It's that time of year that our furry friends start shedding! Badly! What can you do to hasten the process? Give them a bath! The warm water help loosen the hair of their undercoat and promotes faster shedding. There won't be any less hair, but I promise, it will come out in a week, instead of 4 weeks! The key is to make sure you brush your dog every day for a week after he's had his bath. By the end of the week, he will have lost all his winter undercoat and he can now get on with the summer side of life!
But how do you properly wash your dog? Yes, there is a right way. I'm not a groomer but I have washed hundreds of dogs. As a matter of fact I'm about to wash Hawk to get him ready for the show on Mother's Day weekend!
The first thing you want to do is brush your dog. Get out any matts or clumps of mud before you start. Next, get everything you need beside the tub. Towels, shampoo, leash, hair dryer etc. Since I'm not as young as I used to be, I use the towels to kneel on when I bath the dog. If possible, have a shower head that you can turn on and off with a push button on the sprayer. This will save a lot of water while you are soaping the dog. The water should be warm but not too warm. A comfortable bath temperature for us would be much too hot for a dog. If your shampoo is condensed (most good shampoos are) be sure to have it ready to go in a container before your dog gets into the tub. If your dog is not appreciative of baths, I suggest you put a leash on her so she doesn't jump out of the bathtub. Hopefully, you've been desensitizing your dog to the bathtub prior to bathing by tossing toys and balls into the tub. This should make it easy to ask your dog to jump in.
Once inside, you should be able to turn the shower head on and it should already be at the right temperature. Start by allowing the dog to feel it on her feet and legs so it doesn't surprise her. Once she's used to it, start by wetting her all around her neck, then down her back and eventually her chest and belly. At this point you can stop the water and grab the shampoo. Now here's the important part that you may not know. Suds up her neck all the way around. Especially if you are using flea shampoo! If your dog happens to have little critters hitching a ride, the first thing they do is run upward! They run upward and then hide inside your dogs ears! GROSS! Poor dog! If you make a ring of water, then a ring of shampoo around her neck, it will prevent them from getting away. Bye bye critters!
Now it should be straight forward. Shampoo and rinse the rest of the dog. Be careful not to get any water in her ears or soap in her eyes. I wash their face with a wet face cloth to prevent problems. Once the dog is rinsed, then rinse again. Make sure that ALL the shampoo has been washed away or it could cause sores on your dog. And to stop your dog from shaking and getting you and your whole bathroom wet, stick your finger in her ear when she looks like she's about to shake. I think it just makes them think about something else. But it almost always works. Saves a lot of clean up time!
Once she's well rinsed, I close the shower curtain and let her shake. This saves on the amount of towels you need to dry her. Once she's finished shaking, I dry her with the first towel as she stands in the tub. Once most of the water is off, I allow her to jump out of the tub and dry her with the second towel. If you plan on using a dryer, make sure that you have desensitized her to it beforehand. If you've done that, you're well on your way to getting finished. It isn't necessary to blow dry them. I have often pinned a large towel on them and put them in a crate to finish drying. The towel prevents that extra fuzzy look they get after a bath. But some people like that so it's totally up to you! Be sure to keep your dog warm until she's completely dry. Depending on the kind of coat, this could take several hours. Just run your fingers through her coat to check for dampness before you let her outside.
And that's it! Good luck with your Spring time bath!
