There are a lot of various types of equipment on the market for the clipping and nail cutting of large breed dogs, small fogs and cats of pet nails. As pet owners  — its always unpleasant when we do it ourselves and actually hit a quick and cause our best friend to bleed.

Personally, I’m like the shoemakers who’s kids don’t have shoes in terms of cutting my own dogs nails. I hate it! I prefer to have another Pet Nanny do that chore.  It’s hard to do your personal pets as you know you are causing them some distress.

On other people’s pets I’m more at ease and try and do it as quickly and painlessly as possible. I rarely to never have to get the styptic out!

I’ve found that using a human nail clipper, small in size, is the most effective tool for cutting kitty nails. Its quick and efficient and I’ve rarely had a problem with drawing blood. Cats are usually easier as you can see where the quick is and can avoid it. Not so much in dark cats and black cats, but the orange, and fair haired ones are a breeze.

With small dogs a guillotine clipper works well. You just have to take it slow and clip until you see the first spot of white. That indicates that the quick is coming up shortly. Dogs with whiter claws are obviously easier to do, as you can see where the blood flow stops, darker ones, slow and steady is the rule.

For the larger breed dogs, I prefer a Dremel. A Demel grinds the nail so ultimately you have more control. In bigger breeds and in small breeds, there can be nail cracking, which causes lots of pain for your pet. In those circumstances you may need to use a multi-approach of a clipper (guillotine) and a Dremel depending on how bad the injury is.

One way to avoid nail cracking in animals, should you ever run into this problem is by using some kind of oil (edible like fish oil) on the nails. Just think of it as a mani-pedi for your pet.  They will probably enjoy you rubbing oil on their claws, I know when I get a manicure the massage is always the best part!