I have a couple of different videos on setting lines on a pet groom for an American Cocker Spaniel. They are fairly self explanatory so I am going to let them stand.
The lines are almost the same as a show dog, and remember, the differences between a show dog and a pet is LENGTH amd technique.
Show dogs are carded and stripped and pet dogs are clippered and sometimes carded
I have done this groom in sections on video to make it easier to upload and easier to watch.
I will cover the back, and how to set the shoulders and hips. Then I cover how to do the legs on a Suburban clip and the bevels.
Some of these videos have been published in my blog before but they warrant publishing again in this case. I have shown two dogs because both dogs get done similarly yet they are different and have different coats.
I hope you learn something watching these videos. They were fun to make.
I was getting ready to start show grooming a Soft Coated Wheaten Terrier about 11 years ago and bought an older VHS tape on how to groom the breed. I really didn't think that one video would change my grooming forever but it did.
I was watching the video and the woman showed how to make the hair "lay correctly" by taking a small section of hair on the opposite side of the dog from where you are clipping or scissoring and tugging hard enough to move the hair on the other side of the dog. I was flabbergasted. It was as if a lightbulb went off in my head.
I had always been taught to back brush, or comb out, and was never really happy with my results on drop coats and especially unhappy on my Wheaten. In fact I grabbed Kreamer immediately and tried it out.
MAN! IT WORKED! When you shake that side of the dogs body, neck, leg, or even head the opposite side falls into place perfectly!
When you think about it, a dog that shakes their hair after a bath, or just for the fun of it, the hair always falls into place perfectly afterwards, so why this never occurred to me before is beyond me. But now, I am so glad I ordered that VHS tape and it has changed the way I groom forever.
I have been using this technique on shihtzu, maltese, yorkies, cockers...pretty much every breed whose hair falls or lays down. HECK it even works on poodles with long hair and Doodles as well. Any breed with hair over about an inch long will benefit from this technique.
Here is a basic, short video clip showing this technique on a Morkie, Jack Jack. He is done with a C comb and was done a moth prior to this video clip. He was boarding at my shop this weekend, had been outside to play, so he is wet in the video. I was also not dressed AT ALL for this video it just happened to be a good idea to get this video clip while I was at work this morning.
I will get a couple more video clips later this week to update this post with. In the meantime, try this out and see how it does for you!