Text Transcript – Grooming Video

I’m Meredith Harman and this guy is Monroe. Today we’re going to talk about grooming the CCI way.

So, let’s get started!

With the grooming process, it’s not just a day at the spa. It has a lot to do with you reinforcing yourself as the dog’s pack leader physical benefits and grooming are making sure the eyes the teeth the ears and the coat are all in good condition. Regular brushing provides a good healthy coat. It also allows you to remove any sort of parasites like fleas or ticks off the dog’s body. Think about acclimating the dog to the grieving process as early as seven or eight weeks of age. One of the important things is to make sure that the dog is OK with all these different physical manipulations done by you. So just having your hand around the ear of the dog and inside the ear flap is great. Having your hand touching the pads and the paws of the dog in and out in between the toes. That makes the dog OK with nail trimming. So to set up your grooming routine, you want to check things on a daily basis. From the head down to the tippy-toe. Note any unusual odors, taking a big sniff of the ears when you open the flap. They’re getting a little sniff. And also check both ears. You don’t want to just check one and assume that both look the same because you can always have an ear infection in one and not the other.

Making sure that their mouth smells fairly good. You know it is a dog so you never know. Also the pads of the feet making sure that those don’t have any unusual odors in between the toes. It’s not uncommon for things to get stuck in there if you’re out walking or on a trail and then all the way to the back area to you want to make sure there are no unusual odors coming out of the back end of the dog either. Make sure they’re all healthy all over.

Good Boy.

One of the great things about grooming is acclimating the dog to the different tools that you’re going to be using. The first step with brushing the dog is using something like this. It’s a supple rubber brush and it’s good for going over the entire coat of the dog’s body. It will aggravate any of the sensitive spots like the elbows or the knees or the head. Go in circular motions and also clean it out periodically so you make sure it’s still doing what it needs to do. The second step you can use a shedding blade. And what this has are fine teeth on one side and even surface on the other. Definitely, want to go with the side with the teeth. This one is going to be just along the sides in the back of the dog because it could aggravate some of those sensitive spots like the elbows and the knees that grabs all the excess right off the surface of the coat. The third step is with this wire brush. This brush has wire bristles that are at a slant you apply pressure. So, you make sure you get all of that fur off that you’ve loosened up previously. And this can go all over the dog’s body as well.

Ask your vet whether you need to use all these various tools for your dog. Bathing is another example of something that is dependent on the breed of your dog. Here at CCI, we do things weekly or biweekly which include cleaning the ears, trimming the nails, brushing the teeth. We’re going to take a look at those now. Good boy. With the weekly or biweekly schedule.

We’re going to clean the ears. Take a piece of clean cotton, fold the flap over, do a little dip there into the ear canal. Not too far and you don’t want to be shoving any wax farther down.

Give the dogs here a good smell. Smells great.

You don’t want to have any yeasty smell or like a smell of dirty socks. Just make sure that the air flap is a nice pink hue and that there’s not a lot of heat coming off of the air either that’s also a sign of infection.

Good boy. You want to start early with introducing the dog to physical manipulation of the paws. Just holding the paw is going to get the dog used to you doing something with it and gradually introducing the nail clippers. This is an example of a good nail clipper just takes off to the tip of the nail and I want to stabilize the pad and the nail with my index finger and my thumb. So you’re making sure you have a good idea of where you’re trimming. And I’m going to come around and just take the tip off of Monroe’s nail.

Good boy! Good, good boy.

Now we’re going to talk about brushing the teeth. You want to make sure that you’re using appropriate toothpaste, however.  Unlike humans, dogs don’t spit this stuff. Beef flavored toothpaste is excellent. Lift the lip here of the dog and put the brush in.

Monroe is loving this. He’s getting a whole bunch of beef in his mouth right now. Then I going to switch to the other side.

I’m just lifting his nose a little bit so that I can have the teeth exposed, for the brushing.

That’s about it for the grooming process. Again, I always ask your vet if you have any questions about your particular pet dog and hope you had fun. Monroe did! For more tips for your extraordinary puppy go to www.puppystart.com/cci.