Cleaning teeth ... catching up fast I hope ... what are the next steps?

[loveyouradvice]

So... my dog's teeth have had erratic cleaning over the last six years, including occasional venison bones. Definitely some plaque build up, not too bad according to the vet, but clearly I want it gone! Breath has always smelt great and seldom remotely doggy, surprisingly.

He's not keen on toothpaste or having his teeth brushed but quite relaxed about me looking and having a good poke around.

Having just watched a video I see there can be two phases:

1. Soften plaque - with Plaque Off, coconut oil or tooth gel
2. Remove plaque - clearly manually or by letting him chew... bones, tendons, Yak chews, even Kongs and the dog toy with soft "teeth" in a ball. (Can't quite bring myself to use bull's pizzles, go a little weak at the knees!)

How does this really work? Do I soften it and then feed him a chew or bone straight afterwards? Or what do you do?

Although he is raw fed, he is a gulper so I'll probably only be doing a bone once every 7-10 days closely supervised.

I brush at least once a day, usually 2 or 3

If he doesn’t mind you having a poke about to check his teeth, but would object to a toothbrush, I would suggest doing them twice a day using a nice meaty flavoured enzymatic paste and a microfibre finger brush like these. Lintbells do a good one, but it seems to be out of stock everywhere at the moment.

Once they have some plaque build up it’s sort of a muti-modal approach. Plaque Off helps, but it’s the gradual process of that, plus daily brushing and the use of various gnawing option that all work together to gradually improve it.

Once it’s improved you may be able to drop to once daily brushing for maintenance.

Thanks moose sounds like I better step up - I'd been hoping with reviews I'd read of bone-fed dogs he could do more and I do less...

And I've just ordered chicken flavour tooth paste which I think might help - the one I have he's not very keen on

Any other toothpaste recommendations?

I just use coconut oil.
Dogs love the taste of it usually.
Only a tiny swipe on the brush to start with as it’s pure oil and too much will cause diarrhoea.

I use Virbac Enzymatic. My old boy would have eaten it straight out of the tube if I’d let him.

I'll try both and see what happens!!

Mine do eat it straight out of the tube...

I stopped with bones as one dog lost a tooth & the other cracked one.

Loving this ... wait to see! Has been stressful to date so with a new toothpaste and coconut oil hopefully tis a new world

This is also my battle - the dogs would eat Logic paste off the brush but it's clearly made from gold dust in a Swiss lab at £8 a go, so I'm hoping the Plaque Off will speed things up. Eventually.