Spinone Italiano Grooming

About the Spinone Italiano

A large Italian pointing gundog with a coat built for brambles and cold water: harsh, dense, wiry and about an inch and a half to two and a half inches long, lying flat, with no undercoat.

No undercoat is the useful detail. It means the coat sheds moderately rather than heavily, it does not felt the way a Bouvier does, and a weekly brush genuinely keeps it.

What it does have is furnishings: prominent tousled eyebrows and a full beard, both softer than the jacket, and both a real job.

The beard on a Spinone is famous. It holds water, it drips across a room after every drink, and owners describe it as the defining feature of living with the breed. It is also the part that goes wrong if it is not cleaned.

A harsh coat with nothing underneath it

The jacket is harsh, dense and wiry, lying flat rather than standing off, and there is no undercoat at all. That single fact makes this one of the easier harsh coats on the site.

Brush weekly with a slicker or a stiff bristle brush and comb the furnishings. Matting is a moderate risk confined to the beard, behind the ears, the armpits and the feathering on the legs.

Twice a year or so the dead coat needs plucking out by hand, which keeps the texture harsh and the color clear. It is a lighter job than stripping a terrier: going over the dog and taking what has loosened, rather than taking the whole jacket down.

Clipping is the thing to avoid. It cuts the hair off and leaves the root, the coat comes back softer and thinner, and on a working gundog it removes genuine protection from brambles and cold water. It also grows back unevenly, which shows badly on a coat this length.

Trimming is functional: pads, sanitary area, and tidying the hair around the ear openings.

Bathe every ten weeks or so. Over-bathing softens a harsh coat and this one sheds mud well when dry.

The beard, and the water it carries

The beard is large, soft and absorbent, and it is the single biggest practical fact about the breed.

It goes fully into the water bowl at every drink, comes out loaded, and then drips across whatever the dog walks over next. Spinone owners keep towels by the bowl as a matter of course, and it is worth knowing before taking one on.

For grooming, the problem is that a permanently damp beard sours, smells, stains rust brown and eventually leaves the skin under the chin red and sore.

Comb it through daily, wipe and dry it after every meal and drink, and wash it far more often than you bathe the dog. Rinsing it daily is entirely reasonable.

A shallow wide bowl helps considerably. Some owners use bowls designed to keep a beard out of the water and they do work.

Trimming the hair immediately around the mouth shorter reduces it noticeably without changing the look, since the beard shape comes from the sides and the chin.

A beard that still smells after washing, or skin under the chin that is red or losing hair, is a skin infection and needs a veterinarian.

Ears, eyes and the working dog

The ears are long, low set and moderately feathered drop ears on a dog that works in wet cover and swims, which is the standard recipe for trouble.

Lift weekly, look and smell. Keep the hair around the opening trimmed, and dry the ears after every bath, swim and wet walk.

The eyebrows are prominent and tousled and are part of the breed's look, so they are tidied rather than removed. Hair actually resting on the eye surface should be kept clear, since it irritates and eventually scars.

Spinoni have somewhat loose lower eyelids, less pronounced than a Clumber but enough that the eye collects debris, so wipe the eye area regularly and check after work in cover.

Check the feet after walks. A working gundog in cover collects grass seeds that burrow between the toes and abscess.

Deep chested, so bloat is a risk: no large meal around an appointment, and unproductive retching with a swollen abdomen is an emergency.

Nails every three to four weeks.

A patient dog, and a rare one

Spinoni are famously gentle, patient and slow to take offense, and they are among the easier large breeds to handle at a salon. Many are described as almost comically laid back.

That is worth using. A dog this size that stands quietly is a straightforward appointment, and there is no reason for one to be an ordeal.

They are also uncommon outside Italy and the United Kingdom, so many groomers will not have handled one and may reach for clippers by default on a coat this length.

Say what you want clearly and bring a photograph if you can: harsh coat plucked or left, beard cleaned and tidied around the mouth, eyebrows kept, ear openings clear, pads and sanitary trimmed, and no body clip.

They are slow maturing and stay puppyish for a long time, so early handling pays off across a long adolescence.

Check the skin under the coat while brushing, since a harsh flat coat hides scratches from cover better than you would expect.

What to tell your groomer

Say the coat is harsh with no undercoat, plucked rather than clipped, and that clipping softens it permanently.

Ask for the beard washed, dried and the hair right around the mouth kept short.

Ask for the eyebrows tidied but kept, and clear of the eye surface.

Ask for the ear openings kept clear and the ears dried and checked.

Ask for pads and sanitary trimmed and nothing else cut, and expect them not to have met the breed.

Say not to feed the dog around the appointment because of bloat risk.

Keeping the coat between grooms

Common Questions About the Spinone Italiano