Dental care

Whether you decide to go down the tooth brushing route recommended by veterinary dentists or choose to use brisket bones, chicken wings or the like as a natural method, or even Dentabones, do work at getting your schnauzer puppy used to having their mouth examined and handled from an early age. If for any reason they do require surgery at some point in their lives, it can be a good idea to request their teeth be cleaned at the same time.

Speaking of bones, do not feed your pup/ dog cooked bones under any circumstances. Even raw bones are a disputed area, some have bad experience that have required veterinary intervention. Personally I have had no problem with brisket bones, which are the only bones other than chicken wings I’ve fed my Schnauzers over the many years I’ve had them. It does depend on your dog – if they gulp their food very quickly, chicken wings can be a bad idea. For more measured eaters, which my dogs have always been, there doesn’t seem to generally be any issue. To be safe, if you do choose to give your dogs bones it’s best to only do so under supervision and not leave dogs with bones unattended.

For those who have bought a pup from us:

Adult teeth start coming through for schnauzer from about 12 weeks.  You may not notice the baby teeth fall out but if you do see the occasional little white tooth around the place, don’t be concerned!  More often than not the pup will swallow them so the whole process may go somewhat unnoticed unless you’re particularly observant.

It is normal for your schnauzer puppy to start chewing on everything while they’re teething so it’s important to give them a variety of suitable chew toys.  This will hopefully help save your furniture, shoes and fingers!  Avoid giving harder dental bones or chews until your schnauzer has all their adult teeth.  Baby teeth are quite fragile and can break with the chewing of hard objects.

Think about what areas your pup has access to while they’re going through their teething stage.  Don’t give them access to furniture that’s precious and that would be upsetting for you to have damaged.  It is normal for them to chew – they need to.  It’s your responsibility to give them what they can safely chew and keep them away from those objects they’re not allowed to!

Your schnauzer’s adult teeth will normally be through by about 6 months; they’ll have 42 in total, 20 up the top and 22 in the lower jaw.