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Thursday, February 28, 2008
My dogs, not a groundhog, tell me when spring’s coming
I do not need a Groundhog to tell me when spring will come. My dogs let me know - by shedding. It seems about a week ago the fur seemed to just start jumping off of them. I have increased their brushings and I have increased the use of my vacuum. The fur is everywhere. Fur tumbleweeds gently roll across my floors and I have lost count of the number of lint roller rolls I have gone through.
Although the vernal equinox marks the start of Spring on March 20 this year, the meteorological start of spring is March 1, and my dogs seem to know that.
As I brush my Corgi/Chow mix Lexi every other day, I am amazed at how much fur comes off that dog. I am shocked she still has any fur left! I think the fur I have brushed out of her in a week would be the equivalent of a whole other dog. We will be moving to daily brushings this weekend.
Hannah, the Beagle/Bassett mix, is not as bad, but I have still had to increase the amount I brush her.
I use three different brush types when brushing my dogs. My favorite is the Kong Zoom Groom. It is a rubber-nubbed brush that really seems to grab the loose fur and pull it out from the coat. It doesn’t hurt the dogs and does just pull the loose fur. The Zoom Broom is also good to use in the bath to lather up the dogs. I follow the Zoom Broom up to actually collect the fur that is pulled out with a wire-bristle slicker brush. The slicker brush also gets the undercoat around Lexi’s hind quarters. Finally on Lexi I use the natural bristle side of my two-side finishing brush to catch any last loose fur on top of her coat.
I use the Zoom Broom first on Hannah then switch to the finishing brush on her. I don’t need the wire-bristle brush on her because her coat is short.
I purchased a ShedEnder last week at Rite Aid, but have only used it halfheartedly once. The dogs seemed a little afraid of it for some reason. I’ll try sneaking it in when we are in the middle of grooming instead of just using it. Maybe they won’t notice it then.
I have tried this rubber “glove” before, but I couldn’t control it very well. The dogs were more interested in smelling it than letting me groom them.
Happy grooming to all the owners of shedding dogs out there. It looks like it’s going to be a long, fur-flying spring!
