# Brushes/combs for a Maltese?



## Jewelzee94 (Jul 18, 2011)

I'm clueless as to what I need to be using for Molly's coat to brush her. It's never really been any issue before, when we kept her in a puppy-cut... But out of no where over the summer, my mom declared I was no longer allowed to cut Molly's hair, apparently she hated how she looked (I'm not a trained groomer, of course it isn't going to look perfect!) so now we've been growing out her coat. (Only because my Mom wants us to, she wants that full, flowy Maltese show coat, even though there's no way we'd be able to ever show her, even if we wanted to...)

With that, it's been getting worse with getting tangles if she isn't brushed daily, where before I could go all week without brushing her and only have 1 or 2 tangles that came out with one brush stroke. Now, if she isn't brushed at least daily, then I end up with matts.

As of now, she's brushed daily with a slicker (very little spring-y ness), trimmed in certain areas every couple weeks to keep poop out of her fur, and given a bath about once a month, maybe more if needed. 

But, what's a good tool to use for mats for those days I just forget, or don't have time to groom her? I'm the only one who'll do anything with her care wise... Most anyone else does is my dad petting her & cuddling with her, and my parents paying for vet bills & food.


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## mom24doggies (Mar 25, 2011)

Since you aren't going to be showing her, you probably don't care too much if the hair gets a little broken in some areas, right? So a slicker brush and comb will be just fine for getting small mats out. I'm assuming that you are line brushing her, right? Let me know if you don't know what line brushing is and I will explain. When you come upon a mat, you start to remove it by brushing at the beginning of the mat. Then work your way in towards the middle...once you think you've gotten it all out, check with your comb. Repeat that process until the whole mat is out. If you start at the middle, the process ends up being longer and more painful for the dog, since you have to force the tangle up through the rest of the hair. Basically, you brush dog hair like you do human hair...from the ends up. I don't typically recommend that beginning groomers try using a dematting tool...it's very easy to hurt the dog with it!! I've been grooming for just 2 yrs now, and I still don't use one all that often. I prefer a good ol' slicker, and if that doesn't work, a #10 on my clippers works great too.  

It sounds like you might need to get a different slicker, too...I've found that the really hard ones aren't that great for getting out tangles. I like my small #1 all systems slicker brush. It does a great job on most coats. It's softer, too, so it's harder to brush burn a dog. It also doesn't remove much hair. When I brush my poodle (he gets brushed about 2x a week right now, although I'm growing him out so that will change) I break off very little hair...


If you are trying to grow her out, I would recommend a good shampoo/conditioning once a week, more if she gets really dirty one week. Clean hair doesn't break as easily, grows faster, and doesn't mat as quickly.

Good luck growing her out! Long hair can be a lot of work, but it's fun.


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