Last week’s 80-degree temperatures accelerated pet shedding and suddenly Richard and I are ankle-deep in Finian fur.

Finian is our Maine Coon cat. The breed is known for their splendid good looks, their large size and massive amounts of long, thick fur. The sloughing season has arrived.

Every room looks as if an army of giant dark, thick dust-bunnies has invaded. Finian’s fur loss has never been this profuse. Yesterday, there were so many dark fur clumps on our off-white living room carpet that it looked like a large Dalmatian had spread out, asleep on the floor.

In addition to the flat shingles of shedding that fall off our hairy boy, he is working at scratching off large quantities that resemble sports balls – golf, tennis, baseball, and yesterday, a softball in the kitchen. This morning, first thing, I plucked a round clump the size of a tennis ball off of Finian’s chin. I don’t even know if he knew it was there. And no, he doesn’t have fleas. He just normally does a little scratching as part of his constant bathing routine.

Finian is fastidious. He is devoted to his bathing ritual although he’s not particularly fussy where it takes place – the top of the living room sofa, his window perch in the kitchen, or at my feet in the middle of the night. Sometimes the rhythmic movements of his long licks wake me up. When I realize it’s just Old Fur-Tongue doing his thing, I drift right back to sleep.

What I don’t understand with all this coat coming off is why he doesn’t look thinner, less plush. The vet always comments, “Marcy, there’s not an awful lot of cat inside all this fur.” And he’s right. Now 5 years old, Finian weighs 12 pounds, but his heft looks more like 15. And yet, after a week into the Big Shed, he doesn’t look one bit thinner.

Yesterday morning in the kitchen, I picked up a white, wiry strand of – what?

Almost six inches long, it looked like a length of thick thread that had been heavily starched. Only when I noticed that one end was tapered did I realize that it was a Finian whisker. I’d never seen one unattached from its proper place. I found another one last night. I questioned whether he has something else going on rather than mere shedding, but the vet reassured me that spring has sprung, overall. I guess when daffodils come up, whiskers come down.

We are getting a fair amount of exercise picking up the fur balls throughout the house. And we have already picked up the other detritus of the molting process – upchucked hairballs. Actually, “hairball” is a misnomer. I wish they came up in ball shape, but they don’t. They resemble what comes out of the cat’s other end, in both shape and color, but they are just concentrated tubes of fur. It took me quite a while to assure myself of their content, but now I pick them up easily.

I remember a discussion at a party about cats and dogs. Some of the chat was about pet odors. The dog owners agreed that unless they are bathed, dogs easi can smell bad. Sorta doggy. But they all were adamant that cat odors are disgusting. Well, yes and no.

Cats themselves have no odor. Garrison Keillor, the author and entertainer, once said, “Cats smell so sweet – which is amazing when you consider that they are covered in 100% dried cat spit.” And he was absolutely right. You can bury your nose in a cat’s fur and smell – nothing. It’s what comes out of cats that stink. Just like what comes out of us. If a cat has a well-tended litter box, there is no cat odor.

My son’s dog, Walter, is a yellow Labrador. His actual hair color is English cream, which he generously spreads everywhere he goes. There is a running joke among Lab owners – that their dogs only shed twice a year; six months during the winter and six months during the summer. Walter is an Olympic-class shedder.

However, when he visits our house, his shedding isn’t horrible. The same off-white carpets that show every trace of dark cat fur, play host to Walt’s enormous amounts of off-white fur. No problemo. But if you’re wearing black pants? Sitting requires allowing time for a complete brush-down, when you stand up.

In the past few years, I have harbored hopes of owning a she-shed. What is happening now is not what I had in mind. Instead, I’m finding Finian’s spring-shed ritual everywhere.

If you’re looking for me, I’m not in the toolshed. I’m the one behind the self-filtering, bagless Sharp vacuum – scooping out the container for the third time today. Pushing this Sharp, this often, is a habit I want to shed.

Marcy O’Brien can be reached at Moby32@hotmail.com.