How to De-Shed Your Dog at Home

Angela Vuckovic
by Angela Vuckovic
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Regular grooming ensures that there’s no shed pet hair everywhere around your house. Here’s how to de-shed your dog at home to minimize shedding and enjoy a tidy home without much hassle!


Many dog owners around the world are battling with those pesky hairs that can get everywhere around your house. If your doggo is of a hairy, shaggy breed or has a high shedding short coat, you certainly know this issue all too well. Hair on the carpet, hair on the furniture – hair everywhere. In order to prevent this from becoming a constant and annoying issue, many owners opt to de-shed their dogs on their own – at home. With just a little patience and practice, de-shedding can become a regular part of your pet’s grooming routine that doesn’t take up a lot of your time.


De-Shedding Explained


What is deshedding? Put simply, it is the physical removal of your dog’s loose undercoat. While you can use a brush to regularly go over their coat, you won’t do much for that deeper layer, the undercoat, where that loose hair is just waiting to land on your furniture. De-shedding requires more attention and more tools than routine brushing and can help make your dog feel comfortable and your home clean. De-shedding is usually done by groomers with a variety of tools and techniques, but you can do it too in your home.


The first thing to know is that deshedding at home requires time and patience. Most hairy dog breeds are also large, and that means it will require plenty of time to fully de-shed these doggos. After a while, your pet might get fidgety, and you will need your patience to get through it. Also, don’t be surprised to realize that not all of the undercoat was removed in the process: shedding in dogs is a continual process and the removal needs to be repeated at certain intervals. Seasonal shedding or so-called blowout will have you reaching for the brush much more often, though, so make sure not to skip grooming day when your pet is in full hairy beast mode.


Deshedding Tools & Tips


To successfully deshed your dog at home, you’ll need to invest in some handy deshedding tools. These are usually specialized combs that can reach underneath the regular coat and pull out the accumulated undercoat hairs below. These special combs can make the process much simpler. With flowing, measured moves, you should drag the comb over the length of your dog’s body, pulling clumps of shed undercoat with each move. You will be surprised at just how much hair there can be, hidden in plain sight. In time, when you notice that the pulls don’t yield any hair clumps, you will know that the de-shedding session is done.


Another thing to remember is to always de-shed your dog’s coat when it is dry. This makes for a much easier process. A wet coat can be a nightmare to de-shed. It can create tangled mats and clumps that can be near-impossible to remove and cause discomfort to your dog.


However, bathing your dog and drying their coat thoroughly before de-shedding can help immensely. It helps loosen the underlying hair, eventually making the work with the special brush easier and quicker. Either way, there is no reason to see de-shedding as some impossible, daunting task. With just a bit of hard work and patience, and minimal investment as well, you can help spruce up your dog’s coat in no time.

Angela Vuckovic
Angela Vuckovic

A proud mama to seven dogs and ten cats, Angela spends her days writing for her fellow pet parents and pampering her furballs, all of whom are rescues. When she's not gushing over her adorable cats or playing with her dogs, she can be found curled up with a good fantasy book.

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