Grooming is not just about maintaining your dog’s level of cleanliness, and it is not just about keeping your dog good-looking. Grooming is about maintaining both your dog’s physical health as well as it’s appearance.
In general terms, a clean pet is a happy pet. No hair in the eyes, clean fur and skin, clipped nails cleaned ears all make for a pet that is comfortable and better behaved.
Benefits of pet grooming include:
A pet that looks and smells nice all the time, plus your best friend will be free from discomfort, feel great and behave well.
Easy vet checks as your pet will be more comfortable and used to being handled, especially around the face, feet and tail. Less stress for all involved!
Increased sociability as grooming becomes a positive experience and easy for both you or your groomer and your pet.
Brushing, is beneficial for all kinds of dogs no matter what breed they are, helping to remove dead hair, dirt, and dandruff. Regular brushing also helps to bring out the natural oils in the dog’s fur. As you brush, the natural oils are spread all over your puppy’s fur giving the coat a healthy sheen.
Another benefit of grooming is that it allows you to check your dog for any abnormalities. This includes skin problems such as ticks, fleas and dry patches, or issues with their nails, teeth, ears, and eyes such as infection or inflammation. When found at an early stage, these problems can be treated right away, before they have a chance to become more serious.
But adverse, serious side effects occur when we neglect to groom our pets. If we don’t tend to our pet’s grooming needs on a regular basis, we encourage a variety of issues which can lead to expensive vet bills and difficult or even aggressive behaviour from your pet.
Matting of the hair can be painful and cause many skin conditions. Severe matting restricts blood flow, pulling tightly on a pet’s skin and making a simple pat painful and can load your pet with extra weight.
Overgrown nails can be very painful, with long nails growing into the paw pads and causing infection. Long nails can cause your pet’s toes to bend and create a walking disfigurement.
Double coating from irregular brushing leads to extra coating, causing your pet to suffer heat stress.
Puppies need to be groomed. While many believe it is better for your dog to wait until it is at least 6 months old, the truth is that earlier is usually better. It is recommended that your dog receive its first groom between 12 – 16 weeks. whenever it is done with its vaccinations, with nail trimming as early as 2 weeks for both puppies and kittens.
The very first grooming appointment is an introduction to the puppy and the owner to the world of grooming. The puppy will be introduced to a bath, blow drying, nail clipping, and slight trimming. We do not recommend that a puppy receive a full hair cut on their first time being groomed. The reason behind this is to introduce the puppy to grooming. Having a puppy stand still and be handled for 1.5 hours on its first grooming session, would likely taint further grooming sessions due to the negative experience. This is a lot to ask of a puppy. That is why we only do the basics for puppies first groom. We bathe them, slowly dry them, trim the nails, trim the fur from around their eyes, pads, and around the sanitary area. This is about all they can handle. The puppy will be introduced to having scissors around the face, having to hold still while the pads on their feet are trimmed. Depending on how the puppy reacts to the first grooming we may recommend doing this type of trimming one more time before the full haircut. The more comfortable the puppy becomes with being handled by the groomer and being on a table, and in the tub the better the puppy will become as they grow up.
This is especially important for long-haired dogs, which require more intense grooming sessions as compared to short-haired dogs. It takes more time to brush their long fur and they need to get used to staying still for this starting at an early age. That is not to say dogs with short, clipped fur do not require grooming.
Grooming can be a scary experience for puppies.Training your pet to love the groomer is much easier when you start early to that make the process less frightening for your furbaby. If you wait too long to begin the grooming, your puppy may not be agreeable to it later on, especially when it comes to ear cleaning and nail clipping.
How Can I Help?
If you want to help your pet feel safe and secure at the groomer, there are strategies you can implement yourself that will help the groomer care for your companion. These include:
Brush Often – Gentle brushing can prep your puppy for the grooming experience.
Play with Paws – Playing with your puppy’s paws will prepare them for the groomer’s handling.
Socialise – The more experience your puppy has with strangers, the more relaxed they will be.
You should also minimise dramatic drop-offs. When leaving your puppy with a groomer for the first time, try to avoid the fear and excitement of long goodbyes. Hand your puppy over to the groomer in a calm and collected way, so that your doggy doesn’t feel empty and frightened when you leave.