Dropping her coat

[nancyweNW]

My Border Collie mix, Mickey, I think, drops her coat. I noticed last fall or early winter that I could pull big tufts of fur off of her. At first I was concerned and thought she had something wrong. But then the fur grew back in and I noticed that it's happening again now. She may have some Northern breed dog in her but I don't know. Are there other breeds that also drop their coats during the year?

[Giselle]

All of my dogs have different coat types and textures. All of them blow coat. It's a natural reaction to weather changes and there are patterns, so to speak. Mine generally tend to blow coat right before winter and around spring (in preparation for summer). So I guess you could call that blowing coat all year round ;)

[Canis-Lupess]

Bitches tend to blow their coats when they are across their season. If they'd been bred, their pups would be about 8-12 weeks when they start although my bitches often started blowing before the pups were even weaned. I remember Mist losing a load of hair on her chest and developing a total bald patch for a while but that had started growing back by the time the rest decided to start falling out.
A similar thing happened with Jess where she developed a series of smaller bald patches but, again, these had started growing back when the rest of her coat decided to start shedding and, before it did, it's length covered the bald bits and then when it did shed, the bald bits were black again with short hair covering them thank goodness. Bitches look horrid enough at this time without really visible bald patches to make it even worse.
If they are bred, they moult is even more severely than when they aren't and the bitch looks very scrawny for a while until she gets her new coat back but the moult is also quite heavy even when they aren't bred.
Because of this harmonal influence, it can happen at any time of the year depending on their seasons.
I'm not sure but if they are spayed, it probably helps to alleviate this. I'm not sure if yours is spayed or whether spaying stops these mid season moults.

After having pups, it is the bitches way of getting rid of excess toxins that build up during pregnancy and lactation due to eating extra and all the rest. They don't sweat like us and so they lose a lot of their toxins through moulting their coat...like trees do when they shed leaves.