The legs and feet of your pet do a lot of work and need regular care to stay healthy. The feet, in particular, require regular examination to ensure that nothing compromises your pet’s ability to walk and run. Grooming the legs can prevent injury, so it is important to train your pet to allow leg and paw handling. Building up positive (pawsitive?) association in your pet will go a long way to making grooming time easier.
If you want to maintain some or most of your pet’s long hair, daily grooming is essential. Most sensitive pets object less to brushing or combing. Whatever works for your pet, do it – every day! It takes only a few minutes to quickly brush through the ‘trouble’ spots where mats form. However, if you are trimming the hair back regularly, read on:
Grooming the Legs
Forelegs
If you start at the top of the foreleg with a long haired pet, you’ll notice that the fur around the elbows and the ‘pits’ can be a location for mats. Keep these areas combed and clipped down and you will worry less about mats and hotspots forming. The long fur on the forelegs can be trimmed back or just shaped. If your pet mats frequently, it is usually best to trim this fur closely against the foreleg.
attachments to prevent nicks and keep the trim uniform.
Hind Legs
The hind legs should be brushed out completely before attempting clipping. Pets with thick hair on the back of their hind legs can acquire all manner of debris in the course of sitting or moving about, so it is better to ensure that the only thing you are clipping is hair.
Start at the bottom and work your way up, just as you would
the body. Go very slowly through thicker hair, as too much hair will just interfere with the scissors’ ability to make a clean cut. It is sometimes a good idea to ‘rough cut’ areas of thick hair – get rid of the bulk of hair first and then clean up the trim afterwards.