Brussels Griffon Grooming

About the Brussels Griffon

The Wire Fox Terrier and Airedale pages both make the case for hand stripping a wire coat: pulling the dead jacket out at the root keeps the texture harsh and the color deep, while clipping cuts it off and the coat returns softer and paler each time.

A Brussels Griffon is the smallest common wire coat, and it carries an extra complication those breeds do not. The breed comes in two coat varieties, rough and smooth, and they appear in the same litter. The rough is a harsh wire coat that is hand stripped. The smooth is a short flat coat that needs a rubber mitt and nothing else.

They are the same breed with opposite grooming, and owners are frequently not told which one they have.

Which coat do you have, and why it matters so much

Rough and smooth Griffons come from the same parents. The smooth coat is recessive, so two rough coated parents can produce smooth puppies, and in some countries the smooth is treated as a separate breed under the name Petit Brabancon.

Telling them apart is easy once the puppy coat has come through, and impossible to guess from the name on a pedigree. A rough has a harsh, dense, slightly crinkly jacket and a full beard and mustache. A smooth has a short, flat, glossy coat, no beard, and a face that reads as much more Pug like.

The reason it matters is that the correct routine for one is the wrong routine for the other.

A rough coat needs stripping, either rolled through the year or in a full session every few months, and it needs weekly brushing to keep the beard and furnishings clear.

A smooth coat needs a rubber curry mitt once a week and a bath every couple of months. It sheds more than the rough does, seasonally and noticeably for such a small dog, and there is no stripping, no clipping and no trimming beyond pads and sanitary.

An owner told to book a full groom for a smooth Griffon is being sold something the dog does not need, and an owner of a rough who books a clip is quietly ruining the coat.

Hand stripping the rough coat

A wire coat grows in cycles. Each hair grows, dies and loosens in the follicle, and in a harsh coated breed it stays there rather than dropping out. Stripping is the act of pulling those dead hairs out at the root, either with finger and thumb or with a stripping knife used as a grip rather than a blade.

Done at the right point in the cycle it does not hurt: a dead hair in a loose follicle comes away easily. A live hair does not, and if it is a struggle then the coat is not ready. That is the test.

Two approaches. Rolling the coat means stripping a little regularly, every few weeks, taking whatever is loose so the jacket is always somewhere in the middle of its cycle. Stripping out means taking the whole jacket down in one session two or three times a year, after which the dog looks bare for a while and then comes back in full harsh coat.

Clipping is the alternative and it is a real choice rather than a crime, but it is not reversible in the short term. Clipping cuts the dead hair off and leaves the root in place, so the coat comes back softer, thinner and paler, and the red of a Griffon goes noticeably dull after a few clips. Once a coat has been clipped for a long time it may not strip properly again for a year or more.

For a companion dog whose owner does not care about texture, a clipped Griffon is comfortable and perfectly reasonable. Just decide knowingly.

Between sessions, brush weekly with a slicker and comb the furnishings, and keep the beard clean.

The beard, the face and the eyes

The rough coat comes with a full beard and mustache, and a beard on a small dog with a very short face is a permanently damp object.

It collects food and water at every meal, it holds saliva, and left alone it sours, smells and stains. Wipe it after meals and dry it, comb it through daily, and wash it more often than the rest of the dog. Keeping the hair immediately around the mouth trimmed shorter helps a great deal without changing the look much.

The eyes are the other constant. A Griffon has large, round, prominent dark eyes on a flat face, and the beard and eyebrow furnishings sit close to them. Hair rubbing on the eye surface causes irritation and eventually scarring, so keeping the furnishings above the eye trimmed clear is functional rather than cosmetic.

Nothing is sprayed toward the face. Eyes are wiped with a damp cloth outward and away.

As with every very prominent eyed toy breed, a Griffon is at risk of proptosis from trauma or from being gripped around the neck and head, and it should never be scruffed.

Squinting, pawing at an eye, cloudiness or a visible mark on the surface needs a veterinarian the same day.

A Griffon is brachycephalic, so the usual rules apply: no cage dryer, short cool sessions, and stop if the breathing becomes noisy or laboured.

Finding someone who strips, and what it costs

Hand stripping is a hand skill that takes time to learn and much longer to do than clipping, and a lot of salons no longer offer it. That is the practical constraint on keeping a rough Griffon in proper coat.

Ask directly whether the groomer hand strips, and on what schedule they would want the dog. A groomer who strips will usually prefer to roll the coat on a regular cycle rather than see the dog twice a year.

Expect it to cost more than a clip and to take longer, and expect to book further ahead.

If nobody within reach strips, the honest options are to learn to roll the coat yourself, which is very achievable on a dog this small and is how many owners do it, or to accept a clipped coat and its softer paler texture.

What is not a good outcome is a rough coat that is neither stripped nor clipped and simply left, because the dead jacket stays in place, the furnishings mat, and the dog ends up needing to be shaved down.

Whichever route, pads, nails, sanitary area, ears and the beard still need doing on the ordinary schedule.

What to tell your groomer

Say whether the dog is rough or smooth, because the two need opposite things and the name on the booking will not say.

For a rough, say whether you want it stripped or clipped, and understand that clipping softens and fades the coat over time.

Ask for the furnishings above the eyes kept clear of the eye surface, and the hair right around the mouth kept short.

Say no cage dryer, and no spray near the face.

Say the dog is never scruffed or held by the neck and head.

For a smooth, book a bath and tidy rather than a full groom, and say that the coat needs a rubber mitt and no clipping at all.

Keeping the coat between grooms

Common Questions About the Brussels Griffon