I Shaved a Gizmo

I groom my own dogs. I like to think it's because grooming is a bonding method and this way I don't have to send them to strangers and risk ill treatment. It started as a solution to a financial problem. A groomer charges forty-five dollars to groom a shih tzu. I have three that need grooming every six weeks, at least.

I purchased a ridiculously expensive pair of clippers and watched a bunch of youtube videos and started clipping. The first time I trimmed Taz's eyes I had the shakes. I bought blunt tipped scissor for safety, but they were never sharp enough.

It took time and practice before I became proficient at clipping the dogs. I usually clip the dogs about every two weeks depending on the weather. If it's warm they get buzzed sooner in the spring. Tonight Gizmo got his "big" hair cut. I took it all. The only thing he has left is a tail. The rest of the hair is gone. See ya bye.

Gizmo is not happy about this and has been sulking for three days. He'll eat, go out and then back to bed with looks of disgust aimed my way. Taz is thrilled to have her spa day over and she dances and runs around like crazy with her new style. Poco is more dignified and sits statue-like for several hours so as not to muss it up, but Gizmo is completely put out.

I find Gizmo with his thick, luxurious, copious amounts of hair the easiest to clip. It doesn't seem to matter how I clip him, he looks amazing. If I leave his tail and ears or clip them down to nothing he always manages to look adorable. It's easiest to just clip, wash and dry.

If you want to leave a bit and use a guard to clip then the dogs need to be brushed, washed and then combed before you can clip. You can not run clippers with a guard through a mat because the guard acts like a comb and everything gets caught, it pulls and hurts.

I can manage to shave Taz and still have her looking cute, but she's always too cold. She's a tiny little thing with no body fat to keep her warm, so I'm always struggling to keep her shih poo hair with a slight curl brushed to prevent mats. I find it easier to clip legs, face, belly and bum short and leave the back long. It feels like I'm cheating, but we're all happy with this make-shift puppy clip.

Poco is an entirely different story. Years of neglect and abuse have damaged even the fine hair he manages to grow. The hair is sparse even after a year of healthy food and clean living. Poco gets incredibly cold if I leave less than an inch of hair and he looks sickly. His skin is the blotchy shih tzu pink and black and looks blanched against his white, white hair. When he first came to live on the farm he had no hair on his hind end and only mats everywhere else and it took him six months to grow anything.

I use delicate caution when I clip Poco and let him grow really long and then go at it for a few days. Poco doesn't handle stress well, so I usually brush for a day and then give him a break, then a bath, then brush and then another break. Finally we get to the clipping part.

Poco stands like a statue while he gets clipped. You can hear a low warning growl when you get to the back end, but it's more fear than aggression. The infection in his bum was ugly and took weeks to clear. He rarely actually bites anymore, but the warning snarl is enough to slow down and give a few cuddles to help him relax.

It's taken a week, but everyone is groomed. It took a day for Taz to try and dig under the bunny pen and get filthy dirty. Poco rolled in something that was either dead or pooped out and stunk, so bath number two. Gizmo is still in bed and at least clean.

Brent was amazed at how much doggie laundry had piled up over the past ten days. He offered to bath Poco after a bad rolling "incident" and I said yes please! Brent plopped Poco in the sink and said "what do I do now?" I picked up the soapless shampoo and read the directions: wet, lather, rinse and repeat.

Good rule to live by: wet, lather, rinse and repeat.