Top Dog Grooming Tips

I was a professional dog groomer for twelve years. I worked with almost every breed with short hair and long hair. When I first started, most of the dogs were Miniature Schnauzers and Toy, Miniature, and Standard Poodles. Later Cocker Spaniels and Shih Tzu became the most popular breeds.

I have been training dogs for thirty years. For the best results, they should all be trained at least the basic commands like sit, lay down, stay, heel, come, and to walk on a leash as soon as possible when they are puppies. If you wait until they are adults to train them, it will be more difficult but not impossible.

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If you have a long haired dog, he or she must be brushed or combed every day. If you do not brush your dog, their hair will get tangled and matted and it is very painful for the dog. Then their hair will all have to be clipped or shaved off and that can be very painful for the dog to be clipped when their hair is matted into one piece. Short haired dogs should also be brushed to control their shedding. They only need to be brushed once every few days, if their hair will not tangle.

All dogs need to be bathed at least once a month or more, with shampoo that is made for dogs and warm water, whether they have long hair or short hair. Their toenails should be clipped at least once a month. If they are too long, the nail can grow into their foot and cause problems. The dogs skin should be checked for fleas, ticks, and other parasites. Their ears should also be checked and cleaned out. Good grooming will help to keep your dog healthy.

To trim and shape pet hair around the ears, legs, and feet.

It's important to trim your dog's toenails every month or two.

It's very important to brush the tangles and mats out of long haired dogs often, especially before a bath.

Dogs need to run and play for several hours every day.

My first dogs were our Australian Cattle Dogs or Blue Heelers that we had to work on our farm.

They are working dogs and they were too destructive in the city without farm work to do, so I got German Shepherd Dogs. They are working and herding dogs too, but they will do fine in the city if they get enough exercise and they are trained.

Some dog breeds are very stubborn and will resist being trained, like Dalmatians and Dachshunds. The smartest dog breeds like German Shepherds and Border Collies try to think on their own and do what they want to. They must be obedience trained to keep them from getting too dominant, when the dog tries to control everything and push people around, and then aggressive, when the dog becomes vicious.

All dogs need as much exercise every day and as much training as possible to prevent them from developing behavior problems. Almost all dog behavior problems can be cured by giving the dog enough of these two things, a lot of exercise every day and training to keep the dog from getting dominant and aggressive. It's a lot easier to start early when the dog is a puppy and prevent problems than to fix it later after problems develop.

Dogs need to be taught how to properly behave, even if they're just small pets. They don't just know what is expected of them.

Long leads work the best to safely teach the come and stay commands.

Dogs have been trained to help people in many ways, like police and military dogs that track criminals and people that are lost and use their nose to help people find things. Guide dogs for the blind used to be mostly German Shepherd Dogs, but now they are mostly Labrador Retrievers because the German Shepherd Dogs get too attached to one person and can't work with many different trainers and handlers as easy as some other dog breeds. There are dogs that alert deaf people to sounds. Any dog breed can be used for that if they have the ability, even small dogs like Miniature Poodles. Search and Rescue disaster dogs help to find people in natural and other disasters.