalanges, or end bones, of the animal's toes.
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