# ear layering



## minipoodlelover (Jul 25, 2011)

Angie is almost 10 months old and still has mostly soft, straight puppy fur. Her groomer layered her ears last time, but they're a little choppy and I'm wondering if they would look better with the layers grown out. When I first got Angie, her ears were long and very pretty.

I know literally nothing about ear grooming, so any suggestions would be helpful. Thank you!


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## Chagall's mom (Jan 9, 2010)

I am a fan of long, full ears myself (think of glorious Beau's!). My experience is that ear hair takes its time growing. I have zero grooming expertise, those who do will surely be by soon. Meanwhile, can you post a photo of Angie so we can see her current ear style? I'm betting she looks lovely!:beauty: I groom Chagall myself (such an amateur!), here's what he looked after I groomed him this week. Not the best or most flattering photo of him, but his ears look pretty much the way I like them.:smile:


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## Fluffyspoos (Aug 11, 2009)

I'd suggest just letting them grow long naturally, then trim off the ends and make them even after your pood eats them (yes, it probably will happen.)


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## minipoodlelover (Jul 25, 2011)

Chagall's Mom - when I first joined this forum, you hadn't yet begun grooming. And now I see your work on Chagall and I'm so impressed! Granted, you had great material to begin with  but still - wow. Thanks for sharing your photo. 

There are so many beautiful poodles on this forum - melting expressions, glorious coats and colors, how they treat their humans - that I love the breed all over again. 

Thanks for the feedback Fluffyspoos. Your grooming speaks for itself and I will follow your advice.

I'm a bad photographer but I took a few pictures of Angie's ears. I think she's at that in-between period of coat change, which may be part of the problem....


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## minipoodlelover (Jul 25, 2011)

Picture


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## Fluffyspoos (Aug 11, 2009)

Sure make sure to keep those ears brushed well! I tell clients that can't keep up on a full body brush to brush the things they absolutely don't want to lose (ears, tails, heads.) Puppy coat is really straight and cottony; hard to hide scissor marks in! I'll do a scissor on Cairo, think he looks amazing the first day, then everything looks like crap a couple days later after the hair settles because I can see all the marks!

Her puppy ears are going to be stringy and straight, it will take until her adult coat comes in for them to be thicker and fluffy, but enjoy that puppy coat for now! It doesn't last forever!


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## Chagall's mom (Jan 9, 2010)

I love Angie's coloring! She looks like she's made of taffeta :smile:Keep growing those ear leathers and consider, if you don't already use one, a snood. The are_ really _helpful for keeping food off the ear fringe, thereby less temptation for ear nibbling.


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## minipoodlelover (Jul 25, 2011)

Fluffyspoos said:


> ..then everything looks like crap a couple days later after the hair settles because I can see all the marks!


Yep. I was surprised when I saw the photo because she appeared scruffier than I thought she was. Ha, wishful thinking on my part... I do brush her every day but like you say, cottony fur and now staticy too. 

I'm going to check out snoods. Thanks again for the feedback!


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## tortoise (Feb 5, 2012)

Fluffyspoos said:


> Puppy coat is really straight and cottony; hard to hide scissor marks in! I'll do a scissor on Cairo, think he looks amazing the first day, then everything looks like crap a couple days later after the hair settles because I can see all the marks!


THANK YOU! I feel much less inadequate now.


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## Rowan (May 27, 2011)

Chagall's mom said:


> I love Angie's coloring! She looks like she's made of taffeta :smile:Keep growing those ear leathers and *consider, if you don't already use one, a snood. The are really helpful for keeping food off the ear fringe, thereby less temptation for ear nibbling*.


I was going to suggest the same thing. Snoods are ear savers for sure.  

Mini--you can make these yourself. I can't sew worth a crap and I managed to make a bunch of them (not using a machine but by hand). I just bought a handful of lycra fabrics from the local fabric shop and then made them to fit. I have three from Poodleit, but the MPOO size wasn't quite big enough for Alex (oversized) so I added approximately an inch to the width. I can give you the dimensions if you go this route. 

If I can do it, anyone can! Good luck.


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## minipoodlelover (Jul 25, 2011)

Rowan said:


> Mini--you can make these yourself. I can't sew worth a crap and I managed to make a bunch of them (not using a machine but by hand). I just bought a handful of lycra fabrics from the local fabric shop and then made them to fit.


LOL...why am I not surprised you could do this? I've never seen Angie nibbling her ears, but they sure do look ragged. Hello snood!


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## Rowan (May 27, 2011)

minipoodlelover said:


> LOL...why am I not surprised you could do this? I've never seen Angie nibbling her ears, but they sure do look ragged. Hello snood!


I have zero sewing talent and I'm _not _being humble. I once stitched something to my yoga pants by accident and I've stuck myself in the finger more times than I care to admit.  

I found some colorful fabrics and they really do protect the ears so it was well worth the effort.


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## tortoise (Feb 5, 2012)

PoodleLounge on etsy.com sells nice snoods. She is making some custom stuff for me!


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## mom24doggies (Mar 28, 2011)

To me, Angie's ears just look like regular "puppy ears", like the hair just hasn't grown out even yet. Trev still has the layered look, actually, and he's one yr. I've never layered them, in fact I don't even trim much length off them, just the ends when they get scraggly. Did your groomer actually say she cut them that way? Either way, she's very cute, and I don't think her ears look bad at all. But of course, if you don't like it, grow it out! You are the one looking at her 24/7.


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## Rowan (May 27, 2011)

*More than you wanted to know about Snoods*

There appears to be 2 basic Snood styles--ones with elastic gathers on the end and ones without. I like that *Poodleit *uses the lycra fabrics that mold to the shape of the head and there's no elastic or seams to potentially damage the coat. Here are *CharismaticMillie's* three SPOOS wearing them: http://www.poodleforum.com/3-poodle-pictures/14732-my-silly-puppers.html

These tend to stay put when they're eating or chewing bones too! I had one with elastic on the end and Alex pushed it back off his head and down his neck every time. It all comes down to personal preference. 

Elastic ends: Dog beds backpack dog walk bags eye pillows plus by PoodleLounge

No elastic: Snoods ? poodleit


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## minipoodlelover (Jul 25, 2011)

mom24doggies said:


> To me, Angie's ears just look like regular "puppy ears", like the hair just hasn't grown out even yet. Trev still has the layered look, actually, and he's one yr. I've never layered them, in fact I don't even trim much length off them, just the ends when they get scraggly. Did your groomer actually say she cut them that way? Either way, she's very cute, and I don't think her ears look bad at all. But of course, if you don't like it, grow it out! You are the one looking at her 24/7.


Thanks for your feedback  This is why I asked - because I really know nothing! No, my groomer didn't say she cut Angie's ears this way, but I assumed she did because they didn't used to look choppy or layered. Maybe they just grew out and this is the result? I'm taking Angie to be groomed this week, and I wanted some guidance on what is usually done with puppy ears.


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## sandooch (Jan 20, 2011)

I tried to layer Gigi's ears a few grooms ago because I wanted them to look more poofy. Let me tell you, layering a humans hair and layering a poodles hair are two different things altogether. For one thing, the human usually will sit still. Not Gigi! It didn't come out half bad, but it also did not look fluffy, just choppy like you had mentions. So I'm in the process of growing them out again.


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## minipoodlelover (Jul 25, 2011)

sandooch said:


> I tried to layer Gigi's ears a few grooms ago because I wanted them to look more poofy. Let me tell you, layering a humans hair and layering a poodles hair are two different things altogether.


I would have thought the same thing - layering adds fullness, just as it does in human hair. Angie is at the groomer right now, and I asked her about the ears. It turns out mom24doggies was right :adore:, the groomer never did layer them, they just grew out that way. She's going to neaten the ends, and that's it. Thanks again for all the great feedback.


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## SSCarr (Dec 11, 2013)

*Trimming Ear hair*

I do my own grooming and I like Gunnar's ear hair short but not puffy, like it was when he was a puppy. He has larger ear leathers and soooooooo much cottony hair. Still a lot of puppy coat left and it mats horribly. Because he hikes and swims it's almost impossible to keep it from matting. It's long right now but I'd like to know how to cut it so that the hair is kind of all one length about 2 inches from the skin out all over the ears, as it was as a puppy. Maybe leaving it a little longer towards the bottom or each ear. I just finished brushing/combing out all his matted ear hair and he hated it. He does look beautiful but since I don't show him so why bother with all the work of keeping it long?


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## Johanna (Jun 21, 2017)

I used to tassle Lili's ears in the summer. I shaved them with a 10 blade down to about an inch before the bottom of the ear and left that last bit grown out, but trimmed smoothly. In fact, in summer I clipped her entire body with a 10 blade. I always left a nice topknot and tail. Sometimes I left bracelets.

Lili had a huge amount of hair on her ears, and, as I've mentioned before, had a corded coat type. Clipping her down in the summer kept her from collecting large amounts of trash in her coat.

During the fall, I let the coat grow out some. Around January she would have about an inch of body coat and full ears. That kept her warm. Only down side of the winter coat was that snow balled up in it.


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