Most dog owners, lovers or those who have spent much time around puppies will recognise that beautiful sweet scent puppies have! This “new puppy smell” is a result of drinking their mother’s milk. However cute this smell may be at first, unfortunately, it soon disappears! So once that sweet scent has diminished, what are you left with? Well in Ronnie's case, you're left with a very stinky little puppy! Ronnie is a 10-week-old Doberman Cross Border Collie, a joyful bundle of love that has left his older brother Rolo, who is an 8 year old Doberman Cross Border Collie, questioning what he ever did to deserve having this puppy inflicted into his peaceful life.
Although he looks very clean and shiny, Ronnies favourite pastime is rolling, sleeping or digging in the gardens flowerbeds!! So, it is safe to say, that “sweet puppy smell” is long gone and now he sometimes smells like soil! Which can only mean one thing… Bath time!
Bath Time!
Having only just left his mummy and siblings, Ronnie is still learning, it is imperative to his development both physically and mentally for Ronnie to explore and experience new things to help build his confidence, he has never had a bath or experienced water in this way before, so it is equally important to make this an enjoyable experience and as least stressful as possible so in the future, he doesn’t associate bath time with a negative memory.
Bath times not only stop your pet from smelling a little bit questionable, they are also a good way to manage any skin complaints or as a preventative method to external parasites such as ticks or dreaded fleas! Now Ronnie is exploring the garden more and as previously mentioned, rolling in the flower beds, he runs the risk of catching fleas or ticks. It’s still relatively low risk whilst still confined to his home, but once he starts to venture out of the house on walks this risk increases. For Ronnies first bath we used a non-medicated shampoo which contains neem oil and citronella, this is suitable for sensitive skin and leaves the coat soft, shiny, smelling fresh and tick/flea repellent!
We ran a shallow lukewarm bath that just came up to his tummy, using an old jug gently tipping water over him until he was completely wet; at this point he was too busy lapping up the bath water to notice anything else was going on! Then came the bubbles, this wasn’t so enjoyable in Ronnies books and looked rather worried. Once lathered up and smelling fresh, the bubbles and suds were washed away with jugs of water gently, its important to make sure you wash off all suds from your puppy to prevent soap drying and getting itchy, so once the water was running clear it was time to get dry... the fun part!
Dog Drying Bag Mission Complete
Ever tried to dry an overly excited-relatively large puppy with a towel? It’s not the easiest thing in the world so I prefer drying bags for dogs. The WeatherBeeta Dry Dog Bag was a fantastic investment to contain the feral beast… I mean to dry the lovely bundle of joy! After a brisk wipe down with a towel to remove access water, Ronnie wore the WeatherBeeta Dry Dog Bag for around 10-15 minutes, this time of which was spent snuggled up on the sofa with his older big brother thankful that 1) the dog drying bag would be too small for him to fit into 2) he had missed out on bath time and 3) the puppy was now a potato that couldn’t attack him! After this time Ronnie was warm, dry and sparklingly clean from his bath and was back to his cheeky little self, chasing Rolo around and biting his tail. Bath one of many; Complete!