This is a progress video of documenting my thought process of how I handstrip my Airedale Terrier puppy Raja's neck into the withers and shoulders. Raja has been stripped ever since he was 8 weeks old, and I have been training him to enjoy the grooming process on the table. He is so comfortable on the table, that sometimes he takes short naps as I trim him. I am not affiliated with any of the companies of the products I used in this video. I purchased them all during the years of collecting my horde of grooming tools used in handstripping a broken coated terrier.


Handstripping is an ongoing process which is labor and time consuming. If a dog is being actively shown in the show ring, the coat will need to get worked on consistently every single week to keep it in tip top condition. However, if a dog is not being actively shown, the grooming would not be such a top priority and we could let the coat go. This would result in the dog looking woolly and shaggy like an ewok (from Star Wars). It is very normal to find a household with multiple Airedales with different hair styles because handstripping is really very time consuming. So it doesn't surprise me to find a handstripped Airedale looking like a Rastafarian with small dreadlocks.