Newfoundland Grooming

About the Newfoundland

The Newfoundland carries an enormous, dense, oily double coat built for hauling nets out of the North Atlantic. It is genuinely water resistant, it insulates in both directions, and there is an extraordinary amount of it on a dog that can weigh a hundred and fifty pounds.

Nothing about grooming one is conceptually difficult. The coat follows exactly the same rules as a Pomeranian's. What changes everything is scale: a bath uses a remarkable quantity of water and shampoo, the rinse takes longer than the wash, and the dry runs into hours rather than minutes.

The practical problem with this breed is not technique. It is finding somebody with the table, the bath, the floor space and the half day to spare, and that is worth sorting out before you need it.

What a full groom involves

A half day, and often two people, and the reason is arithmetic rather than difficulty.

A full rake and brush out first, dry, working the ruff, the trousers, behind the ears and the feathering. On a coat that has been left, this stage alone can be an hour.

Then the bath, which takes real physical effort to work shampoo through to the skin, because the skin is the only part that matters and there is a great deal of coat in the way. The rinse takes longer than the wash: shampoo left in a dense undercoat irritates the skin and dulls the coat, and rinsing this much hair to genuinely clear water is slow.

Then the dry, which is the bottleneck and runs into hours. A high velocity dryer drives the water off and blasts the loosened undercoat out at the same time, and there is no shortcut. A Newfoundland sent home damp is a hot spot waiting to happen.

Then the deshed proper, the feathering and pads tidied, sanitary trim, ears and nails, which on a dog this size need proper tools.

How often, and what happens if you stretch it

Every six to eight weeks, which is more often than most double coated breeds, and the reason is that the consequences of falling behind scale with the dog.

The coat is dense enough and the dog large enough that a season of retained undercoat is a genuinely enormous amount of material, and retained undercoat is what mats. A Newfoundland left for six months does not come back with a slightly untidy coat; it comes back with felted trousers, a matted ruff and mats behind the ears that have to be cut out.

The other reason is the appointment itself. The gap between a maintained giant coat and a neglected one is measured in hours of extra work, and it is the difference between a salon that is glad to see you and one that quietly stops having availability. Salons that take giant breeds are a small set and worth keeping.

Between appointments, an undercoat rake for ten minutes every couple of days does more good than an hour once a month, and it is the single thing that keeps this manageable.

Drool, hot spots and the parts nobody plans for

The drool is not a joke and it is not cosmetic. Newfoundlands carry loose flews that hold saliva against the skin and the coat below the jaw. Left alone it turns the hair around the mouth and on the chest into a damp, stained, sour smelling mat and the skin underneath gets sore. Wipe it, dry it, and ask for the chest and jaw feathering to be kept short. It is the single most useful trim on this breed and the one owners never think to request.

Hot spots are the second, and this breed is a textbook candidate: a dog that loves water, an oily coat that holds it, and a dense undercoat that keeps the skin damp for hours. An acute moist dermatitis can go from nothing to a raw painful patch the size of a hand inside a day. Dry the dog properly after swimming, particularly the ruff and the base of the tail.

Then the ears, which are drop ears on a dog that swims.

And joints. Hip and elbow dysplasia are common in the breed, and a full groom asks the dog to stand for a long time on a hard surface. Tell the salon in advance if the dog is older or arthritic; splitting the bath and deshed from the rest across two visits is completely normal.

What moves the price

Size and drying time, which here are the same thing and dominate everything else. This is the most expensive routine appointment on the site and the reason is hours rather than skill.

Coat condition second, and on this breed it swings the bill more than on any other: a maintained coat is a long appointment, a neglected one is a much longer one that may need two people and may need a second visit.

Whether it is a coat blow, third.

And whether a second groomer is needed at all, which is a safety question as much as a speed one. A dog that leans, sits down or turns around at a hundred and forty pounds cannot be repositioned by one person without risk to both of them.

Booking ahead is worth something too. A salon fitting a half day into a schedule built around ninety minute appointments has limited slots, and the good ones fill.

What to tell your groomer

Call rather than book online, and lead with the breed and the weight. Ask three things: what their table is rated for, whether they have a walk in bath, and how long they block out. A salon that regularly takes giant breeds answers all three instantly.

Ask for a bath, a full deshed and a blow out, plus the jaw and chest feathering kept short for the drool. Do not ask for a shave down: it is a double coat and the same rules apply, and on a dog this size a clipped coat is a genuinely miserable outcome that takes a year or more to recover from.

Say if the dog is older, arthritic or post surgical, and be open to splitting the work across two visits.

Consider a mobile groomer, and ask specifically, because the answer varies. Some are excellent for giant breeds since the dog never leaves its own driveway. Others cannot take them, because a van has neither the floor space nor a table rated for the weight.

And feed lightly beforehand rather than heavily. Deep chested giant breeds carry a bloat risk and a full stomach plus several hours of handling is a combination worth avoiding.

Keeping the coat between grooms

Common Questions About the Newfoundland