Senior dog grooming in southern Maine.
Old dogs don't stop needing grooming — they stop tolerating the way most places do it. We come to the driveway, keep the visit short, and let your dog lie down whenever they need to.
from $55 · sized to your dog, paced to their day
What's Included
What changes for a senior dog
Lie-down bathing
Dogs who can't hold a stand get bathed lying on a padded, non-slip orthopedic mat. Nothing about a bath requires a dog to stand for fifteen minutes.
No crate, no cage dryer
Seniors overheat faster and panic harder in a cage dryer. Everything is hand-dried at low heat, and your dog is never left unattended.
Shorter, split visits
If a full groom is too much in one sitting, we split it: bath and nails today, face and feet next week. Two easy visits beat one exhausting one.
Lump and skin mapping
We note every lump, wart, hot spot, and skin tag we find, and we clip around them rather than over them. You get the list after every visit.
Traction-first nail work
Long nails and slick floors are how old dogs fall. Nails come back short and the fur between the pads gets trimmed so paws grip hardwood again.
Easy-care haircuts
We'll talk you into a slightly shorter, easier trim. Less coat means less brushing for you and less standing for them between appointments.
Good To Know
Why mobile is genuinely better for an old dog
For a fourteen-year-old dog, the grooming appointment isn't the hard part — the day around it is. The car ride, the strange floor, the barking, the hours in a crate waiting for a turn, the second car ride home. Take all of that away and what's left is a warm bath and twenty minutes of being fussed over.
Arthritis is the other half of it. Hips and elbows that ache after a walk are not going to enjoy an hour on a raised table. Our seniors get a low table with a ramp or a lift, a mat under them, and permission to change position whenever they want. If a leg won't extend, we work around it — nobody gets stretched into a groomer's preferred angle.
Deaf and cloudy-eyed dogs also do better without surprises. We keep a hand on the dog before any tool starts, use the quietest dryer setting that works, and skip the clippers near the head when a dog can't hear them coming.
In coastal Maine there's a seasonal wrinkle too: old dogs get stiff in the damp cold and struggle to dry off, so we run longer, warmer dry times in winter and never send a damp senior back outside.
- No car ride, no stairs, no waiting room
- Lie-down bathing on an orthopedic mat
- Visits can be split across two short appointments
- Every lump and skin change reported back to you
Our Process
How a senior groom goes
Same order, every appointment, in the trailer in your driveway. Typical visit: About 45–60 minutes, one dog at a time.
We ask before we start
Arthritis, heart conditions, seizures, hearing, vision, recent surgeries, and what your vet has told you. It changes what we do and how long we do it for.
Ramp or lift in
No jumping, no scooping a heavy dog up. Your dog walks in on a ramp or rides up on the lift table.
Warm bath, lying down if needed
Body-temperature water, gentle oatmeal or medicated shampoo, and a mat that doesn't slide. We support the back end of dogs with weak hind legs the whole time.
Low-heat hand dry
No cage dryer, ever. We dry by hand in sections so your dog is never hot, never trapped, and never damp when we're done.
Nails, pads, ears, sanitary
The comfort work: short nails for traction, pad fur trimmed, ears cleaned, and a sanitary trim so an incontinent or stiff dog stays clean between grooms.
A short, honest report
What we found, what looked different from last visit, and what we'd flag for your vet. Then a biscuit and a long nap.
From The Driveway
What neighbors say.
"Our fifteen-year-old couldn't do the car ride anymore, so she just stopped getting groomed. This fixed it. She's clean, her nails are short, and she didn't have to leave the yard."
"They bathed our lab lying down because his hips are shot. I didn't know that was even an option. He slept the whole afternoon, in the good way."
"They found a lump on our old cocker's chest and told us plainly. Vet checked it the next week. Small thing, but it mattered."
Where We Go
Twelve towns, one trailer.
We bring this service to every town on the southern Maine coast we serve — no travel fee inside the area.
Breeds We Groom
Coat-specific care, too.
Every coat behaves differently. These guides cover what we do differently for each breed.
Also Worth Reading
Services that pair with this.
FAQ
Questions we get asked.
- Is my dog too old to be groomed?
- Almost never. Age is not a condition — arthritis, heart disease, and collapsing tracheas are, and each of those changes how we groom rather than whether we groom. We do shorter visits, lie-down baths, and split appointments. If your vet has asked that your dog be sedated for handling, that's a vet-clinic groom, not a mobile one, and we'll tell you so.
- My dog can't stand for very long. Can you still bathe her?
- Yes. Dogs who can't hold a stand get bathed lying down on a padded non-slip mat, and we support the hindquarters of dogs with weak back legs throughout. Most seniors are noticeably calmer lying down than they ever were standing.
- Do you use a cage dryer?
- No — not on any dog, and especially not on seniors. Cage dryers are how older dogs overheat. Everything is hand-dried on the lowest heat that will do the job.
- Should I shave my old dog down?
- Often a shorter trim is kinder. Less coat means less brushing at home, fewer mats behind sore elbows, and shorter grooms. For double-coated seniors like a Golden or a Shepherd we don't shave to the skin — we do a tidy, thin the undercoat, and keep the coat working as insulation.
- What if you find a lump?
- We tell you, describe where it is and roughly how big, and we clip around it. We're not vets and we won't guess at what it is — but groomers see the whole skin surface every six weeks, so we catch a lot of things early.
- How often should a senior dog be groomed?
- Usually a little more often than they were in middle age — every four to six weeks. Older dogs move less, so nails grow long faster, coats mat where they lie down, and sanitary areas need more attention.
Reading we recommend
- AKC: caring for a senior dog — A solid overview of what changes as dogs age and what to watch for.
- Cornell Riney Canine Health Center — arthritis in dogs — Veterinary background on canine osteoarthritis and mobility care.
Ready when your pup is.
Pick your service, pick your town, and we'll roll into your driveway within the week.