Trimming Feet

Are you using regular scissors or thinning shears? Before I learned how to do feet properly, I was using regular scissors and it looked awful! You can pull the hair up from between the toes to trim, that is basically what the slicker brush does in my method. But if you use thinning shears then you don't end up with the funny straight line between the toes. Thinning shears cut the hairs at slightly different lengths so it looks more natural than if it were cut straight across with regular scissors.
 
I use people thinning shears. I bought them at London Drugs for about $15. You can get some dog ones at some pet stores. You can also get the professional dog ones, but they are way too expensive for my liking. :no:
 
GeeRome said:
I use people thinning shears. I bought them at London Drugs for about $15. You can get some dog ones at some pet stores. You can also get the professional dog ones, but they are way too expensive for my liking. :no:
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Duh! I never thought of using people shears. Talk about dense. :rolleyes2:
 
Thanks!

That was a fantastic tutorial! My main problem has always been trimming around the edge of the feet to achieve that balanced look. I will definitely attempt your way next. Now, any advice on ears and/or hocks? :biggrin2:
 
:lol: I am actually planning on doing an ear tutorial later this week! The boys had baths yesterday, and I will likely trim ears on Tuesday ... all in preparation for a big show coming up next weekend. I like to do the ears ahead of time so that if I notice anything unbalanced, I have a chance to fix it. :lol:

I'll post here with a new link to my blog when it is up. I'll toss in a quick explanation of what I do for hocks/front legs as well.
 
Thank You GeeRome!

I bought a pair thinning shears from Walmart just in case they happened to be decent but they wouldn't cut her fur. I'm going to have to look around a bit more.

In any case the little bit of fur I did cut didn't look very good. I recently learned that one of my neighbors is a hair dresser so I asked her for advice. I finally realized what my problem was (I simply wasn't cutting all of the fur, I saw how horrible it looked after a few cuts and would stop, all I really had to do was keep going. I also needed to hold the scissors straight) and she showed me how to do it. Your tutorial was right on the money, I was just getting discouraged before I was finished.

I haven't yet tried to do all of her feet, I'm sure they probably won't look perfect but they'll look better than what I was doing! Practice makes perfect I guess.

Thanks again :smile2:
 
YAY! Glad you are having some success!

It does take practice, but dogs are forgiving like that, so she shouldn't hold a grudge for too long over having messy feet! :lol:

The thinning shears are really amazing things. But you do have to snip a couple of times in the same spot to get all the hair short. It will avoid the straight-cut look that you get with normal scissors, though. That's the key!

Keep practicing, you'll get the hang of it :biggrin2:
 
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