hi

I have 2 dogs - one is a thick furred hairball, and 1 is fine haired... our regular groomer has had a baby and not taking bookings at the mo, and we've not found anyone decent since

How easy is it to tackle this ourselves? I'm on about full clippers / cutting, not just brush and comb, I'm not that lazy!

One of our dogs is very stressy and doesn't like being groomed and I know the groomers don't have an easy time with him...

any thoughts please?

p.s... I used clippers once on my husband's hair ... he ended up with baldy patches!!

Hi, I used to clipper my old english sheepdog and it was really ok. He was a good boy and tolerated grooming very well though so I had no problems from that point of view. The only thing I would say is tricky is the ears and round the butt (etc) areas. If you have a go and make a bit of a mess of it it wouldn't really matter as the fur grows back pretty quickly and the shame would only be there for all to see for a couple of weeks at most . Once you've done it once you will have more confidence next time and as you go on you will probably get quite good at it .

Not sure what to advise on the stressed out dog apart from maybe just get the clippers out and switch them on from time to time so he gets used to the noise before you even try to clipper him. Or brush him only with the clippers just switched on nearby at first so he gets accustomed to it? It may take a while though...I'm sure others here will have better ideas though .

Depends very much on the dog as to how easy it is. Duncan is fantastic and loves being clippered, we find clippers safer than scissors and after a week or so the hair do never looks as bad as it did the first day we did it

Clipping is easy. Clipping well........

But it does grow back!!

All three of mine we apprehensive of the clippers. We gradually desensitised them. They were all good with brushing, so we started brushing with the clippers on the table - turned off. No reaction - treat. Clippers in hand while brushing - treat. Brush clipper over them - no pulling back, treat. Turn clipper on with OH holding at some distance - treat and so on moving closer until a tiny clip - then treat and praise if they were good. Eventially, clipping everywhere and treating.

If at any point they were unhappy, we went back a stage.

We are now at the point that if I get the clippers out they all come running to have their hair ruined

Isn't it a good job that dogs aren't vain.

Well I'm pretty sure Duncan has blushed and been embarrassed when he sees the other dogs laughing at him on his first few walks after a clippering