You only need to be a dog owner for a day to realize how messy these pups can be. They love doing everything in their power to get as dirty as possible – and this includes purposefully rolling through mud or puddles on their walks!
Even if your dog is well-behaved and never tries to get dirty, it’ll still need to be washed to keep it healthy and prevent matting. Washing a dog presents a unique challenge, especially when yours is afraid of baths. For whatever reason, it hates being near water and it starts whining or running away when it knows bathtime is near.
You can’t let your dog be filthy forever, so how do you wash your dog when it’s afraid of baths?
Calm them down beforehand
A clam dog is easier to bathe than a stressed one. Keeping your dog calm ensures they aren’t feeling overly anxious, and this means they’re more docile and likely to follow your commands. Try feeding them some calming chews for dogs an hour or so before you intend to wash them. Or, use dog aromatherapy to induce a sense of calmness, making them easier to move into the bath area.
Find whatever works for your dog; the method isn’t important, what’s important is that your dog feels and acts calm.
Acclimatize your dog to the bathing area
Dogs get scared of baths because they don’t like the water and the whole situation puts them under stress. It’s not something they’re naturally used to enduring – if you set dogs out in the wild, they’d clean themselves by licking one another. This is completely new to them, which is why they’re so stressed out.
In an ideal world, you’ll acclimatize your dog to the bathing area when you bring them home as a puppy. The sooner you start, the easier it is to bathe them as the grow older. Regardless, you should bring them to the bathing area, let them stand and play in the bath, then gradually introduce some water. This gradual acclimatization gets them used to what happens, so when bath time eventually comes, they’re prepared and it isn’t a shock.
Use positive reinforcement
As with all aspects of training a dog, positive reinforcement is your best friend. When a dog gets rewarded for doing something, it learns that this is a positive thing. They’ll be more inclined to do it again because they know a treat will arrive shortly.
Reward your dog during every step of the bathing process. Encourage them to come to the bathing area, then give them a treat or a toy to play with. Be positive with your praise as well – this helps them know they’re doing something good. Keep this up as you bathe them, providing little treats during the process. At the end, give them a big reward for putting up with the bath and they’ll soon associate that reward with bathing. Make it something unique – perhaps a big treat they don’t get for anything else. This stops bathtime being scary and makes it exciting for the doggy!
Dogs will naturally be a bit scared and anxious about baths. They don’t wash like this, so it all feels so weird to them. Don’t let your dog’s fears get in the way of keeping them clean. It must be done so they remain healthy, and all you need to do is follow these three tips to move things along.
