Clipping Poodle dogs is as easy as 1, 2, 3…
- Buy a good set of clippers with a full set of combs.
- Ask the supplier to recommend the blades for your dog’s coat.
- Put “poodle grooming” into the youtube.com search panel and watch a few grooming sessions online.
Here are a couple of links to start.
I suggest you have your dog clipped by a pro for the first couple of times. This gets the dog used to being clipped. Stay and watch them do it !!! This ensures they are kind and also lets you see how it is completed.
The most difficult clips are the first 2, as the dog is unused to clippers and will move around a lot so don’t panic if they have a hard time doing it. I use treats as positive reinforcement and an ironing board as the table to clip our poodles. The reason for the ironing board is that if the dog moves at all, the table wobbles and they instinctively sit down. Choose the cut you wish to replicate, then go for broke. I would suggest you start with a Poodle “puppy cut” or “lamb cut” and progress from there as you become more adept with the clippers.
Remember, the dog won’t make any complaints to the management and despite how bad it looks, there is only a couple of weeks between a good cut and a bad one. Take your time, have some breaks if the pup gets ansty. Keep calm as this flows thru to the pup. Make sure you bathe, condition and blow-dry, and brush well prior to starting to clip. If you have knots, deal with these before you clip, try to gently pull them apart with one tooth on the comb, if that fails use the scissors to cut thru the center of the knot from the skin out north / south then east /west then use the comb to remove the loose hair. Shaving it all off is an absolute last resort.
Badly matted coats will need to be shaved as trying to work through hundreds of knots is agony for the dog. If you have cared for and brushed regularly this shouldn’t be an issue. Select the length for the comb, Start clipping on the legs and body, work methodically with nice slow smooth strokes go from the bottom of the leg up and on the bodywork from the tail forwards i.e. against the natural fall of the coat.
Remember there is another day tomorrow, so if the fur baby gets to the point where he/she has just had enough, stop and have another go at it tomorrow.
