Matted hair on your dog?
First of all, don’t panic — if you have a Shih Tzu, sooner or later, you are going to encounter a little mat. It is when you realize that your sweet little Tzu has more than a little mat that doesn’t make people panic.
All dogs, even short-haired dogs, need to be brushed from time to time. Small breeds with coats that continue to grow present much larger grooming issues, especially those whose owners choose to keep their coats long.
Small matted dog hair can happen every day because your long-haired dog keeps shedding dead hair. This process of shedding is not like the breeds that leave hair all over your house. Rather, a long-haired dog sheds his hair in a coat that causes small mats to develop.
Cleaning the outer coat will make the dog look so good, but it may not look good at all the mats. Sometimes the only way to ensure that the dog has been thoroughly brushed it through the entire body with a metal comb.
Matted hair not only dishevels the coat, it actually adds to the dog’s distress and causes skin irritation. When this takes place, the dog bites its skin or wants to scratch, causing the mat to increase in size and the hair to get even more tangled.
A badly matted dog is not a happy dog. A dog that bites his skin continuously because of the large mats that have formed will also discolor the hair, leaving red stains. The stains are caused by the saliva in his mouth.
Small mats or nodes are easy to remove if the dog is brushed every day or even several times a week. Larger knots are formed when part of the dog’s coat has been ignored for some time.
Even with proper training and socialization in the grooming process, some long-haired dogs do not like parts of their body being brushed or trimmed.
Groomers will usually charge by the hour for removing mats, and so your bill can suddenly get high. So the best recommendation for a matted dog is prevention!
Source: PetGroooming
