The purpose of this guide is three-fold.
First, to offer the novice basic information on the preliminaries of
grooming. These include coat conditioning, ear and nail care, and clipping.
The second purpose is to give the reader a clear and precise visualization of
the actual breed. Third, and I feel, most important, I present step-by-step
instructions for the grooming your of dog, along with information on the types
of equipment needed for the grooming of your breed, and explanations of
grooming terms.
The techniques I demonstrate here are the same theoretical and practical
techniques I used on 128 different breeds of dogs, in my twenty-five years of
teaching while an Associate of the world's largest grooming school, The New
York School of Dog Grooming. The school was the first grooming school in the
United States to be licensed by the State Education Department. It was also
the first grooming school to be accredited by the accrediting commission of
the National Association of Trade and Technical Schools in Washington, D.C.
I am a fully certified Instructor, Groomer, owner Director of the largest
teaching, grooming establishment in Montreal, Studio De Caniche Frontenac, and
graduated over 2,000 students trained to become professional all-breed dog
groomers who have gone on to become owners/operators of their own shops or
otherwise working in Veterinary Clinics or other animal health care facilities
around the country.
3. Brush the coat with a slicker brush to remove any mats and dead hair.
Comb through the coat after brushing until your comb slides easily through
every part of its coat.
4. Bathe and cage or fluff dry. [A table top portable dog dryer/blower can
be obtained at any pet supply store or ordered by catalog. It's one of the
best investments you will make.] Using a hair dryer used for people is unwise
and can damage and/or burn your dog's skin. Resist the temptation. Besides
which you need two hands to work. Trying to handle a hair dryer and
work on your dog's coat at the same time is extremely stressful for both you
and the dog.
5. Clip the hair from the rectum area [about half an inch on either side of
the rectum] with #10 blade. Never put the blade in direct contact with the
rectum.
6. Clip the hair from the stomach area [from the groin to the navel] with
#10 blade.
7. Scissor the between pads of the feet, flush with the pads. It is a good
time to check the condition of the pads and nail beds for signs of trouble.
8. Using a #5, #7 or #8-1/2 blade, clip from the base of the skull down the
back to the base of the tail.
9. Using a #5, #7 or #8-1/2 blade, clip down the sides of the neck to the
top of the shoulder [between the withers and the elbow].
10. Following the contours of the dog's body, clip over the entire back
using the top of the shoulder as your guideline. Use a #5 blade. [The dog when
being clipped has to be standing foursquare on a solid surface non-slip mat,
the table should be at least 36" from the floor - i.e. std. kitchen table -
and must be of a size for the dog to be able to turn around comfortably but
not so large that you have to lean
forward and inward as you groom him. With your dog on the table your
position is standing straight with very little stooping down towards the dog.
Bending down over your dog is unwise as it will eventually cause you a
lot of pain and suffering in your neck, shoulders and back leaving you with
chronic disabilities. It is easier to raise the dog to your level than
bending halfway down to groom him.
The correct position at this point in the process is for you to be standing
behind your dog looking straight down the center of his back towards the back
of his ears. This is the best angle from which to make a straight line with
your clippers and will be the your "cut in line" which acts as a ruler so as
to get a smooth, even finish.
Holding the clippers at a perpendicular angle to the dog's back, so that
the blade is barely skimming the surface of the coat, from the center point
below the occiput, clip using a smooth flowing angle all the way to the base
of the spine where the top of the tail begins.
11. Using a #5 blade, clip down the fore-chest just above the breastbone.
12. Using a #5 blade, clip the topside of the tail from the base to the
tip.
13. Clip the top half of the ears, inside and out, with a #7 blade.
14. Scissor around the outside edge of the top half of each ear giving them
a slightly rounded appearance.
15. The Westie head is never clipped with a clipper; thinning shears are
used to shape the head so that it is round in appearance when viewed from the
front. Thin the eyebrows slightly [awning shaped] with your thinning shears.
There is no definite division between the eyebrows. [By taping all your
scissors on the inside finger holes, the clicking noise your scissors makes as
you work will quiet this annoyance to your dog's sensitive ears and reduce his
stress level.]
16. Pluck any excess hair from under the eyes with your fingers.
17. Blend the hair into the body at the shoulder, hips, and fore-chest
using thinning shears, if necessary.
18. Scissor around the outside edges of the feet.
19. Scissor the tail from wide at the base to tapered at the end, leaving
the feathering underneath the tail alone. Using your thinning shears lightly
trim the underside to give a neat appearance.
20. Apply a Lanolin Coat Conditioner by first putting a small amount in
your hands and then rubbing it onto the coat. The West Highland White Terrier
should be bathed and groomed every six to eight weeks. The ears should be
cleaned weekly.
The nails should be checked monthly to see if they need clipping. They may
need clipping more frequently if your dog walks on a lot of broadloom
carpeting in the house, whereas for the pads and nails of any dog, pebbled
surfaces are best for wearing nails down naturally. Dew claws checked more
frequently.
SOME USEFUL SECRETS OF THE PROFESSIONAL DOG GROOMER
There is on the market some excellent dog grooming videos available if you
are reluctant to take a course from a state accredited trade school.
Never make a decision to groom your dog unless you are feeling
rested and relaxed and have installed yourself in a quiet area
where no one is likely to come in while you are working on your dog, unless
you need someone to assist you at some point in the process. Try to keep in
mind that grooming your own dog is not the same thing as grooming someone
else's pet. You have an emotional investment in your dog and your dog knows
this and could react in unusual and unexpected ways.
The order in which you groom each section of the dog is precise for
good reasons. It is a step-by-step process which is to be followed
in the order of presentation. There are no shortcuts. Before you begin,
make sure you have taken your dog for a good long walk so that your dog is
relaxed and not made nervous by having to relieve himself. Do not
feed your dog before a grooming session or you will have a dog who is unable
to stand still long enough for you to finish the job. Remember that these
grooming sessions should be pleasant, pleasurable and calming for the dog.
This is not torture. This is not a time to play games with your dog or to
excite him in any way that will distract him from what you are doing. You must
approach the work in a calm, deliberate and soothing manner speaking as little
as possible. Do not move your dog while he is in a standing position, you
are the one who moves around the dog on the table, not the other way around.
With your dog standing firmly on a solid non-slip surface, secured to a
grooming arm clamped onto your table, with the groomer's leather loop around
his neck, the dog will not be able to either suddenly sit, lie down or jump
off the table. Above all accidents are to be avoided.
When working with paws and limbs, never hyperextend any of his limbs
since over a period of years this can cause subluxation of either the patella
or hips and cause irreversible long term damage.Many a good pet dog has been
ruined by either picking the dog up by its forearms or stretching its front or
rear legs into unnatural positions. Proper technique is the key.
Invest in the best possible equipment you can afford. It will serve you
for a lifetime and cut your work in half the time.. While you do not need gold
plated scissors, some groomers actually do own spend that much money for the
top of the line equipment, you do not need it. Good ice-tempered
scissors manufactured by Solingen [a German manufacturer] make
excellent products, specializing in grooming equipment.
Never but never use your grooming equipment on anything else but your pet.
There is nothing more harmful to your pet than using a pair of scissors
somebody else has used to cut wrapping paper, cardboard, human hair, etc.
Groomng scissors are ground for the sole purpose of grooming animals. Once the
angle of the blade is ruined you might just as well throw them out. Do not
have your scissors or clipper blades serviced by anybody else than a
specialist in dog grooming equipment. They have the right tools and
experience to know how blades need to be sharpened.
Never but never attempt to use electric clippers or scissors on a dog's
dirty hair.
And yes, dog's have hair not fur. Bears have fur. Before even thinking of
using an electric clipper on your pet dog, it is good to consider:
It takes acquired skill and hundred of hours of practice and that those
clipper blades are shunting back and forth at a speed of anywhere from 1500 to
1700 revolutions per minute. Which translates into hot blades, which in turn
can burn your dog's skin which, while not fatal, is not comfortable for the
dog either. As soon as you feel the barrel of the clipper gets warm, turn it
off and either cool the blade down in a bowl of ice water or purchase the
specially formulated Oster Kool Lube.
Begin using your new Oster Electric Clipper on the back of your forearm
with
a #10 blade, turned off. This will assist you in learning to handle and
manipulate the
clipper and how to angle the blade so that it is lying almost flat against
your
skin. Hurry slowly and keep your fingers away from the blade when it is
turned on.
Once you feel comfortable that you can manipulate the clipper without
wrapping
yourself in a twisted tangled mess of the cord, and you are able to switch
angles
with ease, then and only then, should you attempt to use the clipper on a
live dog.
You can learn this quite easily within a couple of hours of practicing on
your own
arms. Oster includes a valuable booklet on the care and maintenance of your
new
clippers. Should you buy a second hand clipper, make sure that the booklet
comes with it and make sure to have the whole assembly checked by a
professional. They have replacement parts for every part of the assembly which
you can order from them if you should need to.
On the subject of keeping your clipper blades in proper functioning order.
Blades, made of forged stainless steel should last a lifetime for the
average
home pet groomer. They are very expensive. But since you will only be
needing
perhaps four or five in total, at topmost, you will render yourself a great
service
by buying excellent quality. Your blades needs cleaning out the hair left
between blades after every use, keeping them well oiled, having them sharpened
as often as needed depending on how often you use them, throwing out any blade
which has been accidentally broken and has missing teeth and replacing it
generally following the manufacturer's instructions which come with your Oster.
N.B.: It will come as a surprise as it affects female groomers in
particular, after
you have had a session clippering your dog, you will suffer the indignity
of intense itching in parts you didn't know existed as all the miniscule hairs
scattered by the clippers will attach themselves to your body like velcro.
This seems to affect women more than men for obvious thanks to anatomical
differences between men and women. After working on your dog for a couple of
hours, you will be hot and sweaty which is why these little hairs stick to you
in the first place. The only solution is to take a shower as soon as you are
completely done and have cleaned up your grooming area.
Never vacuum your grooming area until you are absolutely certain that no
blades, or other equipment, have fallen on the floor and are lying in a pile
of hair
on the floor. Many a professional groomer has paid heavily for the price of
losing both blade and vacuum cleaner hose by not sweeping instead of
vacuuming
first. You will have to do both unless you enjoy breathing hair particles
until....Forewarned is forearmed.
The numbers indicated on each Oster blade runs from #15 to number #4. The
higher the number the closer the cut. So that #15 is a surgical blade
used by veterinarians for
the most part. While the #4 blade is used primarily on German Shepherds,
some Cockers
and other longhaired hunting breeds and leaves a very long coat. Increments
of 1/2 are just that, blades with an "f" after the number indicate that this
is a finishing blade used to
smooth out rough edges left behind by either other blades or scissors.
I recommend purchasing, in descending order: #5, #7, #7f, #8-1/2, #10.
You may find this excessive, but here are the reasons behind them:
The three blades you are most often going to be using are #10, #5 and #7.
The two others, #7f (finishing blade) and number #8-1/2. A finishing blade can
considerably
cut down on the amount of scissoring you will have to do and do a much
smoother job.
The #8-1/2 leaves the dog's coat a little longer for wintertime when your
dog will require more coat to protect it from inclement weather. So that would
leave you using #5 and #7 for summertime when you will want a more comfortable
shorter coat while still giving
your dog protection from the heat of the sun.
As soon as you have finished doing you dog and you have taken your shower,
feed, water, walk you dog immediately. Grooming is stressful on both dog
and owner.
Your dog will be thirsty, hungry and want to relieve himself. Be kind. The
fresh air will also relieve your own stress. Be kind to yourself as well.
A note about dog hair. Try and think of your dog as having the perfect
weather
system built right into its genes. The dog's coat has both a built-in duvet
in
winter and a perfect air conditioning system in summer. It takes less than
1 minute for your dog to adjust to fluctuations in a variety of climates.
Removing a dog's hair
for no logical reason than our own personal biological bias is not
following nature's own rules of adaptation. It's ill conceived on our part.
In the summer you observe FiFi panting away while you yourself are sweating
under
the heat, humidity, and blazing sun of summer. But why is FiFi panting,
even
drooling? The answer lies in FiFi's internal clock, she is panting because
dogs do not have sweat glands as we do. They do not "perspire" through the
skin in their
bodies as we do. FiFi with her tongue hanging out is dissipating heat
through her
tongue which is what all dogs share in common. Dogs sweat through their
tongues
and the pads of their feet. Another way of looking at it is: FiFi and Fido
are "letting
off steam" and thereby are cooling themselves down. This is as it should
be, if you are a dog. In summertime, if you observe your dog very carefully,
you will take notice that when your dog goes outside it's hair will "stand
away" from it's body
which then allows cool air to flow through the hair on its body thus
creating an
built-in air conditioner. Nature is very clever. Too bad evolution has not
been as
kind to humans and we have very little body hair in comparison to mammals
and so we boil away in discomfort, believing that if we feel awful, FiFi and
Fido must feel worse. Not so. When you remove a dog's natural air conditioning
by removing most of its coat you are actually creating an imbalance in the
dog's system and forcing it to work harder at keeping cool. It becomes a
vicious circle. All mammals
instinctively searching out the coolest place it can lie down in when it is
feeling too hot. You've seen your dog do this a hundred times at least. Let
it be.
If you could you would join him. But we are not dogs so that would not be
very
practical, but you could "imitate" his natural behavior and follow his lead
and
do as he does and follow him to where his coolest spot is.
In wintertime the whole process is put in reverse. When you take your dog
out
into the cold winter air, if you observe carefully, you will immediately
notice
that your dog's hair suddenly puffs up and again stands away from it's
body.
It takes approximately 3 seconds for an adult dog to go from hot (in the
house) to outdoors (in a heavy snow storm) without any ill effect whatsoever.
That's because
our dogs begin to shed their summer coats beginning in late June early July
and
gain their full winter coats mid October-December. The dog, in effect, is
wearing
a brand new duvet (down) winter coat which protects it from the coldest of
cold
weather when the outside temperature reaches -30C. A very efficient and
effective
system. When you remove too much hair from your dog's coat, you are
removing
it's heating system. Warm air circulates through that coat and it is a
disservice
to clip any breed of dog to be unnaturally short. Putting a fancy snowsuit,
sweater,
coat of any kind on any breed of dog other than hairless dogs is unkind.
It's cute, but it's still a disservice and shortsighted.
So, unless your dog happens to fall into a vat of tar, or you have
neglected to brush and comb him to rid him of grease, grime, dirt, sand, mud,
whatever else he may bring home
and do so at least twice a week, then there is no logical earthly reason to
try to improve on God's original design is there? In the animal kingdom form
follows function and not the other way around. We are all victims of "current
fashion" whether it be for ourselves or for our pets. This is not to say that
there is anything intrinsically wrong with wanting
our beloved pets to be part of all this fun and play dress-up so long as we
keep it in check and do not begin identifying with our dogs rather than
understanding and respecting their function. FiFi and Fido could care less
what they look like, after all they certainly don't laugh at us and think it's
cute when we do all the things we do to ourselves to change how God created us
to be.
I purposely have not covered stripping knives, duplex dressers, dental
scalers because
from personal experience I have learned that these items are best left in
the hands of
professionally trained and experienced groomers; improperly misused these
tools in the hands of a novice can cause untold pain and suffering as they
require considerable skill and knowledge beyond the scope of the average dog
owner.
As to the astonishing number of shampoos and conditioners currently on the
market, a lot of them are sheer nonsense. What I do recommend to all my
customers is purchasing one basic kind of shampoo made specifically for dogs
is pure lanolin paste which can be purchased in pet supply houses, most chain
store pet shops and through most dog grooming shops. It is the purest form of
soap, is non-perfumed is tasteless, odorless and low sudsing and requires only
a small dab on your finger tips to give your dog a perfect coat leaving it
squeaky clean and easily rinsed out. A coat conditioner is fine and makes for
a fine finish. If you are using the lanolin paste, you may dispense with the
conditioner. It is unwise to use shampoo designed for human beings as the Ph
balance is never correct. Not even Johnson's & Johnson's baby shampoo will do.
Avoid the temptation. That pure lanolin paste comes in a large container
and should last you for a good year, if not more, if you have only one dog. A
word about using electric clippers on the Terrier Class of dogs: over time the
"shredded wheat" harsh to the touch quality of your terrier will become soft
and limp, which explains why I never use electric clippers on any terrier. But
I do understand the need or necessity of the average pet owner to use clippers
as long as you understand the long term consequences to your dog's
coat.
I trust that you will never do the unpardonable and disastrous error of
trying to do things backwards and instead begin with doing what is referred to
as "roughing in":
Which is to say, clear excess hair from inside the ears first, then clip
nails, then proceed with untangling, thoroughly brushing, and finally
thoroughly combing your dog before moving to the bathtub.
Regarding bathing your dog: Always place a rubber bathmat on the bottom of
the tub, secure your dog while he is in the bathtub which you can do in either
one of two ways: using a short leash and a collar, wrap the leash around the
handle of the soap dish until you have approximately a foot length of leash
hanging loose enough
so that you can turn your dog around comfortably while using a shower
attachment you can purchase in any pharmacy. Do not forget to insert a cotton
ball which has been tipped with vaseline into your dog's ears before you turn
on the water. Water that gets into your dog's ears can cause some serious
bacterial infections and permanently deafen your dog's hearing requiring some
very expensive surgery to
open the blocked inner ear canal. The water temperature should be lukewarm,
which you will test on the inner side of your wrist, before turning the hose
on the dog. Thoroughly rinse out the soap in your dog's coat, as soapy hair
will not only cause problems with your dog's skin but completely ruin your
clipper blades in very short order. If the dog's hair squeaks when you gently
run it through your fingers, it is clean and ready for blow drying.
A FINAL WORD:
In the beginning, God created the Heaven and the Earth. Man, a bit
later, created the fable that "the dog, when he understands, always wants to
please."
The dog, the world's first opportunist, in some ways knowing more of man
than man knew of him, sensed and endorsed this delightful state and was so
constant and clever in his
professions as to give man scant time to review this theory. Through
generations the dog worked his wiles, sincere in his faith and devotion, but
seeing no harm in throwing man an occasional herring, and in withholding
respect from these loved ones whom he so easily bested in every battle of
wits. So effective has been this strategy that to this day of mass
communication, much has been written which has profitably catered to those who
believe that they can own a dog while holding him accountable only for those
actions they approve, and write off his transgressions with, "He didn't
understand - he really wants to please." Mythology aside, dogs do not
"always want to please." But that is another subject for another time to
debunk.
I know that if you follow these instructions, step by step by step, you
will soon acquire a level of skill and knowledge and add your own "tricks of
the trade" and become a proficient groomer. You may even arrive at a point
where you may want to go further and perhaps take a course from a state
licensed grooming school to further your knowledge or even become a
professional dog groomer or offer to groom your family, friends or
acquaintances dogs in your neighborhood which you will soon learn will help
defray all of your basic expenses in equipping yourself with the best
equipment and supplies you can afford.
? Gwen "Sissy" Labelle
Studio de Caniche Frontenac
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