Standard Schnauzer Grooming

About the Standard Schnauzer

The Standard is the original that the Miniature and the Giant were both bred from: a German farm dog used for ratting, guarding and hauling.

The coat construction is identical in all three. A harsh, dense, wiry jacket that sheds almost nothing and rarely mats, plus soft longer furnishings on the legs and a full beard and eyebrows that mat readily.

What changes with size is the decision, not the coat. Hand stripping a Miniature is an evening on your lap. A Giant is a project, which is why most Giants are clipped.

A Standard sits in the middle, and it is the size at which stripping is still a realistic thing for an owner to keep up with.

Three sizes, one coat, and how the answer shifts

All three schnauzers carry the same construction, so the coat advice transfers freely between them. What does not transfer is the practicality.

Stripping a Miniature is genuinely achievable at home: a twelve pound dog on your lap, a stripping knife, half an hour every few weeks.

Stripping a Standard is a longer session but still realistic, and rolling the coat a little every few weeks keeps it manageable. Plenty of Standard owners do it themselves.

Stripping a Giant is a serious undertaking, which is why the great majority are clipped and why that page spends its time on the trade rather than the technique.

The cost of clipping is the same at every size and it accumulates: the harsh outer hair is cut rather than removed, the soft undercoat comes to dominate, and the salt and pepper goes progressively duller and softer. A soft jacket then mats where the harsh one did not.

Neither is wrong for a companion dog. Ask a groomer directly which they do before booking, because that decides what your dog's coat becomes over the next few years.

The furnishings, which are the actual work

The jacket is the easy part. It sheds little, rarely mats, and brushing it achieves almost nothing.

The furnishings are a different coat: soft, longer hair on the legs, the chest, the beard and the eyebrows, and they mat readily.

Comb them through every two or three days with a metal comb, working to the skin. The reliable failure points are the beard, the backs of the front legs, the insides of the thighs, the armpits and the chest between the front legs.

This is where Standard Schnauzers arrive at a salon matted with owners who report brushing regularly. They brushed the jacket.

A schnauzer is an active outdoor dog, and wet furnishings put away damp will felt within a day. Dry the legs after wet walks.

Keep the hair between the pads cleared, since a working foot collects grit and mats there.

The furnishings need scissoring and thinning at every groom whichever route you take with the jacket, to keep the leggy columnar look the breed is meant to have.

The beard, and the water bowl

A schnauzer beard is the breed's signature and a daily job, and on a Standard there is a substantial amount of it.

It goes into the water bowl at every drink and the food at every meal, and because the hair around the mouth is soft rather than harsh, it soaks and holds. Left alone it sours, smells, stains rust brown around the mouth and leaves the skin under the chin red and sore.

Comb it daily, wipe and dry it after meals and drinks, and wash it far more often than you bathe the dog. Rinsing the beard daily is entirely reasonable.

A shallow wide bowl helps more than anything else, since deep narrow bowls submerge the whole beard at every drink.

Trimming the hair immediately around the mouth shorter reduces the problem noticeably without changing the look, because the beard shape comes from the sides and the chin rather than the lip line.

The eyebrows want keeping clear of the eye surface rather than cut off, since hair resting on the cornea irritates and scars it.

A beard that still smells after washing needs a veterinarian rather than more shampoo.

A robust working dog

Standard Schnauzers are lively, confident, intelligent farm dogs, and they are notably robust: the breed is one of the healthier medium sized dogs and frequently lives thirteen to sixteen years.

They are also opinionated and quick to decide things, so handling has to be established in puppyhood rather than negotiated later.

Groom at home constantly from the start so standing, feet held, ears looked at and clippers running are entirely ordinary.

Keep the six to eight week appointment. Almost every serious coat problem in the schnauzers starts with an interval that quietly stretched over a winter.

Nails every three to four weeks, teeth daily.

Ears are small folded drop ears in countries where cropping is banned, and erect where it is not. A natural folded ear needs the ordinary weekly lift, look and smell.

Check the dog over after walks in cover, since a schnauzer with leg furnishings collects burrs and grass seeds.

What to tell your groomer

Ask whether they hand strip before you book, since it decides what the coat becomes.

Say whether you want the jacket rolled, stripped out or clipped, and understand that clipping softens and dulls it permanently.

Say the furnishings are the priority: legs, chest, armpits and beard combed to the skin, not just the jacket.

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

Ask for the eyebrows kept clear of the eye rather than removed.

Book the next appointment before you leave, on six to eight weeks.

Keeping the coat between grooms

Common Questions About the Standard Schnauzer