The Uglies

If your purchasing a chihuahua from myself, more specifically a long hair chihuahua, your going to hear me mention "the uglies". 

When your chihuahua puppy is born, it'll have one coat of fluffy soft fur.  The chihuahua uglies is a ‘term' that has been used to describe the transition from their baby soft fur to the more adult coat.

Around 4-8 months your chihuahua's fur may start to thin, fall out or shed heavily. They are growing fast and may start to look a bit gangly, you'll see in my slide show my beautiful Stud Mario when he went through the uglies, we called him HeiHei as he looked like the chicken from Moana, don't worry to much as this stage doesn't last long and on rare occasions some chihuahuas don't even go through this stage. The uglies is a natural process for a long coated chihuahua puppy, so no need to delay the process, i wouldn't recommend shaving your chihuahua, just bath and groom like normal and your chihuahua will do the rest.

If you find your puppies fur is falling out and patches of skin start to show, its worth popping them to the vet to check it is not something more serious.

When they reach adulthood, they should start getting a more full adult coat, this consists of two coats of fur. An undercoat is short and thick and the overcoat is longer, soft and fluffy.

A typically adult coat usually takes two years to fully come through, although some may have their full coat at just one year and some may take a little longer.

Male chihuahua generally have more fur than a females and a beautiful fluffy ruff around his neck.

Long Coat Care

Looking after your chihuahuas coat is easy, they usually have fringing over the toes, they can easily be snipped nice and neat at home to keep their appearance looking sharp without the cost of a dog groomer. Its a good idea to trim lightly  around the bottom area too as its usually thick and can be in the way when they toilet.

Chihuahuas don't need to have hair plucked from their ears like other breeds, as they don't get internal ear hair.

Its a good idea to use a good quality dog conditioner when bathing your dog, more so with lilac and blue dogs as their coat can be drier. Coat and skin supplements can be given for that extra boost, be sure to check the dosage on the packaging. 

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