There comes a time when a dog has matted hair and you need to make a decision: demat or shave the coat? This depends on the degree of matting. If the matting isn’t too severe, sometimes you can comb out the mats with a little work. If the matting is extensive or very tight, the most humane thing to do is shave them off and start over. Matted hair is painful and uncomfortable for a dog.

Dematting, if done carefully, is time consuming to say the least, and can be uncomfortable for the dog. Once hair becomes damaged, you cannot reverse damage to the hair shaft. You have to remove it, just as your beautician removes split ends on your hair.

Allergies and scratching, fleas and biting, and bathing the dog without combing out can all cause matted hair. Keeping up with regular grooming, bathing, brushing, and excellent nutrition are the cornerstone of healthy hair.

If you choose not to shave down your puppy, you must begin brushing out what you can daily until the dog is mat free. If you keep up with the daily combing and brushing, all the way down to the skin and not just brushing over the top, the dog won’t need a shave-down because there will be few mats only.

It takes dedication on your part to continue thorough combing and brushing, but it is possible to avoid a shave-down. Always brush the coat after you spray it with water mixed with conditioner to reduce static and keep the coat from breaking.

The Dematting Process

The first thing to do if your dog is not severely matted is to bathe and condition the dog and work out some tangles in the tub while the hair is wet. If you use a force dryer on the coat, like professional groomers use, you can blow out a few tangles just with the dryer, and if you have a badly matted area, you can use a slicker brush on that mat in a gentle pat-pull motion, making sure you aren’t scraping the dog’s skin.

Slicker brushes are commonly misused, but they will last a long time if you take care to use them correctly. The slicker brush should loosen up the matted hair, and then you can use a wide-tooth comb to pick at it and comb it out.

If the hair is really matted and has a great deal of undercoat in it, you can use a dematting rake with curved blades on it, which will cut through the matted hair. These tools work great on removing undercoat, but you can’t use them in the same place on the dog for long because it does cut the hair and you will end up with a bald patch.

Using Thinners and Blenders

When everything else fails, you can use thinning or blending shears to remove the matting. Lift the matted hair and use your thinners or blenders underneath the mat. Make sure to tilt the blade away from the skin so you don’t cut the dog, and make a couple of cuts either through the matted hair or behind the mat next to the skin. You can usually brush out the mat and it won’t look like you just chopped out a hunk of hair.

Thinners and blenders make the hair look more natural and can remove choppy marks made by scissors or clipper blades. You want to use them vertically if possible so the hair falls naturally. If you use them horizontally across the hair, it won’t blend in as well.

Tip:

Don’t be carried away and make several cuts with your thinners or you will have a huge chunk cut out. Thinners and blenders cut just part of the hair, leaving the rest to fall between the teeth. This leaves the hair looking more natural.

Blending the Hair

You can blend hair all over the dog to look natural rather than cutting with blending shears. This can help a dematted coat look fuller, but you can also enhance a dog’s face by using blenders to remove excess hair in front of the ears and cheeks. This works especially well on long-nosed breeds such as Collies and Shelties to show off their beautiful features.

You can use blending shears down the skirts of Spaniels to soften the line of trimming and make the Spaniel look as though his hair grew like this naturally, even if he is clipped and not hand stripped.

You can blend the hair around the ears, and tails of thick coated dogs to thin out the hair and trim the coat slightly. You can also use blending shears on the feet and hocks of dogs to make them appear more natural and take care of removing wispy hairs.

Once you get used to using thinners and blending shears, you will find numerous uses for them and you’ll find it hard to live without them.

How Short Should You Shave Your Dog?

If your dog is matted badly, the kindest thing to do is simply to shave it off and start over. If it’s cold, put a sweater on her. If it’s hot, be sure to keep her out of direct sunlight to prevent sunburn.

It’s important to keep the skin taut as you shave the mats off the dog. Mats can be so tight that they pull up skin and you can nick or seriously cut your dog if you aren’t careful. If you are using scissors, put a comb between the mat and the skin and cut off only what is on top of the comb.

If you cannot get a comb underneath the mat, you need to use a very close blade such as an A5 blade number 10, 15, or higher to gently get under the mat. Be careful around the belly area, the tuck-up where the hind leg meets the body, as there is loose skin in the area that can be easily cut.

Try to clip with the grain of the hair when possible. If it’s not possible, clip in reverse or against the grain to get the mat out. It all depends on the degree of the matting and where it’s located. The important thing is to try not to cut the dog’s skin.

How short you need to take the coat and where determines if you can make the dog look good. If the head and ears of the dog aren’t too badly matted, you can leave a cute head and face and maybe leave the tail longer and shave the body short. This look is often requested at grooming shops in the summertime; some groomers call it a smoothie.

Let’s say you have a Schnauzer and his chest and belly have mats. You could shell out this dog, leaving the fringe on the sides but shaving off the hair on the belly and chest. Nobody will see the shaved-off portion unless your dog rolls over.

This works on any dog with longer side and leg hair such as Cocker Spaniels, Yorkies, and Afghan Hounds.

If your dog’s ears are matted, you can shave them short and leave a little beard on the dog’s face and call it a German trim. Remember, it’s just hair, it will grow back!