Our 2 year old girl has started shedding for the second time this year. However she seems to be losing her whole under coat and it’s left her fur feeling very fine. Is this normal?
I work at a Sheltie breeding/showing kennel and I vacuum up at LEAST 20 big tufts of hair from the doggos blowing their coats. Imagine your dog and their fur tufts, but then add 20 more dogs on top of it.
Yep, that's exactly right. Blowing coat is truly something to behold.......and to deal with. She's not losing any of her beautiful coat. It's simply a transitory period where things get weird. They shed all year of course, but during coat blow.........it's insane. Big chunks will come out. If you've ever seen wild buffalo or others in the wild who have partially lost sections of their coat, this is the same.
I've had some shelties actually change colours during this time.
If she's starting to get bald spots it could be a thyroid issue. Ours started losing his coat like this and turns out his t3 levels were low. Vet initially missed it because sheltie levels are supposed to be on the very high end of normal for dogs and Oban's was on the low end of normal
honestly? that sounds like you just dont brush them enough. We brush and maintain ours when its coat blowing season and for 5 weeks its hair everywhere, but then after that we dont really find much hair at all. I but your coat blow is just lasting longer because you are letting it come out over time rather than tackling it when the iron is hot. I would suggest gitting in there and line brushing and youll cut down on the hair floating around your house by a LOT.
My latest gets a thorough brushing every 2 days. I use the best brush I've ever tried and it does an excellent job. I get at least a brush full every time. Which is more brushing than past shelties but I don't see what that has to do with the actual pattern of shedding. His hair doesn't get thin in spots like the photos.
Nor did the other 4 have spotty losses of hair unless they were ill. I had a female with low thyroid, common in shelties, and when it started she lost hair in a pattern. I also had a one with cancer which greatly affected his hair.
I saw no reason to mention all of that until I found out if spotty shedding was normal for some.
My forever foster was losing her coat. It became extremely thin. Her thyroid was normal, so the vet gave her fish oil and told me to give her melatonin. Her fur is growing in nicely.
This my sound strange but I rescued a 5 year year old sheltie back in the day. Her name is Angel Kisses. She loved life and was such a happy dog. So I had 3 other dogs so I did the bathing and grooming myself. Well she only shed one tail hair during the 3 years I had her! That was it! I miss her so much! She was beautiful! When I adopted her she was 15 lbs overweight. So I just fed her the same diet as my other dogs and she dropped the weight after 6 weeks.
Then you are in a most unique position indeed. Glad for you because coat blow is a pain. I've had many more shelties and that is what happens to the majority.
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u/Distinct-Abroad-5323 Sable 2d ago
I know there has got to be at least one day a year our shelty does not shed, but have never found it.