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Grooming your Golden Retriever is a never ending process. The entire process should be down once or twice a week, and will take you around a ½ an hour of time. Brushing your dog while he is shedding will help to control shedding quite a bit. While outside, if your Golden Retriever manages to get burs or other defects in his hair, you should instantly take a few moments of your time and get the burs or other matter out of his coat.

When you groom your pet, you should always start with a good brushing. Brush his entire body, then once you have finished brushing you can switch to a comb to get out any loose hair that remains in the coat. While you are getting out the hair, you can also inspect your pet for ticks, fleas, and other types of skin ailments. If you wish, you can also check his ears and trim his nails as well.

Bathing your Golden is essential to grooming, and can be somewhat complicated. Before you attempt to give him a bath, you should always brush him first, to get rid of tangles. During shampooing, you should always use shampoos that are specifically for dogs, since human shampoo can dry a dog’s skin out. You don’t need to bathe your dog often, once every other week is good enough. If you properly maintain your Golden’s coat, you’ll find it’s much easier to clean.

To prevent matting, which is very common with Golden Retrievers, you should always make sure that you brush your pet on a daily basis. Metal combs and brushes work extremely well, and will help you to get a great deal of the hair out. Although some people choose to use scissors and cut the mats, you can easily injure your Golden if he happens to move or jerk. Scissors aren’t recommended, as brushing and proper bathing will help to prevent matting of the hair better than anything else.

When you cut your dogs nails, you should trim them a great deal, all the while avoiding going down into the quick. You should never let your Golden’s nails get too long, as long nails can easily take the shape of the dog’s foot, resulting in a splay. Therefore, you should always check your Golden Retriever’s nails and trim them every few weeks. If you trim them just right, you’ll have at least 2 weeks before they need to be trimmed again. If you do happen to trim the nails past the quick, bleeding will occur. To stop the bleeding, always keep some styptic powder on hand to make sure that you are prepared if you do make a mistake.

With other types of grooming, you should also make sure that you clean your Golden’s ears as well. They can get ear infections quite easily, if you don’t clean their ears on a regular basis. To get the best results and protect your pet from ear infections, you should clean his ears once a week using a quality cleansing solution. This way, you can rest assured that your Golden has healthy ears.

Grooming is an essential aspect to the health of every Golden Retriever. All it takes is a little bit of time from your day to groom your pet and keep him healthy. If you don’t have the time to groom your Golden, you can always take him to a professional. Whether you do it yourself or take your Golden to a pro – grooming is something that simply must be done.

Grooming Your Golden Retriever courtesy Dog Articles.

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By far the most common use of today’s Labrador is as a home companion, a role at which he excels. Surprisingly, the Labrador Retriever was rarely kept strictly as a house pet until several decades after the breed’s introduction to the United States. The initial fanciers of the breed became acquainted with him through knowledge of the shooting game. When the breed was well established as a sporting companion, his docile, brainy nature won his way out of the kennel and into the home.

The Labrador Retriever’s ability to quickly adapt and respond to instruction made the transition quite easy. Today, puppies raised in the home actually become so entwined in the lives of their owners that they often suffer when relegated to the kennel life. (If you are planning to keep a kennel of Labradors, select puppies that are properly socialized but still familiar with kennel life.)

As a companion, the Labrador Retriever is good-natured and gentle enough to accept the roughhousing of youngsters without returning it. If properly socialized while young, a Labrador will share his “home with another dog, providing there is enough affection for all. It is more common for a Labrador to misbehave out of jealousy than out of dislike for another animal.

Labrador Retrievers are long on self-control and loyalty, but they do not make the most avid watchdogs. As a rule, they are not overly suspicious of strangers or highly protective of loved ones, and when natural instincts are not stimulated they can be inattentive to such a task. Always keen for a scent or sound, a Labrador Retriever would certainly give voice at the approach of an intruder, but he might be won over by a friendly gesture or a luscious piece of sirloin. If left on duty, a Labrador Retriever may wander off in search of a scent that has caught his attention. In short, he is a people-dog. If you really need a watchdog, get your Labrador a German Shepherd friend!

The value of companionship with this breed should not be underestimated. In recent years, obedience-trained Labradors as well as other breeds are being used as Therapy Dogs to enrich the lives of nursing home residents and even emotionally disturbed children. The process is simple: a group of experienced dog handlers, such as those trained by Therapy Dogs International, bring their dogs to visit, perhaps put on an obedience performance for the audience, and then let animals and humans mingle, if conditions permit. The dogs are all obedience trained and have proven themselves to be extremely gentle and outgoing. Their job is to make people feel wanted, and it works wonders for alleviating the loneliness and depression that often burden such lives. Labradors love people and the few hours Therapy Dogs share with others enrich both dog and man.

Beloved Companion and Therapy Dogs courtesy Dog Articles.

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