Keeping your greyhound’s nails trimmed is critical.  Long nails can lead to injuries ranging from a broken nail to a broken toe or cause a nasty gash on another hound as they run and play. Here’s a quick tutorial on how we dremel our hounds’ nails….

The tools you’ll need: A handheld rotary tool. We use the Dremel brand.

Our Dremels

We own two dremel styles, though to be honest I very rarely ever use the smaller dremel. I like the adjustability the larger dremel gives me. I can use a higher speed on thick, hard nails and a slower speed on those very soft, light nails. We use the 60 grit sandpaper wheels. The finer grit sandpaper doesn’t last as long and I’ve found that the dogs are more sensitive to it (pull their feet away more often). Maybe the finer grit gets hotter faster…I’m not sure, but I’ve had much better luck and results with the 60 grit.

Our model for this session is Prajna and the dremeling is being done by Ken.  Please note: We let his nails grow long for demonstration purposes only!

1) Flatten the bottom of the nail. This will help reveal where the quick is as you can usually see it from the underside of the nail.

2) Go straight back on the nail. Depending on the nail and how it grows you may need to hold the dremel at different angles so it grinds smoothly against the nail.

Once you get back to the quick, just round off any sharp edges. The quick is the dark meaty-looking part at the middle of the nail.

Here’s an example of a front foot that I dremeled. You can see that I don’t round as much as Ken does. That’s really personal preference. The goal is to get the nails shorter than they were when you started and not to leave any sharp or jagged edges on the nail.

Happy Dremeling!

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