Scruffy Woofs - new Mayo dog grooming business
By Tom Gillespie
AS a child Catherine Derrig-O’Shea always knew she wanted a career with animals.
The Castlebar native qualified as a veterinary nurse eight years ago, which involved a certain amount of grooming, something she concentrated more and more on.
Now she has opened her own grooming business - Catherine’s Scruffy Woofs - which she operates from a clinic in the family business, Derrig’s Green Bay B&B, on the Mall in Castlebar.
Catherine, who got married last year, said: “I just recently started my own dog grooming business. I was a veterinary nurse for over eight years and worked primarily as a vet nurse but through the job we had to groom. However, grooming was not part of my course. I learned how to groom though Cathriona in the Animal Hospital and Jackie at Laundromut Grooming.
“I have always been doing grooming as part of the nursing and I just decided to go out on my own. The business is very small at the moment and I am hoping to grow it. So far it is going grand.
“The grooming depends on the dog. You find out what the pet owner wants.
“For me my primary focus is to get the dog nice and happy and tidy. I try and do as fancy a job as I can. However it would not be like a show groomer - as of yet.
“In grooming you take off as much as the owner wants. At this time of year you find the dogs can be fairly matted if they haven’t been groomed in a while. Then you have no real choice but to cut them down short.”
She continued: “The dogs get a full groom, wash and blow dry and their nails are trimmed. We do a check up to make sure they are okay, health wise. I suppose you can take the nurse out of the clinic, but cannot take the clinic out of the nurse.”
She explained the length of a full grooming depends on the dog, roughly, though, about two hours.
Catherine added: "You have to give the dog some time to settle in. It varies from breed to breed on how often their dogs should be groomed but curly coated dogs should get done about every eight to 12 weeks. The curly coats tend to grow back fairly quickly and can get very knotted quickly.
“All my life I have loved dogs so I knew, even as a child, that I wanted to do something with animals. I originally wanted to do veterinary but I knew I was not going to get the points for that. I did not want go abroad to do it, so I managed to get into veterinary nursing.
“You do have to have a love of dogs and you have to put yourself in the dog's position. If they are nervous or anxious you have to understand why and what triggers them and be prepared as well.
“You can have trouble with dogs being cross and I would always say to people if they are working in veterinary or grooming that whoever invented the dog muzzle did the profession a great service. They give that level of safety.
“Sometimes if a dog is particularly aggressive and you cannot get a muzzle on them they need to be brought into the vet and be sedated for grooming. But really the best thing is to get them used to grooming from an early age.”
She continued: “Last week we had a dog that wasn’t used to being groomed regularly. Initially I put him up on the table and he was fine for less than a minute and then he just started losing it altogether so I had to try and put the muzzle on him.
“He wasn’t happy with that. We just took it nice and slow with him. I had to give my husband, James, who was reared on a farm in Kerry, a shout. I call him the dog whisperer and within seconds the dog had calmed down. He has a way of talking to them.”
In the future Catherine hopes to move to a different premises and possibly take on staff. However her clinic at the Green Bay B&B is located in the town centre, with nearby parking.
She can handle about four dogs a day and she works Monday to Thursday. During the grooming the owners do not stay in the room.
She explained: “Usually we find, even in veterinary, if the owner stays, the dog can be a little bit more anxious and sometimes they become defensive for their owner and usually they don’t settle.
For appointments, Catherine’s Scruffy Woofs can be contacted on (085) 2295186.
Do you have a story to tell about your business? If so, Tom Gillespie would be delighted to hear from you. Get in touch at (087) 9680780 or gillespietom49@gmail.com.