It is not easy cleaning a big dog in the bathtub, especially when he starts shaking himself every 5 minutes. But as you can imagine, he is still very brave for sitting or standing in the bathtub for at least 15 minutes and lets the disaster pass by him until it’s over. Normally, we have a shampoo that is specifically for dogs, but most of the times we use baby shampoo, because it makes him smell like a big pile of baby floof. After we have tried to rub off any potential wetness (of course that’s impossible), he jumps out and shakes off even more excess wetness. In summer, we normally let him out on the balcony on his little bed with 2 towels for a few hours and give him a lot of treats because of how brave he was! In winter it’s a bit harder, as we don’t want to put him out in the cold for several hours, so we let him go on his bed with even more towels and try to watch him, so he doesn’t leave his bed until he is halfway dry. After 2-3 hours I decide that it’s time to blow-dry the pup and brush him once before we start the blow-drying session and once after. He does not quite like the warm air but he certainly loves to be brushed and starts leaning on me.
Twice a year, Balou gets a full make-over a.k.a. coming home as a bald little baby. As it costs a bit too much for us, we decided to buy a hair trimmer specifically for dogs. We still haven’t bought it, but we think that it would save up some time and money, because he is very well-behaved and lets you do everything. He does look very funny after a fresh trim, because he looks like he’s fully naked, but still has a big tail.
The hairdresser also trims his claws, cleans his ears and brushes his teeth. But as we do the same thing at home as well, we do not see the need of a hairdresser at this point.
