Review - Grooming Gagets

Grooming tips to keep you sane during shedding season

This post was inspired by another blog that I follow, City Girl Searching. She did a similar post about her sweet dog, "Shadow The Jindo" – You can go read it here. It's a really good read for all pet owners and not just dog owners.

A friend of mine at work says every time I walk into her office, there is a trail of cat hair that floats behind me. Isabella really doesn’t shed that much... ok.... she does, but only during summer. In winter, she keeps all her hair to herself. My parent's cats shed right through the year and no matter how much brushing you do, there is hair everywhere, and they all have short hair!

Some cats don’t like being brushed and some cats don’t like being bathed. If you start grooming regularly when your cat is small they will tend to get used to it. I can’t promise they will like it, but they do get into the routine and let you get it over with. At the end of the day, grooming your cat is looking after their health; it reduces the risk of hair balls, matting and knots, ticks, fleas etc.

I want to share some of the things I use to keep Isabella as well groomed as possible to help her, and ourselves, with the shedding in summer. I also want to share some of the tips from other cat lovers and some of the failed attempts I have had.

Brushing

Brushing your cat during shedding season is a lot of work whether you have a short haired cat or a longer haired cat. I find that short hair tends to fly away more as you are brushing so it is easier to do it outside.

There are many different brushes and combs out there to choose from but it all comes down to understanding what type of brushes to use for your cat's coat type. This is where many people are in the dark so I want to help you.

Short Coats:

Short coats should have a soft bristled or fine wire brush to get all the loose hairs.

Medium Coats:

Medium hair, this is like Isabella’s coat. They need combs to get any knots out and a fine toothed brush to get right in there and get all the loose hairs right from the skin. The reason for this is the loose hair gets stuck at the roots and if this is left for too long, it will start matting. This is really uncomfortable for your cat and is hard to remove without good experience.

Some Medium haired cat’s hair will not matt and some are more prone to matt. Isabella is a Ragdoll and her hair is more like a soft rabbit’s fur. Her hair doesn’t matt very easily, but some Ragdolls have a slightly different textured hair and it can matt. The most commonly known cats that get matted hair are Maine Coons.

Long Coat:

Long coats refer to Persians. Persian cats need a lot of grooming, daily. If you are thinking of getting a Persian, remember that it takes a lot of commitment to groom these cats. Their hair can be as long as 20cm, so you need to use a wide toothed comb to get any knots out gently without hurting the cat. To get all hair loose, some knots may need to be cut, but please talk to your breeder to show you how this is done.

Some exceptions here are the Rex cats (curly haired) they need a soft bristles brush preferably with rubber nips as their hair can be very prone to breaking and hair loss if over groomed.

These are the brushed I have;

1 Mikki Easy Clean Slicker - Small

2 Miki Easy Clean Slicker – Medium

3 Tangel Angel – Pet Angel Mini

The Mikki Brushes are amazing and do such a great job. Isabella loves getting brushed! She will flop over on the patio table and lick your hand the whole time. The Medium Mikki brush has plastic tips on the wire bristles which is really nice to use on her tummy and back so it does not scratch her skin.

The small Mikki brush does not have the plastic tips on the wire bristles so it can be a bit scratchy on her skin so I only use this for thick parts, like her sides and her tail. These brushes are available at Pet Masters, I got mine at Wodac this year. The larger retails at R79.00 and the Small is R75.00. They are also avalible on Takealot.com

I do not have any combs for Isabella but Pet Masters does stock a great range of Mikki combs and a Rubber Grooming Glove that is specially designed for short haired cats, I think this could be really good.

My parents found a really great comb at a craft market years ago and this works like a dream on their short haired cats. It has two different size teeth, one very short and the other a bit longer. This gets all the loose hairs from Pancake and it just keeps coming and coming. I have gotten a bigger hair ball off of him in one brush then I have gotten off Isabella and he is the same size as her but with short hair. If anyone knows where you can get these please email me.

The Tangel Angel – Pet Angel Mini I got from Retail Box for R260.00. I was so excited to get this as the reviews for the human ones were amazing and what can I say, it’s pink and super cute!?!?

The Tangel Angel brushes are antibacterial and detangling, so this should be a best of both worlds, right?

Wrong.

I tried it on Belly the second I got it. I was disappointed right away. It does not brush all the way to the roots, only the top layer of the hair, so it doesn’t get any of the loose hairs out. It left her all static and puffy but she didn’t look like she had been brushed at all. I thought maybe I was just being silly and I was expecting it to be the same as the Mikki brushes so I took it to a cat show to try it out on the masses. It was tried on a Maine Coon, 3 Siberians, 4 Ragdolls (excluding Belly) and some short haired cats. Note, that not all of these people were breeders or regular cat show attendees, there were some first time showers that tried this out. Out of all of these there was not a single person who would use this brush on their cat.

We then got creative and thought maybe it should have just been for humans, so we all had a try of the brush on ourselves and kids. No one would even use this brush on themselves.

So in the end, I gave it to a little girl at the show that thought it was very pretty and worked well on her toy pony’s tail. I would not recommend this brush for grooming your cat. It is very pretty but it does not work very well for the reasons your need it. It does not get loose hair out of your cat’s coat. I am very sure that the reviews for the human brush is correct and it is designed well for humans, but the Pet Angel Mini is not designed well for cats or humans.

If you have one of these and it works on Dogs or if you have the human one please share with us in the comments what you think of those?

Note, that if you are using your brushes on more than one pet to use a disinfectant spray to clean them. I used F10 spray that can us found at selected pet stores and vets.

More than just brushing

Grooming your cat means more than just brushing. Bathing your cat can also help tremendously with getting rid of loose hairs without having to over brush your cat.

I know a lot of cats do not like baths but they do get used to them. Isabella hates being bathed, but we have found out what she hates the most about it. Standing in the water. If we put her in an empty bath and use a jug to wet her, shampoo her, and use the jug to rinse her off again, she will let us bath her with minimal fighting and crying.

Once she is bathed, she gets blow dried, but only if it is for a show, otherwise we let her sit in the sun till she is dry. When she is completely dry, I give her another brush and there is not much that comes out. You can see in our drain and the hairdryer where all the hair has gone.

When choosing a shampoo for your cat, there are wide varieties online and at pet stores. I normally just use Johnson & Johnson "No More Tears" Baby Shampoo or Pantene "Aqua Light". Breeder Bev likes using Purl "Snow White" to keep the Ragdolls nice and white on their legs and tummies. This can be used for any white cat. Purl has many different cat shampoos which are good and are available in most pet stores and vets in Johannesburg, but I know it is hard to find in Pretoria so it can be ordered online at www.shingavet.co.za.

Some exceptions here are hairless cats (Sphynx) I have read that the Johnson and Johnson baby shampoo is ok for them but consult your breeder what is the best option.

Human Grooming

After all of this grooming, it doesn’t erase the hair that had already been floating around the house, like a cape behind your cat. You are now going to need to do some home and human grooming. Some of the best things I have found work;

1 CarPet

2 Floorwiz Pro – Wonderbroom

3 Lint Rollers

The CarPet is a wonderful little friend to have around the house. It removes hair from literally everything and anything, although I don’t recommend using it on your clothes is a good idea. It is a small rubber block that has short knobs on all sides. When you rub this over the hair covered area, the knobs catch the hair and pull it off of the area and because it is rubber, the hairs stick to it and are removed easily. I use this for all Isabella’s furniture items such as her hut, cat tree, beds, blankets etc. as well as my car after she has been in it.

The CarPet is available on Takealot.com for R99.00 but is currently on special and you can get it for just R69.00

I don’t feel like my words can express just how well this little CarPet works so I created a short video to show you instead:

My second must have it the Verimark Floorwiz Wonderbroom and Wonderbrush set. These are just amazing for just about anything in your house. The broom gets ALL the hair off the floor in just one sweep, I found a normal broom just kicked the hair into the air and it flies about more than anything. It also works well on the carpet in our bedroom, as the vacuum cannot always suck it up if the hair is really stuck in there. I give the carpet a good sweep first before vacuuming. The smaller brush is great for removing all the bits of cat litter that sabella tracks on the couch, ottoman etc. One simple brush and it sweeps it all off. The same goes for the broom, it really does sweep up all the litter and hair from the floor.

You can get these from a Verimark store near you or from Pick n Pay Hyper for R179.00

Of course the last, and more important item on the list, is lint rollers... and lots of them. I have tried many of them and I have found the Addis one is by far the best. You can get them from Clicks, Pick n Pay, the Crazy Store or just about anywhere. At Clicks they are R34.95 and a pack of 2 refills are R36.95. I have found the cheaper ones handles often break and the paper sometimes gets stuck to your clothes and unravels. The Addis ones are not perforated so they are also easy to remove. I battle to lift and tear the perforated ones.

#Grooming #CarPet #Mikki #Verimark #Floorwiz #Comb #Brush #CatGrooming #Brushacat #Bathingcats