First attempt at grooming!

[parmelbe]

Now that Betsy's finished recovering from her surgery I decided to give stripping/rolling her coat a try. I only did the head because it looks like someone clipped her jacket pretty short before we adopted her. I could tell that her head was starting to get overgrown and uncomfortable for her. I pulled for about an hour and followed up with a bath to get the extra hair out and clean up her old incision area and private areas. 

 

It was tough to find similar photos for before and after, but here goes:

 

Before (she had to wear the t-shirt so she wouldn't scratch at her stitches):

IMG_3736 by Brendon Parmelee, on Flickr

 

After:

IMG_3766 by Brendon Parmelee, on Flickr

 

I think I did a decent job of thinning out the layers on the top and the puffy stuff on the sides. Her eyes and ears got cleaned up, too. 

[sanford]

Amazing! You did a remarkable job. Do you make house calls?

Edited September 13, 2015 by sanford

[hheldorfer]

She's beautiful!

[Hillscreek]

Pretty girl!

[parmelbe]

IMG_3767 by Brendon Parmelee, on Flickr

 

Better picture?

[Autumn & Lola]

She's adorable. You did a great job!

[hheldorfer]

Completely off topic but I have to know:  Is that a laminate or wood floor?  It's very nice!

[parmelbe]

Thanks! Hardwood, but probably nothing too fancy. We rent. Wood floors were one of our major apartment search criteria. 

 

Betsy-related note: she gets really fussy about having the fur on the bottoms of her feet trimmed, so she slides around on these floors like crazy. 

Edited September 14, 2015 by parmelbe

[sanford]

Good (renting) choice... The floor is indeed beautiful and does justice to Betsy's glamour shot! 

 

Ditto for Ruffy sliding around on floor. Like Betsy, he resists having his feet trimmed, so I gave up trying to use scissors for this task.   Too dangerous with him squirming and thrashing, so I use a small electric trimmer instead. He doesn't like it any better, but I'm more relaxed knowing it won't cut his pad! Amazing to realize that with cairns, a small task like this is actually a 2-person job! 

 

As an aside -- I noticed your album of Gotterdammerung on the shelf in the photo. Ruffy and I are Wagner fans; I assume you and Betsy are too. Hmmm... I wonder if admirers of cairns and liking Wagner's music go together. Is this perhaps worthy of a poll? Nah... probably not.

[Hillscreek]

I noticed the record too being a classical music fan.

I know, we are supposed to concentrate on cairn Betsy but can't help noticing the lovely floor and interesting music. 

And coming to Betsy, it's a perfect environment for a good looking cairn

[hheldorfer]

Yes, we examine everything very closely around here. 

 

We have hardwood floors too.  Buffy often "skates" until she hits one of the area rugs, where she regains traction and launches  herself into another slide across the floor.  I need to remember to trim her paw hair the next time I brush her.

 

P.S.  Wagner somehow seems appropriate music for Cairns.  Very dramatic.

Edited September 14, 2015 by hheldorfer

[Malcolm's Dad]

Betsy looks great. Good job on the grooming. I really enjoy hearing about Betsy.

[parmelbe]

Picked up a Furminator today after testing one out at the store and seeing that they were on sale. It seems some are skeptical of them so I thought I'd add my two cents. 

 

I LOVE it. When I groom her jacket by hand I end up missing a lot of the tufts and not doing a very organized job, leaving very thin patches and some areas untouched. It also takes so long that she loses patience about halfway through. Two swipes in an area with the Furminator yields a golf ball-sized pile of old undercoat that, on close examination, looks like it was properly pulled rather than cut. 

 

Her coat looks and feels so much better and she was obviously getting some skin irritation in the areas that I'd been missing, as I seem to have popped a little doggy back pimple as I was doing the brushing. I was also able to quickly take care of the puffy halo under her collar that I usually can't hold her still long enough to clean up. The only spot I had a hard time getting was her chest area. She's very quick to let out a fussy little yelp any time she's uncomfortable and after one run-through of the Furminator she wouldn't even let me near that area. 

 

In summary, two thumbs up. I need to be careful not to pull too much hair and it doesn't work as well on the thick stuff around her face (I'll keep hand-stripping her head), but it saves me so much time and seems to work very well. Pictures aren't working at the moment, as usual, so I'll update along with a Halloween costume in another thread later.