How to Prevent Goldendoodle Matting?

How to prevent Goldendoodle matting and a few tips to help your Doodle looking great.

Matting is one of the common problems that you would notice in dogs with thick coats. Goldendoodles, with their long and thick coats, are no exception to this rule. This is a condition when the dog furs get entangled with each other, creating areas of masses all over.

All you need to do to prevent this problem is to brush the furs at frequent intervals properly. When you don’t do this, the masses become quite painful for the animal when you try to untangle them.

What are some of the tips that will help you in grooming and caring for your pet’s hair? Keep reading to know more about the same:

Frequent grooming

The Goldendoodle, with its long and thick coat, is definitely one of the cutest breeds of pet dogs across the globe. However, if you own one, you will understand that maintaining this coat is not an easy task at all.

The coats of these dogs can grow quite quickly. If they aren’t groomed well, this can lead to matting issues within no time. Matting causes a lot of pain and soreness to your pet dog; therefore, have to ensure that you brush the coats of the Goldendoodles every day.

If the coats are very long and thick, we would suggest you get them groomed and cared for by a professional groomer once in every 2 or 3 weeks, for best results.  You will need to use a good quality hair brush to comb your dog’s hair evenly every single day so that the fur doesn’t get tangled.

Frequent haircuts

Due to the complexity in maintaining the coats of these dogs, most of the owners of Goldendoodles ensure that they maintain a very short coat for their dogs.

Irrespective of the length of their coats, these dogs still look absolutely awesome and cute. You can opt for a short, medium or long coat, based on the time that you have on your hands to groom your dog.

When you maintain a short coat for your dog, you don’t have to brush it every day, thereby saving a great deal of time and effort. However, you should still get them cut, trimmed and shaved once in every 6 weeks or so to get rid of matting issues.

When you opt for a medium coat for your dog, you have to spend a reasonable amount of time and money on grooming products.  You have to brush your dog’s hairs once in a week and check for problem areas (such as behind the ears, neck, tail and in the armpits) to check for matting in the early stages itself.

Preventing matting in dogs with long coats

If you love the way your dog looks with its majestic long coat on,  you should be prepared to invest in quite a lot of grooming equipment and tools, especially when you plan to groom your dog yourself.  Goldendoodles with long coats require daily brushing.

You will need a poodle comb and a brush that are really soft so that they don’t cause pain or irritation to your dog when you use them on him. Goldendoodles can bleed very easily; hence, you have to be very sure that the tools that you use are sharp yet gentle on your pet’s skin.

Following the right brushing technique

Some people are quite alarmed to notice knots in the bodies of their Goldendoodles, even though they brush their pets’ fur and coat daily. This is because they don’t brush the hairs properly. Many people make the mistake of brushing only the external layer of the coat.

You will never be able to get rid of matting, this way. You have to ensure that you groom the hairs all the way, till the dog’s skin, so that you can be sure of removing all kinds of tangles from the body of your pets.

When you are grooming your pet’s coat, ensure that you make the procedure as convenient as possible for your pets. You could start with removing the simple knots with your fingers and then use a scissor to cut off the stubborn notes.  This will cause some pain and discomfort in your Goldendoodle; therefore, you need to do this very cautiously.

Washing your pet’s hair

If you have to avoid matting in Goldendoodles and other breeds of dogs, one of the first things that you need to do is to wash their hair properly. You need to use a Goldendoodle shampoo that is exclusively designed for puppies or dogs.

If you can spot tangles or knots or matting in your dog’s body, please ensure that you get them sorted out before washing off with a mild shampoo.

When you are blow drying your dog’s hair, you should use a dryer that is exclusively designed for him. Usually, these dogs will need a wash once every 3 weeks or so. However, if your Goldendoodle gets dirty too often or goes out too often for a stroll, you could wash him once a week.

An important point that you need to remember here is that shampooing alone can never prevent matting problems in dogs. Brushing is a more important task that you should focus on, to avoid knots and tangle.

Is it possible to prevent completely?

The above tips will only help you to control the occurrence of matting in your Goldendoodle. It is not possible to get rid of matting completely. When the puppy grows into an adult, he will start shedding his young coat so that he can grow a thicker and more mature coat than before.

This change of coat happens when your puppy turns about 9 to 12 months old.  The new, thick coat gets mixed up with the puppy’s already existing coat to form tangles and matting.

A good tip to follow at this stage would be to shed off your puppy’s coat completely.  The mature coat will grow back within a short time, without any knots. This way, you can also save a lot of time that you would have otherwise spent in removing these knots.