# Portuguese Water Dog now looks like a punk rocker..



## B-Line (Feb 1, 2008)

Hey all,

Was hoping to get some advice. I have a 13 week old Portuguese Water Dog named Maggie.
As my brother has some dog allergies, I have always found that keeping the hair short is better than allowing it to grow long. Short=cleaner.

Since my pup is not fully vaccinated for Parvo, my wife and I decided to trim her ourselves.. The cut is obviously not professional but she still looks REALLY cute, even with her punk rock haircut.

So here are my questions.
1)I used a regular hair and beard trimmer bought at a pharmacy (wahl). I started with the largest guard but ended on the smallest #1.
I ran the trimmers down her coat going with the direction of the hair, not against. -- Except for her "private" areas where I used no guard and tried to cut as much hair as possible to avoid "cling-ons" etc.
-- Should I go shorter? Against the grain of the hair growth?

I read somewhere that by cutting them real short, their adult coat will grow in nicer, how short?

Ideally, I do like a nice even, short, all around haircut, except for in the legs where it needs to be a little longer.

Thanks

Here is a "before" picture:


----------



## justagirl21 (Jan 19, 2008)

She is so cute, are you able to post an "after" pic? 
Ok firstly your job in grooming is made a bit easier as I can see from the picture you have the wavy coated variety which is a bit easier than the "poodle" style coat. With the clippers, this time its ok to use normal people trimmers but if you're going to groom at home again you're much better off getting animal clippers as they are specially designed to be on for longer periods of time and are more powerful to get through thick coats. Also if you cant to get extra/more blades they prob wont fit your people trimmer. Its perfectly fine to clipper these dogs shorter if thats your personal preference and the show standard for this breed ideally has the legs left longer and the body is taken off shorter with a rounded head and a short muzzle (think poodle-ish face but a bit longer) and looks quite cute. You can still achieve this look in a pet trim by taking the body off on a #7 and using a #4 (or a comb attachment) on the legs, so the legs will still be longer than the body, but still relatively short. Its best to go with the grain of the hair or you'll wind up with clipper rash but there are exceptions like sanitary areas, 'poodle' feet and the underside of the tail (dogs who are reguarly shaved on the face can take a 'poodle face' against the grain with no worries but I wouldn't recommend it for your little girl as dogs build up this resistance after years of grooming). Clipping her won't make the adult coat grow back any nicer than what it is now and having a shorter coat doesnt always mean cleaner or less shedding but you may find it helps. When you clip your dog make sure to line brush every inch of her and make sure its completely knot free and this is where her being a wavy and not curly coated helps  If you research on the net you can prob find some pattern lines for you to follow (just modify the lengths) and search the "Retriever Clip" as thats the closest to what your looking for.
Good Luck


----------



## B-Line (Feb 1, 2008)

Thanks JustaGirl21,

The only pictures I have of Maggie are now 1.5 weeks after her haircut. So it's getting a little long again. 

I have some pictures at home that we took the night we gave her the cut. I will post them when I have access to the camera.

Thanks for the great advice. We will give it a try..


----------

