# ACK! Roscoe is starting to blow coat...



## galaxie (Dec 1, 2009)

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! My worst nightmare has begun. I'm pretty sure that Roscoe (creeping up on 10 mos) is starting to blow coat. He has been shedding more hair during our grooming sessions, and he seems to be getting matted much more easily.

I just received my order of IOD products, so I'm going to try them out tomorrow. I hope that the wonderful conditioner will make Roscoe's hair a bit more manageable!

What I'm wondering and hoping is that some of you might have some tips to help me stay sane throughout this process. I already groom him daily, and I'm going to start supplementing his diet with salmon oil to further promote healthy coat growth. Anything else I could/should be doing?

Edit: I suppose I should mention that he is a fairly straight, silky coat!


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## alicelc (Feb 6, 2010)

uh oh... the blowing coat phase. 
Is Roscoe fashioning the "puppy cut" do? I read from the forum that puppy cuts help (you probably already know this).
eh, I'm not very helpful...

Well, one good thing is you'll be spending more bonding time with Roscoe as you brush him more


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## HavaneseSoon (Nov 4, 2008)

Galaxie,

I started a thread of "Blowing Coat" when Dexter started in the earlier Spring.

http://havaneseforum.com/showthread.php?t=11162&highlight=blowing+tips

I posted updates and my results with Dexter when he blew his coat.


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## HavaneseSoon (Nov 4, 2008)

Needless to say........I ended up grooming Dexter into a shorter cut and this was about a month after Dexter had completed the blowing coat stage. 

So...........are you you willing to groom your dog and put in the time that is required? Is your pup going to stay still 30 -45 minutes in one setting?

Dexter looks better in a shorter cut and not having to comb 3-6 times a day is so wonderful!


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## DorothyS (Aug 11, 2009)

We blithely thought we would keep our two in long coats, and "how hard can it be?" Ha, ha! I thought, these guys aren't matting at all! Then we started finding mats as big as bird's nests, and we were brushing each dog twice a day for 30 minutes or more each time. We thought "we need a life, and so do these dogs." Off came a big percentage of fur. We're all so much happier now! I think they look great and they would rather be playing fetch with the monkey toy than being brushed.

So that's my take on the whole blowing coat thing!


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## KSC (Aug 6, 2009)

Yep - we groomed Kipling short too and in fact we like him better that way now that we're used to it. He's happier, we're happier and he feels like a chinchilla


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## waybrook (Sep 13, 2009)

KSC said:


> Yep - we groomed Kipling short too and in fact we like him better that way now that we're used to it. He's happier, we're happier and he feels like a chinchilla


Us too. Panda is now in a puppy coat - Phase 1 blowing coat was awful and she is now in Phase 2 of coat blowing at 13 months. She is MUCH happier short - grooming time is cut in half, and she doesn't run from me anymore when I get out the brush. Definitely the way to go IMHO (plus she looks so darn cute!).


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## clare (Feb 6, 2010)

Yep we cheat with Dizzie's hair,it looks fairly long,but has been shaved under his tummy and arm pits,as well as being thinned out,and lots off under/behind his ears.I love the way he looks and we are all happier with less work!Today we were on the beach and Dizzie was in and out of the sea and covered in wet sand,so it was bath time when we came home,the whole proses from start to blow dry finnish,took about 45 mins.


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## Evye's Mom (Dec 16, 2008)

Welcome to BC stage Natalie. It doesn't last forever, it only seems that way.


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## SMARTY (Apr 19, 2007)

BC happens in the best of families. It did in ours. I got to the point I dreaded petting Smarty for fear I'd find another mat.


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## KSC (Aug 6, 2009)

SMARTY said:


> BC happens in the best of families. It did in ours. I got to the point I dreaded petting Smarty for fear I'd find another mat.


So true! I got obsessive for a while...


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## galaxie (Dec 1, 2009)

Ehhh yeah, I'm just going to keep grooming him first thing in the morning and again in the evening. We are definitely not going to cut his coat short or anything...nooo way. I LOVE his long, silky, fluffy coat, and he looks sooooo handsome  I may cheat and clip his tummy and armpits, though. We shall see how bad it gets!


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## Rita Nelson (Jul 13, 2009)

We finally had Tucker's groomer do a puppy cut when he was blowing coat. Not because it was time consuming to brush and comb several times a day, but because I developed a severe case of tennis elbow. I find Tucker seems to enjoy the daily grooming sessions much more now. It must feel good to him because he lays still as long as I'm brushing or combing him.


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## krandall (Jun 11, 2009)

HavaneseSoon said:


> Needless to say........I ended up grooming Dexter into a shorter cut and this was about a month after Dexter had completed the blowing coat stage.
> 
> So...........are you you willing to groom your dog and put in the time that is required? Is your pup going to stay still 30 -45 minutes in one setting?
> 
> Dexter looks better in a shorter cut and not having to comb 3-6 times a day is so wonderful!


With a silky/straight(er) coat, (Kodi's hair is wavy/silky) you can get through blowing coat without marathon grooming sessions. I found that it was absolutely critical to COMPLETELY de-knot him before bed EVERY night, or we both paid the consequences.

Even when he didn't get combed out for one reason or another, I can only remember one time when I spent even 1/2 hour at a sitting on his coat. That was after I had been away for two weeks, and he had gone to the (ocean) beach several times with the person who was caring for him. She otherwise took great care of him, and he was happy as a clam, but he did come home with some dreadful knots.

Otherwise, our typical routine through blowing coat was a 10-15 minute comb out in the morning, and a 15-12 minute thorough comb out in the evening, just before bed. with this schedule, I never had to leave a knot "for later"... he was knot-free when I let him off the grooming table.

I know that those with Havs with more cottony coats often have a lot harder time, but it isn't that way for everyone, and since Natalie has said that Roscoe is the silky type, I wouldn't want to scare her. I was very worried about blowing coat because of all I read on the forum. But in actual fact, (espceially in the past tense:amen it wasn't so bad. We got through it, and I'm glad I stuck with it and kept his glorious coat intact.

(though just having returned from a week of rainy camping, I did have my moments in the last few days!)


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## krandall (Jun 11, 2009)

clare said:


> Yep we cheat with Dizzie's hair,it looks fairly long,but has been shaved under his tummy and arm pits,as well as being thinned out,and lots off under/behind his ears.I love the way he looks and we are all happier with less work!Today we were on the beach and Dizzie was in and out of the sea and covered in wet sand,so it was bath time when we came home,the whole proses from start to blow dry finnish,took about 45 mins.


Oh! I have to agree... Kodi is not a show dog. So for convenience sake, we shave his belly and arm pits. We haven't had to do anything with his ears. Still, unless you flip him over, you'd never know he's missing a strip down his tummy!


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## krandall (Jun 11, 2009)

galaxie said:


> Ehhh yeah, I'm just going to keep grooming him first thing in the morning and again in the evening. We are definitely not going to cut his coat short or anything...nooo way. I LOVE his long, silky, fluffy coat, and he looks sooooo handsome  I may cheat and clip his tummy and armpits, though. We shall see how bad it gets!


The main reason I clipped his belly is that I noticed that he likes to cool himself off by flattening out on the cool ground. I figured that for the summer, it gave him a little more room to cool off. I don't find that clipping his belly saves substantially on grooming... he didn't mat much there anyway. Armpits are a different story. They DEFINITELY collect mats, and the skin is very tender. I couldn't bring myself to comb those out. Clipping doesn't show there at all.


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## trueblue (Jan 22, 2008)

Oh God. I think Santos is blowing coat too! Since he's over a year old now, I thought maybe we just lucked out...nope. Thankfully the knots aren't hard to comb out, but they are massive....and they appear daily even though he's getting combed out daily. I totally understand the dreading petting...I feel the same way. I know this has been asked and answered already a million times, but how long does it last?


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## HavaneseSoon (Nov 4, 2008)

I survived through Dexter's coat blowing. I found most of the mats on the lower legs. Grooming was a job. I also dreaded finding another mat because I knew it would mean another 30 minutes of separating the mat apart. 

Dexter and Jack's hair are very different. I thought Dexter's hair was silky with some cottony areas until I saw Jack's hair. Jack's hair is a lot more silkier than Dexter's. Dexter has hair and he looked too poofy to me with his long hair. Jack's hair lays down...as soon as Jack's hair started putting on any length ...the hair was laying down close to the body. 

Dexter's coat blowing was not a nightmare, I am guessing because his hair was not cottony all over. If Jack's hair gets to the blowing stage without me cutting it down, his hair will be much easier to remove the mats compared to Dexter's. 

Make sure you have corn starch on hand to sprinkle those mats to make them easier to remove. Keep the hair clean by shampooing weekly and using a very good shampoo and conditioner. Make grooming sessions short and build up the mat sessions. Make the grooming a good experience and treat after the mat sessions.

You have to comb the hair to the skin to find those mats! Brushing only will not find the mats.


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## clare (Feb 6, 2010)

krandall said:


> The main reason I clipped his belly is that I noticed that he likes to cool himself off by flattening out on the cool ground. I figured that for the summer, it gave him a little more room to cool off. I don't find that clipping his belly saves substantially on grooming... he didn't mat much there anyway. Armpits are a different story. They DEFINITELY collect mats, and the skin is very tender. I couldn't bring myself to comb those out. Clipping doesn't show there at all.


Yes Dizzie likes to lay out flat on the cool kitchen tiles!!so that was another reason why we shaved his under belly!


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