I am feeling a bit paranoid.
How often do people here bath there dogs?
When I had my Labrador I cant remember her ever needing a real bath at all, she swamin the sea almost daily, and was brushed with a mitt.
My two Australian terriers are bathed approximately every 2 months.............Why are other folk with small dogs doing weekly baths?
Am I a bad dog mother?

Karen

Mine only get a bath if mucky, after seasons the girls will get their tail ends washed otherwise it is just grooming.

Dunno - I bath my Tibetan Terrier as infreqently as possible, somewhere between once a month and once every three months.  My afghan x saluki gets bathed as little as possible because she hates it and therefore so do I, once every six months really..

The Deerhound is five and has been bathed twice in her life, and the other two (small staffie x terriery job, taller bedlington x whippety job) whenever its absolutely unavoidably necessary, ie, fox poo incidents.

There does seem to be a trend in washing dogs frequently though, and I wonder if people are noticing that some dog foods make their dogs STINK, but are addressing it in the wrong way?

My eldest dog, aged 13, has only needed one full bath in his life. He has his feet washed when they're muddy, and I've spot-washed areas where he's rolled in yucky stinky stuff, but other than that ... no, it's not been necessary. My others have only been bathed before some shows (not all).

How often do people here bath there dogs?

Eh? Was I supposed to bathe them?!!

Rarely is the answer ... only when I have to ... basically when they've had a really good roll in badger or fox poo, the sort of roll that gets it well rubbed in and refuses to come off with the hose pipe :-D

Ive never bathed my three,aged 3,nearly 2 and 15months,and dont intend to unless they roll in something nasty!

> How often do people here bath there dogs?

Er, never.  I spot wash fox and badger poo with the hose and hibiscrub and use a warm bucket of water if it's needed.  I also rinse mud off outside with the hose or bucket after every walk, even in the winter.  None of mine have ever seen a bath

>Why are other folk with small dogs doing weekly baths?

Are they really?  What on earth for!?  Perhaps they're bored :)

After a fortnight my Papillons will stink and will not be nice to have on your lap. I try to get each bathed every week. It makes a huge difference, not the least of which being that the coat is a lot easier to look after when clean -it does not matt even half as easily as when it is dirty. You can tell by just stroking the dog how recently it has been bathed. (They need a lot of conditioner as well as shampoo.) The two entire males need far more baths as they pee on themselves -the drawback of long coat. So that's 2 to 3 baths a week for them.

Same with Persian cats although they don't need bathing as frequently, but you can tell that when they matt too easily, it is time for a bath. Plus of course before a show.

The Malinois stay cleaner due to their short coats, and although we have one that does, not many sit for any great lengths of time on your lap! But I can't stand stroking a dog and coming away with a dirty hand afterwards. Even so, dirt doesn't stick too easily to them so they tend to get baths before the most important shows (ticket shows) but not before all shows, so perhaps one bath every 2-3 months.

There does seem to be a trend in washing dogs frequently though, and I wonder if people are noticing that some dog foods make their dogs STINK, but are addressing it in the wrong way?

My Paps are 100 % raw fed. :)

My eldest dog, aged 13, has only needed one full bath in his life.

It's impossible to compare very shortcoated breeds with very long coated breeds of course. I think rescues, groomers etc would see a lot less badly matted dogs if people learnt that the key to keeping them matt free and easy to groom is to keep them CLEAN. Just like our own hair mats easier when dirty and is harder to comb through, so does long dog coats.

>Just like our own hair mats easier when dirty and is harder to comb through

Unless you're very brave and stop washing your hair completely. :-) A friend of mine did this, and after a couple of months her hair looked fabulous - glossy and easily combable but not remotely greasy or smelly. After a year she grew tired of the experiment and reverted to washing it, but it never looked as good again.

I wash the Cavaliers every 2 - 4 weeks when we have a show to go to, and the American cocker about once a month, unless anyone rolls in fox poo! Washed everyone at the weekend and am enjoying the lovely clean soft smelling fur. :-)

Mine are all high-grooming, so the clipped ones get a bath when clipped and trimmed, so every four weeks. My show bitch is at least weekly on her furnishings, as they need conditioning. Her jacket is wire and has never been bathed before, any dirt brushes off, and her skin is healthy through regular carding.

> My eldest dog, aged 13, has only needed one full bath in his life. He has his feet washed when they're muddy, and I've spot-washed areas where he's rolled > in yucky stinky stuff, but other than that ... no, it's not been necessary

Same here - one 14 year old, short-coated, probably bathed twice and one 10 year old long-haired, maybe 3 or 4 times - otherwise just spot washes when necessary. Both have clean, shiny coats and smell healthily doggy rather than of shampoo :) :) :)

Unless you're very brave and stop washing your hair completely. :-) A friend of mine did this, and after a couple of months her hair looked fabulous - glossy and easily combable but not remotely greasy or smelly. After a year she grew tired of the experiment and reverted to washing it, but it never looked as good again.

I've heard about this but it's meant to be hard to start with as it gets worse before it gets better -don't think I could stand it. :)

The difference with longcoated dogs though is, they will get muddy/dirty every time they go outside when it is wet, we of course won't get mud in our hair just because it rains, hence the dog's coat will get a lot dirtier. Some of mine have their coat literally an inch off the ground so it doesn't take much.

Unless you're very brave and stop washing your hair completely. :-) A friend of mine did this, and after a couple of months her hair looked fabulous - glossy and easily combable but not remotely greasy or smelly. After a year she grew tired of the experiment and reverted to washing it, but it never looked as good again.


I think this depends on who you are as i have 2 very riffy friends and i can asure you they dont wash for years at a time and you can most definatly tell :p

I think it is part of being a responsible dog owner to ensure your dogs coat is in good condition and unfortunatly with long coated breeds and my spitz that means regular bathing to get all the dead skin out,, i can always spot a spitz that isnt well groomed as it not stop scratches.

> they will get muddy/dirty every time they go outside when it is wet

Of course, but with mine the dirt falls off once dry leaving the coat just as before :) Of course she is taller than your little ones, so doesn't get muddy all the time, but when our garden was a building site she got muddy (very muddy) every time she went into the garden (as did Bramble) and there was no way I could bath her to get the mud off. She gets a good towel off and that is it. She is restricted to one area (that is easily cleanable) until she is dry. A good brush removes everything anyway and she does not scratch at all :) :) :)

If you just towel dry and brush a Papillon it will after a while turn more and more grey instead of white. It's simply a case of not all breeds are the same so cannot be treated the same as far as bathing goes. :)

I don't usually bath mine, just give them a wipe over with a damp cloth and a good brush down.
Paula

Fred is bathed every 6 weeks at the groomers and occasionally I will bath him inbetween appointments if he gets smelly (although that isnt very often)

I was just about to say, I thought it was more the 'clipped' breeds that needed bathing.  Cockers, lhasas, poodles, that sort of thing.  I know my dogs that don't get clipped/scissored are bathed very infrequently but my trimmed dogs need bathed before as it would blunt my blades if they had any dirt in the coat.
My cockers get bathed every 6 weeks and my springer&GSD have been bathed about twice their whole lives!! I know which I prefer!!lol

Mine get bathed when they roll in something stinky and also before any Ch show too.. I won't put a dirty dog under a judge, for me its a form of rudeness.. But we are all different and my dogs walk through mud and all sorts most days.

There was a dog last year that was so filthy the judge had to stop to wash Germany hands!

I won't put a dirty dog under a judge, for me its a form of rudeness..

I agree and when I said before that I tend to bath before a show with tickets, I should perhaps clarify that with that this is enough for the Malis (Paps of course get bathed the day before every show) so that they are clean enough for the shows in between. I too would not put a dirty dog under a judge and it doesn't have to LOOK dirty, but again it is when you spend time stroking it you notice. I remember a judge writing in one of the dog papers once about how he came home with grey shirt cuffs after judging as so many of the dogs had not been bathed. That is not pleasant when you have to touch so many dogs.

Oh no that should say dirty my stupid phone auto corrected it.
Could admin please correct it as to late to edit

Lol I was looking at that trying to work out what the auto correct had done! :-D

> Could admin please correct it as to late to edit

No please don't it's the funniest thing I've read in ages :)

...my niece once told me she'd been learning about the Germans, when I asked what she'd found out she advised that "it was very important to wash them off your hands after going to the toilet"  !!

Lol, I've been sat sweating thinking how did I not notice and what will people think lol teach me for using my phone andnot checking.

There was a dog last year that was so filthy the judge had to stop to wash Germany hands!

I can't believe how many times I read that trying to make it right, I ended up thinking " I knew I had a lot to learn about dogs etc but I must get a book with all the different kinds of dogs in " And what exactly do the judges do, it was such a relief when I scrolled down I just keep giggling now lol thanks 😄

I have a GR - 7 years old  now - so a long and double coat and he has only been washed with shampoo 3 times in his life. He does have mud rinsed off after most walks in the winter and is also spot washed when he rolls in something undesirable. I groom him on a regular basis with brush and comb and he has a  very clean coat. He does swim a lot but not always in clean water but the dirt tends to fall out of his coat as he dries and a good brush and comb gets him looking good again.

Regular grooming stops any matts forming and I have to make sure that all burrs etc are removed following each walk - huge amounts of them stick to him at this time of year. He lies down and presents various parts of his anatomy to me to remove thistles etc when we come in from walks and then he is ready to go out and collect the next lot :-)

Our short haired small dog has only had 1 bath in his life and very rarely needs to be rinsed off as the mud seems to have disappeared from him by the time we have got back to the car but he too needs spot washing when he has liberally daubed himself in eau de Reynard :-)

> in eau de Reynard

C'est mieux en francais :) :) :)

I thought it was something to do with German judges...

I think it has something to do with shedding V non-shedding breeds.  My dogs have all been fine with only being bathed if they have rolled in something smelly.  Or if they have a rear-end runny incident.  ahem.

But I've met some really really stinky poodles.  Like made me gag when within 2 feet of them.  They were not owned by unclean people, in fact one of them was a toy poodle owned by a hairdresser.

I think perhaps non-shedding breeds produce serum and also don't shed and replace hairs, so what is there, stays there unless washed out.  Is that true?  Do people with poodles and non-shedding breeds agree they are stinkier if not washed?

I bet most of the dogs that are not bathed also have a very strong doggy odour, i am always suprised by the difference between mine and my spitz friends homes compared to alot of my friends short haired dogs homes with smell, it always hits like a wall and although i think mine have a minimal smell i bet my none doggy friends come in and can smell them but not as strong as others. I can also tell when say we are at open shows like lichfield and when i walk through the hall with all the wroking breeds it nearly knocks me out :)

Nope - the dogs don't smell remotely doggy, which is one of the things I like about the breed. I hate a doggy smell. :-)

> I bet most of the dogs that are not bathed also have a very strong doggy odour

Depends what you mean by a strong smell :) Mine smell if they get wet - until they dry. If put my nose right up against them, then they smell doggy :) But that is what I expect from a dog - I don't expect to smell shampoo and conditioner :) :) :) One of my dogs is lying against my chair and I can't smell her :) :)

I wasn't really thinking of the dals as i must confess when your by us ive never noticed a pong, only lots of wagging tails!

Depends what you mean by a strong smell :-) Mine smell if they get wet - until they dry. If put my nose right up against them, then they smell doggy :-) But that is what I expect from a dog - I don't expect to smell shampoo and conditioner :-) :-) :-) One of my dogs is lying against my chair and I can't smell her :-)

You can't smell shampoo on mine either but i can't really smell anything on mine apart from when they come in they smell like clothes after theyve been on a line on a cold day lol.

> xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">Do people with poodles and non-shedding breeds agree they are stinkier if not washed?

Fred really doesnt smell (and thats not me being biased). If he gets filthy dirty or rolls in something smelly i would have to bath him between appointments but i think the groomer bathes him for the ease of cutting purposes not because he needs it. If he wasnt bathed it wouldnt matter smell wise. Not sure how long he could go without a bath as I've never tried it :-)

> xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">C'est mieux en francais :-) :-) :-)

ça ne sent pas tout mieux  :-)

I've not noticed mine smelling (unless they've rolled....) and friends who visit have said the house is surprisingly non dog smelly considering we have 4. I like it when they're freshly bathed and smell of shampoo and warm clean dog when I bury my face in their fur for a cuddle. :-)

> ça ne sent pas tout mieux 

:) :) :) Mort de rire

>I wasn't really thinking of the dals as i must confess when your by us ive never noticed a pong

As I say, it's a breed characteristic. :-)

I think what makes houses smell is the more fabric you have around:  The more fabric sofas (rather than leather), the more carpets (rather than wooden floors), the more dog blankets (or the less they are washed) and so on.  Whenever I start to notice a faint doggy smell, it's never the dogs I clean to get rid of it, it's their blankets. 

No, mine are not bathed unless they roll in something and they don't smell at all doggy.

I also think the food is very relevant, as is whether they are feeling a bit ill - I've noticed doggy smell increasing at times they've been eating a crappy food or feeling ill.

Our Spitz breed in common with most don't have typical doggy odour, yet don't need frequent baths either, should have a close fitting (rather than open/stand off) double coat that shrugs of dirt.

The only time they really need bathing (unless rolled in something) is to remove staining if you have red soil, or to help the moult along.

I have no carpets at all, only leather furniture, and the dogs are fed raw -but the male Paps will stink within 3 days of a bath as they wee on themselves. And occasionally on others....

I have a red and white breed :-)

They get their whites washed before every show (apart from the crazy week we did 5 shows in 8 days) and a full bath maybe every four months. It depends on what they have been doing the day before--my youngest boy loves a full body mudpack and has an uncanny sense of timing :-))))

I use organic shampoos and conditioners and they get sprays of mink oil on a regular basis. They are raw fed and if I say so myself their coats look very good indeed

Marianne my chins are exactly the same as your paps! I wash them before every show,even if only a week apart,as they always have yellow bellies and like yours will actually pee on each others heads.

A chin that hasn't been bathed before a show will stand out a mile against a freshly bathed one,coat looks greyish,especially at indoor shows with the false light.

I was at Darlington last weekend and so the dogs were bathed and will be again on Saturday as we have another show on sunday

My friend has affies and as they are required to have a harsh coat they are never bathed. I think the oldest at 12 has only ever had a handful of baths in her life.

I really don't think one size fits all in this debate but that basically it comes  down to breed,coat type and whether the dog is a show dog or not.

My cavs who are agility dogs get only 2/3 baths a year unless they've rolled in something unpleasant