# UNDERCOAT?



## Luciledodd

want someone to explain this undercoat thing to me. All of Rosie's hair is approx. the same length My little schnauzers had undercoats. It was a short soft hair and entirely different from the rough outter coat. I can't tell any difference in Rosie's hair. When she was a puppy, her coat was thin and silky. Then it begain to thicken up with more cottony hair and now it is now apparent difference. So how would one tell on an adult dog if it was double-coated?


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## Suzi

Luciledodd said:


> want someone to explain this undercoat thing to me. All of Rosie's hair is approx. the same length My little schnauzers had undercoats. It was a short soft hair and entirely different from the rough outter coat. I can't tell any difference in Rosie's hair. When she was a puppy, her coat was thin and silky. Then it begain to thicken up with more cottony hair and now it is now apparent difference. So how would one tell on an adult dog if it was double-coated?


 I have no idea I use that word for not knowing a better word. For me it is the puppy coat and the new coat coming in it is fuzzier. It doesn't really make since that it would be a under coat because wouldn't the adult coat be the hair that is stronger and it is the top coat that is falling out? I never see hair shedding either just fuzz when I brush. And a lot of the fuzz is from the mats.
Zoeys coat is getting really full and is a pain in the but to keep up with lately. I have been told she has a great coat By breeders at shows 
These pictures are what her coat looks like before brushing out. It reminds me of when I had a perm squiggle. I don't see a under coat either. Is squiggle normal? What does a silky coat look like? I was told Zoey is silky it doesn't seem silky to me. Do your Havanese have SQUIGGLES?


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## Luciledodd

Rosie has tiny corkscrews if I don't brush every day. I don't know about looks but her puppy hair just felt like silk then as it thckened up it felt more like cotton. But her head hair is still thin an silky. I don't do a top know because it breaks off so easily. 

Guess we will have to wait for the experts to weigh in.


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## TilliesMom

yes, Tillie's hair looks like someone took a crimper to it! LOL


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## StarrLhasa

From Wikipedia, quoting from Chapter 1, History of the Havanese: In Cuba and beyond, The Havanese, by Diane Klumb, published by BookSurge Publishing, July 10, 2006

Coat

The coat is long, soft, lightweight, and silky.[3]

The Havanese coat is slightly wavy, profuse, and undulating. Unlike other double-coated breeds, the Havanese outer coat is neither coarse nor overly dense, but rather soft and light. The undercoat is sometimes completely absent. The Havanese coat should be very soft, almost cool to the touch, like unrefined silk (compared to the Maltese coat, which feels like refined silk). However, in some dogs the coat can become too silky, looking oily. On the other end of the spectrum, Havanese coats can be too harsh or cottony, giving a frizzy appearance.

Because of the tropical nature of the Havanese, the fine and lightweight coat is designed to act as a sunshade and cooling agent on hot days. This means that, though the coat is abundant and may appear warm, the Havanese must be protected from the cold.

The coat can be shown naturally brushed out, or corded, a technique which turns the long coat into cords of hair, similar to dreadlocks in humans. This corded look may be difficult to achieve for the first timer, so it is always recommended that someone interested in cording their Havanese consults someone who has done it before.

Care

HavaneseThe profuse coat needs to be thoroughly combed at least twice per week. A Havanese with a dense or curly coat will be more prone to tangling and matting, thus requiring more frequent combing, than one with a silky, slightly wavy coat. If not showing the dog, it can be trimmed shorter to require less brushing. Many pet owners clip their dogs into a 1-2 inch long "puppy cut" for ease of maintenance.

If they go out in the snow, ice clumps will stick between their paw pads; just rinse off in warm water or buy booties. When you give them a bath, make sure to dry them. Some in shorter clips can blot and air dry, but most will need to be blown dry. You should also comb their hair out after bathing so as not to dry in mats. Use high air but low heat to protect their sensitive skin. Hot air can damage the skin.

Hair that grows on the bottom of their feet between the paw-pads needs trimming to allow traction on smooth floors. Some develop tear staining. A veterinarian might suggest treating red yeast issues to help diminish or eliminate staining; sometimes diet allergens are to blame and switching to a food without common allergens can be helpful. Excess tearing is sometimes a result of hair getting into the eyes; it is recommended that hair below eyes be allowed to grow out instead of shaved out. Havanese can wear a topknot or small braids to keep the hair out of their eyes during everyday activities.

As with any dog with dropped ears, the ears must be kept clean to help prevent ear infections. A cottonball can be placed just inside each ear before bathing to prevent excess water from entering in.


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## Kathie

Lucile, Abby has the thin silky hair on her head, too, and tends to break off. The very front has never gotten much over an inch and a half even though it's never been cut. I have heard that even the Havs with a double coat both of the coats have that very light textured hair. I'm not sure if Abby's is double or not since it is very thin - easy to groom, though.


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## Luciledodd

The first time I gave Rosie a bath, as soon as I wet her hair it seemed to disolve. My granddaughter was here and we both were intrigued. It was because there was no second coat yet and the hair was so fine and silky, it just seemed to disappear. She looked like a little spotted puppy then maybe a beagle. Now the hair is so thick that the skin can't be seen when wet. But I still don't understand DOUBLE-COAT.


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## Suzi

Luciledodd said:


> The first time I gave Rosie a bath, as soon as I wet her hair it seemed to disolve. My granddaughter was here and we both were intrigued. It was because there was no second coat yet and the hair was so fine and silky, it just seemed to disappear. She looked like a little spotted puppy then maybe a beagle. Now the hair is so thick that the skin can't be seen when wet. But I still don't understand DOUBLE-COAT.


 I don't either:frusty: Does someone have a picture of what it looks like?


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## Becky Chittenden

The "silk" dogs don't have as much undercoat as others. At least that is my experience, as all mine would have qualified as silk until my last breeding. They get it in time, but not right away. this hurt me in the conformation ring after the "split", but now mine are older and is no problem. when you cut down a coat, the waves appear more wavy or even curly. I have only two that I've cut down that don't do that and their coats had almost no wave to it. Hope this helps. Oh, when I bred my last litter, I was breeding for (not only) proper coats and the two I kept you can tell they have undercoat.


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## El Bueno Habanero

Luciledodd said:


> want someone to explain this undercoat thing to me....So how would one tell on an adult dog if it was double-coated?


Exactly my question too! And after all the answers here I still don't get it . How do you recognize undercoat? 
And I read different advises on different places....one says you can best remove undercoat, others say just the opposite! I know one show breeder who told me to remove Fedja's undercoat (he has tick coat). He is doing that with one of his dogs who has really profuse coat. And if I want to do this, how do I do it properly?


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## Luciledodd

Yeah, if you don't know what is undercoat, how do you remove it? I am still confused.


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## pjewel

With Milo, the undercoat is very visibly different than his very silky topcoat. Once, when I took him for a grooming, they thinned his undercoat and it caused me all kinds of problems with matting as it started growing out. I wouldn't do it again.


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## El Bueno Habanero

pjewel said:


> ...they thinned his undercoat and it caused me all kinds of problems with matting as it started growing out.


I don't see how they can only thin his undercoat out without touching his topcoat, as these two are so mixed together I believe this to be impossible, so in my opinion they just did plain normal thinning out (with scissors?), and I can understand why you had so much troubles with mats, when the hair started to grow out again.

The breeder I talked with never does this with scissors of any kind, he removes the undercoat by frequent brushing, but I'm not sure about the details/techniques here. Which brush, how do you know if it's the undercoat that you are removing while brushing...

When I groom Fedja I use a slicker brush as my very last tool (I make sure there's no single mat or tangle before using slicker otherwise you damage the coat!), and I do get some very fine hair out, so I suppose this has to be undercoat we're talking about?!


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## DonnaC

The whole thing is mystifying to me, too. When I first got Baxter, he seemed only to have this cottony stuff that you could see his skin through, and I thought either there was something wrong with him or the rest would come in later (and yes, when I gave him a bath, it just sort of dissolved). In the past couple of weeks, something new does seem to be happinging. I can't see his skin as much. The hair around his neck and on the top of his head is crimping when not brushed, and he's getting mats in his belly and leg hair. I have no idea what any of this means (he's getting his undercoat, maybe?) Also, his apricot highlights seem to be becoming more defined (I'm afraid to get him groomed -- afraid they'll get cut off and won't come back!)

Anyway, it's fun to watch!


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## jessegirl

Rollie has always had a cottony coat. The only parts of him that I'd call silky are some of his white spots (one lightning bolt on his head (although it doesn't look like a lightening bolt b/c his hair is so long now - should have named him Harry Potter), his neck ruff, and his tail tip), but everything else, including his white boots are cottony/fluffy/light. Interestingly, his silky white coat grows faster than the rest so you can see that his neck ruff is around an inch longer than the rest of his coat as is his lightning bolt. Weird. He's never been groomed. He also gets that wavy quality to his hair near the roots if he hasn't been brushed recently.


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## Luciledodd

I give up. seems no one can explain it. As for thinning out the undercoat, I think the tools like furminator, etc just cut off hair as it goes through. My Alsation had a double coat and it like the schnauzers was obvious. He had a long stiffer hair and then this soft short hair underneath. When he would shed in the spring it was the undercoat that shed. I could pick the clumps off of him like cotton. The long hair didn't remain. All of Rosie's hair is the same length and the same texture as far as I can see.


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## El Bueno Habanero

Luciledodd said:


> All of Rosie's hair is the same length and the same texture as far as I can see.


Not all hav's have an undercoat, so maybe Rosie is one of those hav's? 
But as far as I understand the hav's undercoat grows long too, just like the topcoat, so it's a different kind of undercoat than what you see in GS e.g. 
I found this somewhere on the net: 'The Havanese double coat is unique in that both the topcoat and the undercoat are soft and silky, rather than having a coarse and wiry topcoat with a softer undercoat.' 
This comes from another thread:


mellowbo said:


> I know that several months ago I used the furminator on Vinny and was delighted with the results. THEN I found out I was not suppose to remove the undercoat on a hav!
> Actually, his undercoat has now regrown about 2 1/2 inches and has not matted at all.Carole


And for me this is exactly what makes it so difficult. If all the hair gets long how do you know which hair is undercoat and which not? Maybe other texture, finer/thinner/softer hair? Agggrrrr...I give up!


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## Luciledodd

Me too. Lucile


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## atsilvers27

The undercoat on a Hav is not as obvious as say, a schnauzer or golden, and can grow out to the same length as the top coat. Some havs might not have an undercoat, so not only is the undercoat more difficult to spot, there may not actually be one present. There is one full coated pet Hav that I groom, and although his hair is actually quite thin, he does have an undercoat. It's kind of easy to spot once you look for it because its kind of color-coded: The top coat is a faded red color, and the undercoat, which is literally under and a little mixed in with the top coat, is mostly under the top coat. The top coat hairs are a little thicker and the undercoat hair is cream, softer and frizzier, and tends to mat up faster. On "shedding" dogs there are multiple hair shafts comming out of the same follicle, so there could be an undercoat hair, a top coat hair and a guard hair (on a triple coated dog!) all comming out of the same follicle. When you use a furminator brush on a husky, the thin teeth on the blade catch the thinner undercoat hairs but the guard hairs are too thick and not "loose" so just the undercoat comes out. On a hav, just combing with a fine metal come will get the undercoat out. If a dog's coat looks like it has the same consistancy throughout in terms of thickness and softness, it doesn't have an undercoat (think maltese or yorkie, both have a single coat and one hair shaft per follicle, however I think on breeds like Havenese, the both type of hairs have have separate follicles). Here are two pictures of dogs that have undercoat, one a Havanese and one a Tibetan Terrier. Both are difficult to spot but they do have undercoats. I groomed a different Tibetan Terrier once and it had very smooth, silky hair all over. It DID NOT have an undercoat!


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## Luciledodd

Thank you. It makes a lot more sense now. And I do use a fine comb on Rosie after I get her brushed free of matts. I always get a little fine hair then. Wish you were close so Rosie could get groomed that well.


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