# One Dog/Many Coat Textures



## Missy (Nov 6, 2006)

I posted this in the Jasper and Cash thread, but wanted to ask the question to as many as possible...so forgive me repeating myself.

We all know these furkids coats and colors change, but has anyone experienced this? 

Cash's coat has always been made up of several different textures...his head, ears and tail are silky, his haunches are kinky, and throughout the body he has always had a double coat...the undercoat cottony and soft and the outer coat silky like his head and tail. When he gets a puppy cut he feels like velvet. But since his last puppy cut, I have noticed, while it is growing in...he seems to have less and less of his silky top coat and where he has it, just along his spine it seems much coarser than it used to be. more like the guard hairs that sometime happen with sables... It is also much blacker than his cottony undercoat. 

Has this happened with any of your Havs? Will he grow out of it? Cash is almost 2. I know Jasper had a period where his sable (that no longer looked sable) felt coarser but not as severely as this..and not his coat is pretty consistent and silky through out.


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## Jane (Jun 2, 2007)

Hi Missy,

That's interesting. I wonder if the cutting can affect the coat texture over time? I have noticed that Lincoln's brother's coat feels different to me now too. He has been in a puppy cut since just before he was a year old (he's 3 yrs old now). His coat is short, but more stiff and dry feeling to me, but I wasn't sure if that was due to something else (diet, dry air, etc.) other than it being cut continually.

I'll be interested to see what responses you get to your question!

Do you know if your groomer has changed products?


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## Missy (Nov 6, 2006)

well this is all after me trying another groomer... and CASH got all sorts of hot spots after that (or they could have been razor burn-- not going back there) but I have been using per vets orders an antibacterial shampoo on him since. It could be the shampoo-- but it's weird that it is only coarse along his spine. I just started using IOD-- so we will see. Me too, curious what others have to say?


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## Poornima (Jun 29, 2007)

Benji's coat has continued to be soft and silky. Lizzie, was cottony soft to begin with, but as she has grown older, the texture has changed in different parts of her body. It is like cotton candy close to the skin, the chest and around her neck, in the front, she is silky, the rest of coat is mostly cottony.


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## irnfit (Nov 21, 2006)

Missy, you saw my two and know the answer. Shelby is straighter and on the silky side, with a slight coarseness to the hair. Kodi is very silky on his head, neck, chest, legs, tail. But his saddle area is cottony with the undercoat being softer. He is also much more wavy than Shelby.


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## SaydeeMomma (Sep 9, 2008)

Missy

It's probably not a big concern, but if Cash's coat changes continue you might just have your vet take a peek at it. I know I talk alot about my former Maltese dogs, one of which was diabetic, but I learned so much from that experience. Before Millie was diagnosed with diabetes, I had brought her to the vet because her coat on her haunches had become very brittle and she was starting to get thinning bald spots. As soon as the insulin got her diabetes under control, her coat filled back in with soft silky Maltese hair. Then when she got Cushing's disease, again her coat changed to a very coarse texture. Anyway, not to alarm you, but I just wanted to mention that sometimes coat changes can be an indication of something else going on.

That being said, Saydee's black hair has always been much more cottony and dry than her white hair. She has one back leg that's white, and the other is black, and the black leg always looks a little wider from behind! As we get closer to bath day, the differences in her coat are more noticable and sometimes she even looks a bit lumpy!


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## MaddiesMom (Apr 1, 2007)

Missy- Maddie used to be completely silky as a pup. When her adult coat came in, she's still silky in all the white parts and the black on her head, but the black spot on her hind end is a little coarser. I also notice that she's gotten a little more wavy on the back of her neck. However, she is holding her black, as she has never silvered.


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## SaydeeMomma (Sep 9, 2008)

Saydee had no silver... yet. Her champion daddy stayed black and white and her momma was a chocolate parti. I do see a rich brown in Saydee's coat, particularly in the sunlight. It seems that the tips of her dark hair is black and then it kind of oscillates between dark brown and black, if that makes sense? It's sucg a fun experience to watch to coat change. I think it's just one of the things that makes the Havanese breed so special. They differ so greatly within the breed, not just in coat, but weight and build, and each variance is not only acceptable, it's embraced!


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## Missy (Nov 6, 2006)

Yikes Maya. But thanks I will keep that in the back of my mind, just in case. Sorry your maltese had all those problems. Maybe it is the antibacterial shampoo I have been using... The vet did say it may dry him out and to use conditioner which I did. I guess we'll see in a bit. It sort of feels like, you know how in sable havs they have a few little stiff black hairs, or in black havs the few stiff white hairs--- that is what it feels like except they are blacker than black... i am still curious of others experience.


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## Perugina (May 28, 2008)

You can see that Sophie lightened up a lot since puppyhood. The few black strands she has on her top coat are dryer and more coarse than here fluffy undercoat. My groomer wants to cut some of the dry damage hair down but I don't want her to because with sables the darker hairs may not come back dark.


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