My lab is 8 months old and his i think they are called dew nails just slightly up from feet are sharp on his front paws. How do i go about cutting them??? (or shall i take him to the vets for them to have a look and cut) his other nails are ok as he wears them down on the pavement when out for walks.
Can John or mattie advise please as they are in the know when it comes to labs.

Thanks
Carole

Dew claws are a nuisance, because as you've found out, they don't get worn down! In extreme cases of neglect they have been known to grow right round and back into the dog's leg. :( It's simple to clip them as long as you know how much to take off! Probably the best thing is to get the vet to show you how much to take off, then you'll be able to do it yourself in future. They'll probably need doing every couple of months.
:)

Thanks for that. Will take him for a trip to vets.

Carole

So much of claw clipping depends on the colour (Strange as it may seem!) Yellow Labs are the easiest because you can see the quick through the claw. It shows as a pinkie flesh colour in the claw. With Blacks the claw is opaque so you are never sure just where the quick is. With blacks it is a matter of trimming back by small amounts till you can see where you are.

Clippers come in two types. The guillotine type and the scissor type. I’ve used both but prefer the scissor type. The guillotine type have a hole that you put the claw in and I find that with a struggling puppy it is easy for the claw to get hooked up and this worries the puppy so making the puppy struggle even more.

Be positive! Don’t mess around. Take hold of the paw, make the cut and put the paw down. The longer you mess around the more it will worry the puppy. With a young puppy I only do one or two claws at a time then leave it until another day so I avoid too much stress.

Shorten the dew claws a little with a straight cut across the end but the claws on the toes you make an angled cut. The object is for the corner of the cut to be the bit which touches the ground rather than the flat of the cut (If you follow what I mean) That way the ground wears the claw fast and carries on shortening the claw from where you left off. If you look at the claw with the paw on the ground and draw a mental line forward and upward at 45 degrees that is the angle to cut at.

If the claws have got long don’t try to take it all off in one go. Take a little off and you will find that over a period of days the quick will retract and you can safely take a bit more off. If you take too much off then you will cut the quick and this will be painful for the dog and will bleed quite badly!

As Jeangenie said, it is a good plan to let your vet do it the first time so you can see what they do and how much they take off.

Best wishes, John

Carole,

If his claws are not long, just sharp, then you maybe don't need to cut them and could try to smooth off the edges with a metal nail file. I've never had to trim Monty's dew claws, his don't really seem to grow, but they do get snagged, so I get rid of the rough snags with a file. If they are growing though, John and Jeangenie's advice is spot on, because you don't want them to become overgrown. HTH

Monty's Mum :)

I tried cutting my dogs nails once...never again! He jerked, cut too short, blood everywhere. Rather pay $7.00 at the grommers!