I was reading an article in a dog magazine the other day that talked about dog grooming. Our dog has her nails as well as the fur between her pads clipped about every 4-6 weeks but the article suggested it should be done weekly or biweekly pointing out that it can become quite uncomfortable, even painful for the dog when their feet go ungroomed for long periods of time.

When we're out and about I see a lot of dogs that don't have clipped nails. With some, I can hear their nails hitting the floor while the dog walks. One dog I saw at puppy daycare had so much fur between it's toes it was making it hard for the dog to stand on the laminate flooring. Seriously, it was all I could do to mind my own business and not suggest that the owner get the in house groomer to clean it's paws. (I would have happily paid for it if I thought it would have helped!).

Another thing the article said is that when walking on decks and concrete their pads can get cut and splintered and in summer, asphalt driveways can be way too hot. We have a deck our dog runs across all the time as well as an asphalt driveway. The decks not in the greatest of condition so I wonder...has that happened to our dog?

A few weeks ago, our dog was shaking her head quite a bit and so I took her to the Vet thinking she'd gotten an ear infection. Nope, as it turned out, there was just a lot of dirt and junk that I hadn't cleaned from in there and it was irritating the cr*p out of her. :c(

These don't seem like difficult things to put into a routine of doing but I'm guessing that clipped nails, trimmed pads and the occassional ear cleaning could make a big make a difference in any dogs day so I thought I'd share.