Schnauzers Grooming
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| GROOMING YOU SCHNAUZER | |
| If you have a Standard Schnauzer strictly as a companion and have no intention of ever showing, you have the option of stripping the coat or clipping it. Stripping is more effort but the stripped coat retains the lovely pepper and salt or glistening black color and the harsh dirt-repelling texture. If you intend to show your Standard Schnauzer, you have no option - your dog must be shown in a stripped coat. The hard, wiry pepper and salt or black coat is one of the outstanding characteristics of the Schnauzer breeds and is therefore a major consideration in the show ring. |
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| Stripping Knife - You will need a Stripping knife if you plan to take the dog into the show ring or if you just want to maintain the nice stripped coat. It is strictly an assistant in the grabbing of hair to be pulled out. Care must be made not to cut the coat with the stripping knife. I use the 'Mars Classic' range, a course, medium and a fine tooth version. The course/medium for the body coat and the finer for the head and neck area. Like all stripping knives be very careful not to cut the skin especially when the knife is new, try to 'blunt' the teeth down a bit on a doorstep or something similar. When you use it to rake out the softer undercoat you must be very careful as you can cut the skin if you hold the knife at the wrong angle – you must hold it almost flat against the body of your dog, raising it only very slightly off flat. |
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| Scissors - These are a long-term investment, and cheap ones will soon just fold the hair instead of cutting cleanly through it. Find a good pair at a dog show or order through a pet catalogue. It is worth investing in the best you can afford. Thinning Shears - Thinning shears are important for blending between clipper and stripped areas. Try the very fine-toothed ones with one solid blade and one serrated blade. |
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| Comb - I use a standard stainless steel comb as pictured. If the furnishings become a bit matted/tangled I lightly spray some coat 'detangler/matting' mix on to the coat first. Personally I use a Conditioning and DeTangler from Simpsons of Langley but there a re a lot of similar products out there. I find it much easier (and less painful for the dog) to comb through without damaging or ripping out hairs. You will need a couple of combs since they tend to get misplaced or lost at shows buy a couple of them! |
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| Brushes - you will need a couple of brushes. The first is a 'slicker' bush which is used to 'brush' up the furnishings before going into the ring. It is also used to clear any dead hairs or undercoat away. |
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| Shampoo – I use a general cheap shampoo (or baby shampoo) whichever is cheaper at the supermarket. Prior to Show days I use a 'brightener' shampoo such as “Fido's” 'White and Bright' shampoo then after I use a shampoo containing vitamin H such as TRESemme which helps condition the furnishings and beard. The waterless shampoos (squirt on, foam up, towel off) are useful at shows if your dog gets dirty on the way in but I prefer to use baby wipes and then towel dry off. Cheap plain talcum powder can be used to help dry out but brush out throroughly with a slicker brush |
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| which isClippers - Don't try to economize. Cheap clippers are a waste of money. This is where you should spend as much as you can afford as a good clipper is the best investment you can make out all grooming equipment. I use a rechargeable clipper by Moser/Whal and it has an adjustable blade. It is very quiet and does not run hot - both very important. Quiet clippers are a must when getting puppies used to clippers, especially around their head and ears. If clippers run hot after using a short while you run risk of giving your dog 'clipper burn', which can be very painful for them. Being rechargeable I take it to shows for any last minute 'missed bits'. The other clipper I have is a mains powered clipper by Moser and again it is very quiet and does not run hot. It has two speeds and is very good for when clipping the coat off - as I do for Murphy. For him I use a 'skip tooth' blade the same principal as thinning scissors. It leaves some longer hair to his coat and gives an impression of a stripper coat. ie it does top take his top coat out completely.
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| FACE, EARS AND EYEBROWS | |
| THIS IS WHERE PEOPLE PANIC (MYSELF INCLUDED) WHEN THEY FIRST BEGIN GROOMING THEIR SCHNAUZER!! | |
| Because if you make a mistake it there for all to see but don't worry, if you do 'snip a bit off' where you shouldn't or too much DON'T WORRY IT WILL GROW BACK!! And your dog certainly will not mind. I find it best to do the head first, after bathing and drying, before my dog gets bored or fidgety. Make sure that you have the eybrows and beard thoroughly combed through before you go anywhere near your dog with the scissors. Then be very calm and talk calmly to your dog whilst you begin scissoring the eyebrows | |
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Ears - Use your clippers (setting 2 on my adjustable clipper blade)work from the top of the ear down to the tip. You need to carefully scissor the edges to a neat straight cut. Be careful on the rear side on the ear, in the region of the fold, as there is an 'envelope' section of ear which can be very easily nicked with the clippers or scissors. Ears bleed very easily and profusely so be careful!
Eyebrows - Comb the eyebrows forward so they fall naturally. (See top row of pictures on the right). Then, looking at the dog head-on (just like you're looking at the pictures on the right), brace your scissors against the bone beside his head and cut off the corner hairs that protrude past the bone. Then recomb the remaining eyebrows and cut on an angle, your imaginary line running from the outside corner of his eye to the opposite corner of his nose.
Scissor between the eyes as shown on the right. The top row of pictures shows how the head should look. The remaining pictures show how to compensate for head lump, short head, and errors in grooming. Don't leave long hairs sticking out from the sides of the dog's head in a puff so he looks like he has the mumps. Trim these hairs off so the head looks long and rectangular. DON'T cut in under the eyes, or you'll get a look as shown in the bottom middle figure on the right instead of a rectangle. Blend short hair on the cheeks gradually into whiskers, so you get a natural look. The head should be rectangular, no indentions, no fluffy puffs. The length and shape of the eyebrows is a personal preference but should not distract from this rectangular look. Clipper the cheeks and the ears as shown on the right. The line at the top should be even with the corner of the eye. The line on the neck should accentuate the arch of the neck. Blend the line between the top of the head which is stripped and the clippered area with the thinning scissors. When clipping a pet, you should strive for this same look.
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| FEET AND PADS GROOMING | |
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Grooming the feet should be done every few weeks for both pets and show dogs. Turn the foot upside down, comb the hair in the direction of the arrows shown in the sketch on the right, and scissor around the edges and across the back of the large pad. Then set the foot down on the table (with the dog standing on it) and do the final scissoring. Remember the foot is supposed to look neat and relatively small with the toes right together. It is NOT supposed to look like a big fat snowshoe. ALWAYS keep your dog's nails clipped short and the hair clipped from between the pads. When you groom the feet, check for mats in between the pads and cut these out with your scissors or your clippers. |
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| SCISSORING FURNISHINGS | |
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Scissoring , the final touch, is very important for the final look of the show dog or your family pet. You can have a beautifully stripped dog and mess up his look by bad scissoring. Work for a neat simple look.
The "blend" areas shown at the right are where you taper gradually the short hair of the body into the longer hair of the legs. Take the funny tuft off short at the front of the elbow with the thinning scissors and neatly scissor backs of the backlegs. Note that the front legs look like a column with a straight line from the floor to the body. Don't leave enough hair to fly in the wind as the dog moves. He is a working dog and you want him to look neat. |
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| CLIPPED AREAS | |
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There are areas that we clip on the show dog: in the UK they are the cheeks, the ears, the tummy, the rear and throat. Throat and cheeks and rear areas are stripped in Europe. Also, in some European countries, the furnishings are stripped. I tend to clip these areas quite close to the skin a week before a show and then again a day before using a 'longer' setting on my variable clipper blade. On my Whal rechargeable I use setting '2' (on a 1 to 5 scale), which is about a 10 blade the week before and then drop back to '3' the day before to 'tidy up' It is not as difficult as you think to clip and strip your Schnauzer for shows - or just to have a fanastic looking pet. A lot of it is achieved by using 'lines' as descibed below |
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| How close to clip on cheeks and the throat depends on your dog. A very cheeky, coarse-headed dog would be clippered much shorter (and closer to the show date) than a fine-boned, narrow skulled dog. Leave 1/4" or so of hair behind the eyes and angle to within 1/2-1" of the corner of the mouth. This leaves you some hair to blend in with thinning shears. The pattern for clipping and scissoring the face can be see in the Eyebrows and Faces section above. |
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Using a No. 10 or No 15 blade (or level 2 or 3 on my adjustable blade). I clip the throat from under the chin; if you feel under the chin there is very often a 'tufty' bit which you can use as a marker, if not vertically below the eye, down to the chest ('X') and then down to the shoulder point. This leaves a 'W' shape of clipped area. The lines 'A' are made by clipping a straight line from the ear down to the shoulder point. To do this I use the clipper blade point straight on to the body and cut the 'line' clipper blade width at a time. This line is then carefully 'straightened' using your scissors and then blended in with the coat with your thinning scissors. 'B' is an inverted V of unclipped area, from chest point to each shoulder points.
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Clip the belly from the navel to the rear. Use a fine tooth blade so you don't clip off a nipple. On males, be sure to closely trim the sheath, but it is best to neatly scissor hair off the testicles. The idea is to have a very neat dog with no extraneous hair that could catch urine or hold dirt. |
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| "ROLLING" A COAT - 'HAND STRIPPING' | |
| The coat can be taken out with either your fingers (which are best anyway when you get down to the fine touches at show time) or a stripping comb. I use the Mars brand of stripping knives (see above under 'Equipment') I also use a stripping stone which is great for pulling out any missed long hairs at show time. | |
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Stripping - In stripping,(by 'hand' or with the aid of a stripping knife) always pull in the direction in which the hair is growing (usually toward the rear or toward the ground). Hold the skin taut so the hair comes out quickly and without pulling the skin. On most of the body you can grab a large fold of loose skin, but in doing the head you will have to hold an ear or hold the eye brows firmly onto the bridge of the nose to keep the skin taut. Grip the hair between forefinger (or the blade of the stripping comb) and your thumb, and pull straight. DO NOT twist your wrist, or you will cut the hair off instead of pulling it out. You may find it easier in some places (head, ears, side of neck) to use just rubber fingers or a stripping stone. If you cut the coat with the stripper, the coat will look like a clippered coat.
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If you start with a long bushy coat, it will take you three months to get a nice coat. That is because the hair taken out today will be in show length in 3 months. After that, if you keep up the good work, you'll be able to just keep "rolling" along
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| Can This Coat Be Rolled? You can probably roll the coat if there are many different lengths of hair or if the dog has a basically short coat with long, loose hairs shedding off the top. If you have a puppy with a slick, glossy, hard coat that clings close to it's body, you have a good candidate for rolling. Every month, strip off about 1/4 of the hairs (the ones that are longest). Remember that the head and neck must be kept shorter than the body. Since the Standard Schnauzer is a two coated dog, you will also need to keep the undercoat raked out. If you have a lot of fluffy soft undercoat, you might want to start by stripping your puppy's top coat, wait 6 weeks and stripping the undercoat, and then try rolling the coat. Puppies often have more undercoat than they will when adults. | |
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If your puppy has a fuzzy topcoat - you can try stripping off the fuzz. If there is a nice hard coat under all the fuzz, you're all set to proceed from there with your monthly rolling. If the coat is all fuzz, you will have to wait and see what the new coat looks like. You really do not want to show a dog with a soft fuzzy coat.
How often do you work the coat? You must take off 1/4 to 1/3 of the coat every month. You will probably have to work on it weekly while you are actually showing the dog. |
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| CLIPPING THE COAT | |
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The pattern and finished work should be the same on the stripped show dog and the Clippered pet.
Try doing the nails and feet first, before they get covered with cut hair. On a dog that's not used to the clippers, do the body next, to get him used to the sound and vibration before going on to the head. |
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| Clip with the grain of the hair - it helps prevent skin irritation ("clipper burn"). Don't try to go the whole length of the dog with one stroke: take short overlapping strokes to make a smooth final product. I find it is easier if you 'pull' the skin tight from above the clipper, clipping away from the hand that you are pulling the skin with. This makes it easier to clip. Start from behind the neck and work to the tail. | |
| For the head use a finer blade and blend into the neck where you used a longer blade. Work from behind the eyebrows to the neck, ears and cheeks. | |
| A blade will not clip if it's teeth are clogged up with hair, so I keep a paint brush handy for brushing the blade teeth off. | |
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A word about clipping - you will lose the protective, dirt and water repellent top coat which contains oils that protect the dog from dirt and cold. It is amazing how clean your Schnauzer will keep with the top coat intact.
If grooming services or advice are required then please contact me (click here) or call 0151 6250309 or 07973 824171 |
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