Grooming Working Group

What these breeds have in common

The Working Group holds the breeds developed for size and strength: guardians, sled dogs, draft animals and rescue dogs. Newfoundlands, Bernese Mountain Dogs, Saint Bernards, Siberian Huskies, Alaskan Malamutes, Great Pyrenees, Rottweilers, Dobermans, Boxers, Great Danes and Mastiffs.

Grooming these dogs is mostly an exercise in scale. There is nothing conceptually difficult about a Newfoundland coat: it is a double coat and the rules are the same as for a Pomeranian. There is simply an enormous amount of it, on an animal that cannot be lifted, and everything takes hours instead of minutes.

That is why this group is where salons start declining bookings, and it is worth knowing before you need one.

A coat blow at this size is a different order of event

Twice a year the northern breeds in this group shed their undercoat in bulk. On a Husky or a Malamute this is genuinely startling the first time: the coat comes out in sheets and clumps rather than drifting, it lasts two to four weeks, and a single dog produces a volume of hair that fills a large bin.

The answer is a proper deshedding appointment rather than more brushing at home. A bath in a shampoo that swells and lifts the undercoat, conditioner to help it release, then a high velocity dryer used to blast the loosened hair out while it dries. The dryer does most of the work and is the piece of equipment an owner does not have.

Book it when the blow starts rather than after it finishes, and consider booking twice through it. Between appointments, an undercoat rake used for a few minutes at a time does more good than a long session once a fortnight.

None of these coats is clipped, ever, including in summer. See the double coat page for why a summer shave down makes a northern breed hotter rather than cooler.