Natural Leave-in Rinse/Conditioner you can make at home

[Barb @ Gemstone Labradoodles]

 

Good news. I have been making my own rinse/conditioner for a few weeks and I am quite amazed at the results. I can hardly wait until some of you try it and report back here on this discussion.

This is a simple lemon rinse and has been making my dogs' coats the softest they have ever been. I have been using it alone after shampooing with no other product as I wanted to see just how good it was. Here's the recipe.

 

Put one sliced fresh lemon and  4 cups of water in a saucepan.

Heat to almost a boil

Remove from heat and let stand overnight

Remove lemon slices and bottle the juice that is now ready to use.

 

I have been storing this in the refrigerator because I thought it would last longer. Then I put some in a spray bottle and add an equal amount of hot water. Originally I added the hot water because it was too cold to spray on a wet dog. The half lemon juice and half water has been working waaaay beyond my expectations.

I haven't given it a really good test to see if it is an adequate detangler, as my dogs' coats are quite short right now. I am going to try it on a longer coat this next week and I will let you know how that works.

 

[Camilla and Darwin]

Sorry it took me forever to respond! Darwin's hair is about 2" right now.

[Taylor & Huff]

I am planning on giving Huff a bath on Thursday or Friday and he always has a few mats (from his harness because we don't take it off but they are not usually too bad) so I will report on using it as a detangler and a spray when I do.

[Ricki and Tara (doodle)]

Great Taylor, I am looking forward to hearing what you think about it when used that way!

[Jennifer Tramell]

Okay, because I am terribly lazy and rarely have fresh lemons on hand, could you make the spray with bottled lemon juice?  Just a thought......

[Taylor & Huff]

So I just got to give Huff a bath yesterday to do the cold and raining weather the past few days. I did use this spray quite liberally and it does work pretty good as a dematter but not quite as good as an actual dematter but I would rather use it since it is natural. It did make the rest of his hair super easy to brush through and it seems to have made it pretty soft. I am pretty impressed with it.:) Thanks for the recipe Barb:)

[Donnie]

Do you squeeze the lemons or just slice 'em up thin and throw 'em in the pot?

[Taylor & Huff]

I just sliced them up:)

[Carla & "Beans"]

I'm still "undecided" as we live in South Carolina/tons of sun, and Beans (chocolate) loves to be out on the deck bird/squirrel/golfer/people watching.  I'd hate it if his hair lightened/dried out due to the lemon juice, so to speak.  I've read the acid in lemon juice lightens the hair and damages - makes it brittle/break after a while.  You guys are making me really want to try this though!

[Barb @ Gemstone Labradoodles]

I have been wondering about this too. I guess as in most things, moderation is best. I will be using a sunscreen leave in conditioner in the summer, but I like having the natural option. I find it doesn't last as long on the coat as my regular leavein conditioner, but instead of drying the coats out, they feel more moist almost to greasy, but not quite. That's quite a feat as the humidity here is around 20%. I recently bought a humidifier to bring the house up to 30%.

[Nina, Phil, Harlow & Lacey]

K, I am going to give this a try on Harlow to see how it helps her wooly coat.

[Kate and Maci]

Barb or anyone who has used this - I am giving Maci a bath this morning and made my lemon conditioner last night. As I understand it, you can either leave it in or rinse it off.  I am leaning towards leaving it in - I guess my questions is, do you just spray it all over her after she is toweled off from the bath but before drying or should I spray her and then told dry  her?  Hope someone sees this first thing as I want to give her a bath this morning before our therapy visit.  Thanks in advance.

[Taylor & Huff]

I don't know if you already went to your therapy visit or not. Sorry I couldn't get to it earlier. I just put it on after I towel dry but before I use the blow drier. Good luck!:)