Grooming Your Dog – The Basics

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Grooming your dog is an important part of the care of your pet as it ensures that their coat is kept in a good condition, provides mental stimulation and promotes a feeling of well being, which is especially important in pets that are unwell. The grooming process should ideally be introduced at a young age as part of habituation and socialisation.

The main reasons to groom your dog are:

• Cleanliness – grooming keeps the animal clean by removing dirt and discharge. Regular grooming also reduces the amount of fur deposited on furniture and carpets.
• Health and inspection – grooming helps to keep the coat clean, stimulates new hair growth, and prevents matting helping to avoid skin irritation. It allows you to conduct regular health checks allowing early recognition of health disorders and permits you to check for fleas as flea faeces can be seen in the coat on close examination. Flea infestations can be treated and prevented by Frontline for dogs and should be applied every two months. Frontline products are available at Viovet, but be sure to buy the correct size suitable for your dog.
• Appearance – this is usually the main reason owners groom their dogs, especially for pedigree breeds.
• Relationship and human contact – this is an important reason for grooming as it strengthens your bond and builds on the trust between you.

There are many grooming tools that all claim to do different things, however FURminator offer a variety of products to aid you in successfully grooming your dog. Their De-shedding tools remove up to 90% of loose hairs to prevent your dog moulting on clothing, furniture and floors and are available for all sizes of dogs. They also offer a variety of combs, brushes and shampoos for different fur types. FURminator products are also available at VioVet.

As a guide; dogs with long fur should ideally be groomed daily, dogs with medium length fur should be groomed once a week and dogs with short fur should be groomed at least once a month.