The Dog's Owner Guide to Stop Excessive Shedding
Excessive dog shedding can become a major headache. How many hours do you spend to clean clumps of dog hair stuck to your clothing?
While you can't stop dog shedding altogether, there are many simple, natural methods to help minimize excessive shedding in your home.
1. Keep Your Dog Hydrated: It might seem like a trivial thing, but a lack of fresh, clean water can lead to some serious complications for pets. Signs of dehydration include a dry mouth, panting, sunken eyes, dry mouth, lethargy, loss of appetite, depression and excessive dog shedding.
Give your dog Pedialyte when you notice one of the previously mentioned dehydration's signs. Formulated for babies, this solution is a great first aid against dehydration and can quickly replace minerals like potassium and sodium.
2. Add a Health Oil to Your Dog's Diet:
Coconut Oil: Coconut oil is one of few foods that can be categorized as a "superfood." Coconut oil has a plethora of benefits that are beneficial both to humans and pets. Coconut oil can help aid your pets' digestion, help flea allergies, reduce allergic reactions, improve and create sleek, glossy coats, prevent infection and much more. Now the question is how much coconut oil you should give to your dog? When starting your dog on coconut oil, it is important to start slowly in the beginning. Give 1/4 teaspoon per day for small dogs and for large dogs you can give 1 teaspoon per day. As the dogs' body has adjusted, you can increase the intake to about 1 teaspoon per 10 pounds of body weight daily.
Flaxseed Oil: Flaxseed oil is an excellent natural treatment to improve the coat and skin conditions of some pets. Add a small amount of flaxseed oil to your dog's diet, and after a few weeks, you should see the change in your dog's shed.
Fish Oil: Fish oil contains EPA and DHA and omega-3 fatty acids that can help to treat many health problems in dogs. Veterinarians use fish oil to treat dog allergies and a wide variety of conditions ranging from kidney disease to arthritis. Fish oil can also help reduce excessive shedding by relieving itching due to an allergy-related skin condition. How much fish oil you should give to your dog? As a general rule, you should give 1,000 mg per 30 pounds of body weight. As for combatting more serious health problems, you can up the dosage to a maximum 1,000 mg per 10 pounds of body weight.
3. Brush Your Dog
Regular brushing is still one of the best options to keep the amount of hair your dog sheds to a minimum as brushing helps remove loose fur before it has a chance to rub off and stick to your furniture. Before you brush your dog, it is important to pick the right brush first. There are different types of dog brushes that you can find at your local pet store or online, each with its own function designed to serve different dog's type and needs. For example, a bristle brush works best for short-haired dogs, a pin brush works best for a dog with long, wavy fur.
4. Bathe Often
Frequent bathing is a great way to get rid of excess hair. As a general rule, you should bathe your dog twice a month with shampoo and conditioner. To reduce shedding, I would recommend using an oatmeal shampoo. This shampoo will help clean your dog's coat without drying the skin and rejuvenate a lackluster haircoat. If your dog's fur tends to mat, follow up the bath with detangler. Be sure to brush your dog thoroughly before the bath to remove as much hair as you can. After bathing, towel dry your dog and blow-dry his coat with the lowest heat setting. As you dry your dog's coat, you can use a brush to help remove loose hair. Keep brushing and drying until your dog is no longer damp. After you have finished drying, brush your dog thoroughly once again. A lot more hair will come out at this stage.
5. Prevent Infestation of Fleas
Fleas, ticks, and mites can seriously impact your dog's health with symptoms that can manifest themselves in forms of bald or thinning spots, rashes,
and open sores... the symptoms that ultimately lead to excessive dog shedding. If you've noticed your dog suffering from any of these things,
you can try these fleas home remedies: herbal flea spray, baking soda,
dish soap, lemon spray, rosemary, and flea repelling plants (lavender,
Penny Royal, and spearmint).