Can You Prepare Your Pet For Grooming?
Harriet enjoying her groom
There are a range of things you can do to get your pet ready for grooming. Starting with brushing. Keeping your pet brushed regularly is the best thing you can do to have them ready for the groomers. Whether you have a dog or cat, shedding or non-shedding if you only have time to improve one thing, make it brushing. Make sure there are always tasty treats or something your pet really likes involved in the process so they learn to love being brushed. Its an easy thing you can do at home with them that gets them used to being handled, prevents painful mats, prevents negative experiences at the groomers, improves coat and skin health and leaves the groomer time to focus on making your pet look and feel good.
Another thing you can do to help your pet is get them used to being touched with strange objects. This will also help at the vet clinic. Scissors, clippers, different looking brushes, combs, dryers are all alien objects that are just scary objects from your pet’s point of view. This is great for any age pet, cat or dog. Start off with showing them you have some tasty treats. Then, pick up a household object, pet them with it, then treat. You can use TV remotes, books, cups, shampoo bottles, anything that you think will be a new experience for your pet. The simple fact of having a cat or dog that is comfortable with you touching them all over with foreign objects can make a huge difference at the grooming salon or the vet clinic. For them, thats what most of the appointment is, just being touched with weird looking equipment. If they are comfortable with that, the whole appointment will go a lot smoother for them.
The final thing you can do to ensure your pet has a positive experience at the groomers is a challenging one for some. Your pet needs to be able to be comfortable being away from their owner. For many reasons throughout their life, it’s good to make sure your pet doesn’t have separation issues. Unfortunately, many pets suffer from separation problems and for the groomers they really need to at least be okay with being left with a stranger. To find out how your pet does with being left without you, try leaving them alone and set up a camera to see how they do with being alone for an hour. Even if your pet gets left alone regularly, it doesn’t mean they aren’t stressing about it. I’ve had many clients who filmed their pets while away and had no idea that compulsive pacing and crying was going on. You can also leave them with a friend your pet is unfamiliar with for a few hours and ask how it goes when you leave, to mimic a similar situation to being dropped off at the groomers.
Separation issues can be very complex and difficult to solve. It’s important to know, these problems don’t get better on their own. If your pet suffers from separation problems, contact us for help. We can set up a consultation and make a training plan for your pet.