Why Regular Dog Grooming is Important

Grooming isn’t just about making your pooch look all pretty and smell fresh. There are several things about grooming that are related to their physical health! Every bit of their grooming serves a purpose, and today we at Prestonwood Kennels are going to tell you a little more about some of those.

• Getting regular grooming (especially by a professional) can help catch early signs of skin conditions. Any lumps, wounds, or dry patches can be noted and then investigated further. This is especially important in the drier season, when many dogs may find themselves with itchy, dry skin.
• Grooming helps to maintain a dog’s healthy coat as well as its skin. As a start, healthy coats will shed less! Regular grooming will also help to prevent things like matting, which is where your dog’s hair gets all tangled together and can start pulling at its skin. This gets painful for your pet and can even cause hair loss. Matting also is an ideal spot for fleas and ticks to hide, so making sure that your dog doesn’t have any is key to their health.
• Grooming will help make sure your pet can walk properly. This is from trimming both their nails and the fur around their paws. If your doggie’s nails get too long, then that means that your pet will be walking on them instead of their paw pads, which will create discomfort and even ingrown nails. Properly trimmed nails help keep their foot structure and posture in a good place. When it comes to the fur around their paws, you need to make sure it doesn’t get too long, or else they will be slipping and sliding all over the place.
• Regular grooming will help with early detection of all sorts of other health concerns. Part of grooming is cleaning and checking their ears and teeth. When doing this part of the groom, your groomer will do a full clean of these spots and be able to note anything that might be concerning, giving you a head’s up on what you may need to work on or have a vet look at.

There are so many other things that grooming will help your pet with, but these are some of the most important we think you should know about. While you can do most of this at home, we do recommend getting to a professional groomer at least a few times a year.