Cockapoo and Cavapoo grooming in Gloucester, MA

Both crosses blend a silky spaniel coat with a curly poodle coat. Wikipedia describes the cockapoo's coat as straight, wavy or curled, and the AKC describes the Cavalier parent's coat as silky, with long feathering on the ears, chest and legs. The common thread is fine, soft hair, and fine hair wraps around itself easily. A tangle the size of a pea at the base of an ear can spread across the whole ear root within a week or two if nobody combs it out.

The AKC's advice for the cocker spaniel is that grooming sessions missed are not easily made up, and the warning fits both crosses, since they carry the same feathered coat on the ears, chest and legs. Size helps and hurts. A small dog has less coat to brush, but its friction points sit close together, and a dog who spends hours on a lap or in a harness rubs the same spots all day. Feathering also catches burrs and wet sand.

A puppy cut takes the whole body to one even length and leaves a rounded, tidy face. On a small doodle it is the most practical haircut, and it sits within the full-service price as a custom cut. The real question is length. A longer cut looks plush for a week; a shorter one dries faster after a swim, holds less sand and lets a brush reach the skin. Tell the groomer how often your dog swims and how often you brush, and the length follows.

On Cape Ann the beach months are the cold ones. At the time of writing, Gloucester admits dogs to Good Harbor on even-numbered days from October 1 to March 31 and to Wingaersheek on odd-numbered days from October 1 to April 30, so a cockapoo that swims in November and rides home damp starts felting before it dries. For a dog on the sand every week, a sensible plan is a shorter cut on the legs and belly with the ears and face kept a little fuller.

Five minutes every other day does more than an hour on a Sunday. Work through the ear feathering with a metal comb, then the armpits, chest and the inside of the back legs, and finish with a quick line brush over the body. If the comb catches, go back with a slicker brush before you move on. Our how-to on brushing a doodle between grooms shows the line-brushing method, and it works the same on a 15-pound cavapoo as on a large doodle.

After a beach day, rinse the salt water out with fresh water and dry the ears and coat completely before the dog curls up. If your cockapoo or cavapoo also comes to daycare, put the groom on that day: drop off between 6:30 and 9:30 AM on a weekday and collect a clean dog between 4 and 6:30 PM. In Rockport, Gloucester, Essex and Manchester-by-the-Sea, the Pup Van can do the daycare driving for $10 each way.