You're right there, not much call for them in deepest, darkest Northamptonshire!! I understand your point, thanx for your patience!

I do know a puli, and he is corded, including the face. I personally didn't like it, poor dog seemed to be so uncomfortable in the hot weather. Sweet dog though, very good with the horses.

I don't think I've ever seen a wooly mop spaniel - I know several who have very long, silky curly hair but I cannot remember whether they have their whiskers or not, I shall look, but I can see the difficulty in avoiding trimming the whiskers.

Ah but I just like to leave them streaming in the wind au naturel! A blast with some mane and tail conditioner, a quick comb and all's beautiful. I don't like plaited manes either, I'm a strange creature!

Lol!! Ben didn't take to it to start with, but I got a crafty tickle in on him early this morning - you just very gently stroke the ends of the whiskers whilst avoiding touching the muzzle, and obviously make sure they are not blinking because of the movement of your hand - just caress the whiskers very gently with a finger and you will them blink honest!!

You are talking about working Springers, I am taking about show Springers. Show Springers whiskers are very profuse in comparison to many other gundog breeds, hence why people trim them.

Isla was used on a handful of occasions on a local shoot when she was 2. Her whiskers had been trimmed the week before for a show and she managed to find game with no problem. She certainly didn't hunt through the cover with her eyes wide open just because she had no whiskers!

Given the speed with which I've seen working Springers hunt through cover I very much doubt they use their whiskers at all, I would imagine they'd close their eyes out of common sense. Especially since they're using their noses when hunting for game and not their eyes!

As I've said: trimming the whiskers off my Springer made no difference whatsoever to her life. She does exactly the same things day in day out with or without whiskers.

Very few people do trim whiskers to show ... in my breeds anyway .....

When we first moved to where we live now I used to see someone walking a corded Poodle. I didn't know this was what it was and used to think it was just a neglect case as it looked awful in my opinion. Just a matted mess of cords trailing along the ground and the dog used to look hot and uncomfortable and didn't move very fast but this may have been because it was old?

I have seen someone walking a Kerry Blue which was completely shaved (including whiskers) and it looked awful too-like a deformed Labrador but I guess they couldn't be bothered to groom it but I don't understand why you would have a coated breed and then do that to it.

I never said they WOULDN'T be able to hunt through cover without whiskers - all I was repeating was what my work colleague told me about his working springer.

Irrespective of trimming or hirsuite, I prefer my dogs and my horses to be au naturel as nature intended. Clearly the whiskers play a very important part in the scheme of things - and clearly dogs can manage very well without them also, proving how adaptable these amazing creatures are.

Thank goodness for that Julie - nice to know that Mals at least are not subjected to such pointless primping (notwithstanding those dogs such as poodles where it is virtually impossible to avoid cutting the whiskers).

Exactly! I don't understand either why you would have dogs like mine and then shave the poor things - they look awful, as you rightly say.

I agree about the cords too - whereas the Puli I knew did not look a mess exactly, he really did not seem to be very happy in warm and hot weather.

How do dogs use their whiskers to smell/scent (bearing in mind I have had 4 gundogs and they were/are superb scenting dogs)?

I would like to know what part their whiskers play in this, if any.

When a dog is going through brambles do they not SEE them?