I have my first Cavalier and she is delightful. She is 16 months old and I have had her for 4 months. My query is about her coat. She had what looked like a hovercraft skirt when I bought her: long, whispy strands growing from the top of her back and reaching to under her tummy. After a few weeks I trimmed this off with thinning scissors. It keeps growing back although not as long now as I whip it off before it gets long. Does anyone have any idea as to whether this is normal, whether she will "grow out of it" or whether that is how she will be? Not yet spayed. I don't see any other Cavaliers with coats like this but they are nearly all shaved to within an inch of their lives in this area (as is every other breed, including some Goldens!)  Show Cavs don't look like this and I don't really like the whispy look! However, if that is how she is, she is still adorable.

It's very normal; if you handstrip, the coat will grow harder and lie flatter. I'm unsure whether spaniels are carded through or not, but if so, this will help too as the coat will come through thicker. If those hairs are lighter in colour to the rest of her coat and a bit softer, they're likely to be undercoat; when I handstrip mixes that come through with similar whispy parts coming out of everywhere I strip them out.

If you don't want to handstrip, then clipping would be the other option. You don't necessarily need to scalp the poor love, and it will make the coat softer, so inevitably, lay less straight.

Hope that helps!

Some coats have the long stringy hairs look and this comes from certain lines.

A Mars Coat king will help keep the upper body free from these 'drapes' and give her back her body shape.
Look here for the size Id recommend    http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/NEW-MARS-COAT-KING-16-BLADE-DOG-GROOMING-FREE-P-P-/360399728290?pt=UK_Pet_Supplies_Dogs&hash=item53e97f6ea2

Please dont strip or clip her, you will regret it....the silky feeling will be lost.

You should neither clip nor handstrip a Cavalier, their coats should be free from all trimming. A quick run through with a coat king is the most I have ever done on a show one. Pet ones I just trim the feathering - don't suppose you're in Suffolk, I'd be happy to show you a nice easy pet trim! However if she does just have a few wispy bits you can trim them off, if you don't want her to have a skirt it's not a problem if you're not showing. Please don't let a groomer anywhere near her with clippers though, it will RUIN that nice flat coat, and it will grow back all woolly and curly. The same thing is quite likely to happen if you do get her spayed, you can almost always spot a spayed or neutered spaniel as they have thick (often matted) woolly coats, are often very fat, and the hair grows in all sorts of odd places like shoulders and neck that are usually somewhat shorter.

ETA lol Tooolz, we were typing at the same time there!

Thanks for the advice. I would never strip or clip any dog. I just love to spend time combing or brushing them. I'll certainly look at the Coat King (very expensive.) I didn't get her for showing , she is too heavily marked anyway, but I do admire the presentation on the show Cavs. They are one of the very few coated breeds which are not over-trimmed and I would like her to look nice with a flat but thick coat. The show ones don't appear to have the skirt. Not near Suffolk but many thanks for the offer.  My little girl obviously does not want to look and smell nice: she rolled all along her back & under her neck in fox poo today. Still smells now, even though I washed it off.  She will be spayed, as are all my Goldens, and not one of them has gone to fat as they are so well exercised and food adjusted to allow for the neutering. I hate fat dogs! (Well, their owners!)  Most of my Goldens developed lovely thick coats after spaying. I hope she does the same.

I'm so sorry; I really thought this breed was stripped! I had no idea they were kept that beautiful just by breeding alone, as so many other Spaniels are stripped!

My mistake, and now I feel soooo silly! (This is why I'm still in training, lol!)

All these things are breed specific and you cant be expected to know them all.

Another Vote here for the Coat King :-D

Yes, they are expensive.  But they pay for themselves in a very short time and you won't need to buy another unless you lose it ;) 

I introduced a friend to them recently for her spaniels and she couldn't believe how quickly their coats were dealt with.  They looked lovely after and kept their lovely waterproof/dirtproof coats and feathering too :-D

Though t hey are not traditionally stripped for the show ring, there is NO reason you cannot hand strip, it IS good for the coat, it thins it out and you can control the length as well as the density, and it encourages a good healthy coat to grow back.

I bit the bullet a few months back and stripped out my bedlington  x whippet - he is 9 now and I have resisted because I really thought I would end up with a bald dog, but I haven't, though I did need to be careful (his coat is rubbish, really fluffy and very few guard hairs, mostly just overgrown undercoat!).

As it is growing back and I am keeping on top of it, it is growing back MUCH nicer and I really wish I had done this years ago.

I also strip my staffie x wire haired thing, my Deerhound, and my Saluki x Afghan. In fact the only dog I do not strip is the Tibetan Terrier, but I could if I wanted to! I don't strip all the above out completely (the staffie x wire haired thing I do, the other two its just to tidy up!), just enough to keep their coats healthy and tight and nice.

I need to study more, me thinks!

Done with Coat King, nothing else touched, coat like silk..... http://www.verheyen.co.uk/tweed.php

Ditto for my Henry.... http://www.luphen.org.uk/public/2003/2003windsorchampshow.htm

Beautiful, both of them!

Em,

The dogs you are talking about have different coats to Spaniels ;)    Also with crosses it can be hit and miss as to what treatment their coats need to keep them in good condition.   From the breeds you mention as involved in their breeding it seems to me that the Bedlington/Whippet would likely have a soft, broken coat which might benefit from stripping, but I'd try a Coat King and try to leave some length and guard hairs but lose the thickness and dead stuff.   The StaffieXWire-Haired - likely Broken Coat,  the Deerhound - Broken Coat, so stripping again.  Saluki x Afghan - depends on the breeding and which breed the dog favours ;)

I lightly stripped my long coated Afghan X coat once, thinking it would improve it.        How Wrong I was!       And it took over a YEAR before it looked the same as before stripping and two years before he really looked good :(    Thereafter I just removed undercoat and he always looked really good and was waterproof and glossy.

As with Clipping, it's possible to strip almost any breed, whether you should is another matter ;) many coats are not improved by it as they aren't the right texture/type ;)



 

Though t hey are not traditionally stripped for the show ring, there is NO reason you cannot hand strip,

There are very good reasons that you can't! Cavaliers do NOT have the same coat as for instance Cockers. If you left a Cocker coat alone it would grow and grow, a Cavalier coat does not.

I tried stripping a Cocker the other month...what a nightmare. I thought coat kings cut the coat , so I didn't use one, it took me FOREVER to even make a dent in that coat with my knife.

I have a breed that has a hard, terrier-like jacket so most dogs are stripped completely out ten weeks before a show. Some strip completely bald (I do this, brings the coat through much better and I can keep on top on undercoat with a stone as it comes through) as a baby's butt two months before. I prefer to strip the terrier mixes we get into the salon I train at, which are mostly Border mixes. We just take out enough to make them look smart but don't take it too far down as most owners like their dog with the ruff around their necks, etc., and just want them to look a bit neater.

We do clip stripped breeds if the owner asks for it; mostly Spaniels, Cockers, Cavvies, and Springers. It isn't through laziness; most of them come through with coats that haven't been bred for show, they're cottony and thick, wavy, and matt terribly so we just clip them and keep them smart, and the owners are very happy with it. No to mention the Cavapoo or Cockerpoo mixes we get through, which are so thick-coated it would be neigh impossible to strip.

Wee bit off topic there, sorry!

I love stripping terriers, I used to have a Westie back when I was working at my old house I stripped and 2 Borders. In my new place I have 3 Norfolks and a Border. Unfortunately the w/h daxies and the other Border I have had all been clipped for many years and are quite elderly, so no point at this stage trying to salvage. I use a Coat King on my American cocker and also on neutered spaniels. I consider I am fairly good at stripping terriers, but stripping spaniels seems to be completely different, someone once said that it is really called carding and they just comb with a stripping knife or coat king to remove undercoat rather than literally stripping dead topcoat. The owners of the cockers I do generally like them clipped, even when I've used the Coat King the first few times they've eventually ask for a short clip. But then most of the dogs out here seem to be clipped pretty short all over!

I have to say here, though, that Cavaliers are not spaniels. They are toys. They might have the spirit of a gundog (mine KNOWS that she is a Golden, albeit a smaller mis-coloured version) but a toy's coat surely should not be treated like a spaniel's coat.

They most certainly are spaniels. They are in the toy group, but that's irrelevant - you don't treat a Maltese coat like a Bichon coat, and they are both toys. You don't treat a Retriever coat like a Cocker, but they are both gundogs. It's the coat type that's important, not what group that particular breed is in.

Disagree, sorry - stripping is just pulling out the longer, older guard hairs - any breed that has those, you can strip - you probably couldnt strip the poodley coated breeds, and you would not need to do it with really fine or flat coated breeds say, whippets (though IF you could seperate out the guard hairs from the others you theoretically could).

Whether it will LOOK as nice.. thats a matter of aesthetics, but yes you COULD strip out some of the longer hairs on a Cavalier - it is just hair, it grows, it is dormant, it falls out, it grows again.

My saluki x afghan has a smooth dense saddle, and then silky ears, and then she explodes into soft soft fluffy stuff - I strip out the stuff on her head which looks silly and tidy up the areas down her flanks, shoulders, chest etc.

stripping is just pulling out the longer, older guard hairs

Traditionally, stripping relies on stripping out hairs that are ready to come out.  The coat can be tested to ensure that only dead hair is stripped out and in many breeds you can see the progression along the body of where the coat is ready - it's most obvious in puppies changing their coat.  

In long haired breeds the long hairs grow for much longer so it's best to leave them to fall out naturally and through normal grooming.  Otherwise the coat will take forever to grow back properly - as I found out to my cost.

As I wrote previously, most breeds can be stripped, it's a different matter as to whether they should be stripped ;)  For some it could be painful to have hairs ripped out if they aren't ready or aren't meant to be stripped :(   Have you ever had your legs waxed?

Regarding Whippets and other short haired breeds, a rubber glove/comb will do the job of stripping out dead hairs very nicely and will only take out dead hairs leaving a glossy healthy coat.