Dog Hair

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I have a dog and his name is Rocky. He is a free range dog. He runs around as free as a bird and he likes that. I live in the country and dogs can run free. He is also an outside dog. I rarely let him inside the house. He doesn't mind the cold weather. He actually enjoys it and loves it when it snows. He develops a very thick coat of fur during the winter and this protect him. It is natural insulation. He has been up and about when the temperature drops to -20°F (-29°C).

But when the temperatures begin to rise after winter, this thick coat becomes too much for him. So I spent an hour grooming him today. Here is a photo before grooming.



This is the hair I removed.



And this is the after photo.



He is a Golden Retriever but he is a red golden retriever. He reminds me of an Irish Setter I had as a young man. He is a water dog - loves the water.

I think that’s pretty common for furred creatures, to develop a thick coat in the winter so they don’t get too cold an then shed it when the weather warms up and they don’t need it anymore. The horses at the place where I take riding lessons all do it.

Of course, then there are animals like my old cat KC, who would shed like that all the time. You could keep brushing and brushing and the hair would just keep coming and coming, I seriously wondered how she could possibly shed so much fur at once and not have any thinning/balding. She was a shorthair, but the vet we took her to was astonished that she was exclusively an indoor cat, both because of the shedding and because she had a double coat (her fur was about twice as long as a typical shorthair’s, I think is what that means, but she certainly didn’t even come close to being long-haired. And the double coat probably contributed to the shedding a lot.).

We always have one cat and one dog. I have to train them to be friendly towards each other. I once had a cat that was the breed of Maine Coon. It was a wonderful cat. The Maine Coon is a large and sociable cat, hence its nickname, "the gentle giant". The cat was unusual because it was a polydactyly, it had 6 claws on each foot. When it was a kitten, its paws were bigger than a normal size cat. It had the personality of a big cat (lion, tiger etc.). Most cats are afraid of dogs. But the Maine Coon even when it was a wee little kitten wasn't. If the dog got too close the kitten would take one swipe at the dog and the dog would take off running.

People tried to breed the polydactyly out of the cat. But a few survived and it was a treat to have such a cat.