shaving dogs for the summer ?

hornimal

500+ Posts
I'm contemplating shaving my black lab to help him cope with the heat. this is a popular practice with long haired and cold weathered dogs. but has anyone had an experience with a lab? my concern is that if I trim off the longer "top coat", the undercoat will be more exposed and my dog will be flinging that fine hair everywhere.

if anyone has done this, does it cut down the number of times your dog takes a dip to cool himself off? the problem that I have is that mine sneaks off to go swiming in the bayou to cool himself off, and he comes back filthy. would anyone recommend this, or would benefits of having a top coat be better for an active dog such as: keep thorns and branches from scratching his skin, and more importantly help him retain skin oils to keep his skin from drying out.
 
I never considered shaving any of my labs, but I have found that a small baby pool filled with water in the back yard would get regular use. I changed it daily and added a little bleach to keep skeeters from using it to propagate their evil. The amount of shed hair in the water during the summer was amazing.
 
I have chow/retriever mixes that manufacture hair with impressive gusto. I shave them twice during the summer. They like it, and it dramatically decreases the amount of loose hairballs floating around my house. Although due largely to them my house is still usually full of stray hair and dust anyway.

As to sneaking off to jump in a filthy cesspool, that sounds like entertainment for your dog, and I would not be surprised if he kept doing it just for giggles.
 
I had a chow and used to shave her every summer. First time I did it and picked her up, the girl goes "Don't laugh--dogs are sensitive to that!" I was thinking, what have they done to my puppy that I would laugh at her??? She did look absolutely ridiculous, like a lion, but she was so happy to have all that thick fur off! I would do it.
 
I have always wondered about this practice. If dogs have few to no sweat glands what good does shaving the hair off accomplish? Other than having less dog hair around the house and a cleaner dog, what good does it do?

Anyways my wife has our dog shaved two to three times a summer at about $50 dollars a clip, saying that he was cooler that way. I just kind of scratched my head and rolled my eyes as I went to put fresh cool water in his water bowl which she never did.
confused.gif
 
my dog has had a kiddie pool since I had him in college, and he tore up the top cover off my hot tub so he could soak in the water when I moved back to houston. I had to take them away (I still fill up the kiddie pool sometimes) because he was soaking in it so much that it was causing his skin to flake.

I know that dogs don't have sweat glands. mine loves to lay on the cold tile floor, or in one of the two holes he has dug up. one behind a bush up against the house, and the other under tall bushes in a flower bed. taking some of the excess hair off would expose more of his skin to the cool surface, I would imagine.
 
We tried it once with our chow/lab. The groomer clipped a little too close to his wang, and he has been quite crazy ever since.
 
I used to have a Himalayan cat that I would shave every summer. Looked like a rat afterwards.
 
Don't "trim" a Lab. As noted above, the baby pool is a good idea. It does become a pain in the ***, because u have to change the water often. If you can't do a pool, find a corner of your yard, and keep it watered / wet where your lab can dig down a little and refrigerate in the mud.
 
there are some breeds that should not be shaved, and some that really do benefit from it. i know that golden retrievers should not be shaved - something about having a double coat. other breeds, like cockers, poodles, chows, and some cats, like persians and himalayans, do really well shaved, even if they do look silly. ask your vet, or look for more info on google. i've never seen a shaved lab, but would imagine it would look pretty funny!
 

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