Nail clipping can be a traumatic experience
for many dogs; dremeling is a recent alternative
to nail clipping that is easier and safer for
the average do-it-yourselfer.
Doberdawn has posted an excellent article on
how to correctly dremel and shape a dog’s
nail (her article can be found by googling “doberdawn”)
But in introducing my sensitive rescue dog to
the dremel tool I found that much, much more
groundwork was required to train her to allow
me to dremel her nails.
If you have a dog traumatized by nail clipping
or who is terrified of the dremel tool this
tutorial is for you. Work these steps twice
a day, before every meal.
Scoop your dog’s food into her bowl
and hold it in your lap. Turn on the dremel
and hold it in your hands, turned on, until
she gets up the courage to come eat anyway.
(watch that they don't touch the sander with
their nose!) After they got over the sound
sensitivity move on.
Sit with the food bowl and make your dog
lift her paw, gently and quickly touch the
TURNED OFF tool to the nail. AS soon as you
get the slightest contact praise and release
the bowl of food. After you can touch the
nail and hold the dremel there for 3 seconds
move on.
Repeat the above step with the tool turned
on low. Take it slow and be careful with long
hair- getting the hair caught now can take
weeks to overcome.
Turn tool on high and begin again, begin
shaping the nails a tiny bit at a time.
Begin desensitizing the dog to having the
back nails dremeled, taking it as slow as
you need to and each time withholding food
until the dog permits you to advance a tiny
bit.
Keep working this program EVERY DAY, as
your dogs gets more and more used to this
activity as a daily exercise to earn her food,
she will totally submit. Work with her to
the point where, you can do multiple nails
and, eventually, multiple paws in one sitting.
Doing one paw at each meal, twice a day,
takes less than 6 or 7 minutes total and results
in having each nail done every other day.
By dremeling a tiny bit of each nail every
other day you can force the quicks to recede
back and keep your dog relaxed about having
her nails dremeled.
