when i go hiking and couple of my friends have huskies, they look skinny and their fur is so short like chihuhua fur kinda thing. is it because they are not full breed or because they shaved them or because thats how some husky are? i askeda employee at a moms and pops shop about that and they said the food they feed them is what makes a dog look good and define. from body, fur etc

Food does have a big part in it but some are just short furred and skinny. My Sophie has short fur and she's skinny but she's started to get a little fluffier.

Coat is usually genetic ( I say usually because some people so shave their dogs but you can tell a shaved dog from a short coated dog). The weight thing can also be genetic. Some dogs are just predisposed to being skinny because they have a fast metabolism (think of humans who eat and eat and eat but can't gain any weight) though weight can also be because of the food they are fed and how much and then the amount of exercise the dog gets.

One of my girls has an extremely short coat (think single coat/no undercoat). She's never been shaved and is on a high quality kibble diet.

I believe food plays a part in how healthy the coat looks and feels, but not how thick the coat is. My Huskies eat the same food and all three of their coats are completely different. I too believe it's genetics that control how the dog's coat will be.

Hayden has a really beautiful fluffy coat! Nicky has a short coat and is very thin and petite weighing in at 39 pounds. Brandi is short and stocky and has a combination coat, but her's isn't finished filling in yet.

Genetics play a huge role in a dogs coat. Some other factors that can play a role to some extent is climate and nutrition. If a dog is genetically predisposed to a fuller/thicker/ longer coat then a bad diet and warmer weather isn't going to change their coat length. Likewise a dog genetically predisposed to a shorter coat isn't going to grow a much longer coat even if it lives in a colder climate and is fed the absolute best diet.

I have a dog from the north, specifically from Snohomish, WA (the Seattle area), who has a short coat but very dense which you can't tell just by looking at him. He is fed an excellent diet and environment doesn't affect his length or density coat in the slightest since we've moved around from Washington to Florida to South Carolina. He has the coat he is genetically supposed to have and there's no changing it. Strangers have come up and accused me of shaving my sibe which I have never done, and would never do. But they make this assumption because my sibe has a shorter coat length than they are accustomed to seeing. It's all genetics and has nothing to do with how he is cared for or where he lives. My shorter coated boy has a denser coat than other sibes I've met who have longer fur. For example I've met a wooly husky with a very thin coat which was a stark contrast to my boy with a very thick but short coat.

oh okay because i thought it was the food doing that, they feed her pedigree thats why i was asking . but if its genetics then they are good to go

A lot of the dogs with shorter coats tend to come from racing lines. Not sure if that is what has been breed for or if its just how they have ended up, but if you looking at a racing team sometime, you'll notice the same.

Another thing that can affect this is a blown coat. My female right now looks bald and has for a month or so and probably will for another month, but its just because she blew her coat.

I agree with most that has been said here. I do believe a diet will improve a coat of a malnurished
dog. My little girl when we got her her coat look pretty thin and bad after a few months of a good diet she looks alot full than I had expect her too. My boy seems to be genetically predisposed to have a shorter coat and Kerian is genetically predisposed to have a shorter fuller coat.

Like its been said, I don't think diet changes length of coat. However I have seen a HUGE improvement in links coat in the past three weeks since taking him off Pedigree and giving him a couple baths. It just looks healthier, and a bit fuller, but thats about it.

I agree with what has been said, food and such can greatly affect how the coat looks, but in terms of how thick and long it is as far as I know it is all genetics and age. One of my friend's sib just turned 3 this winter and magically he finally got that long thick coat people think of with huskies. A few others i know found that there sibs didnt get their thick long coats till 1.5 or 2 years.

The fur does make a HUGE difference in how big they look. Maya is 54ish lb and a girl at the dog park has a female who is 35lb and looks bigger than Maya just from the fur. I often get accused of shaving Maya's coat since it is so much shorter than the average husky, and I just have to say, "nope, its just her coat, sometimes they stay thin and sometimes it takes till they are older to get longer." I also get the what is Maya mixed with question due to the shorter fur making her look smaller and not as fluffy as what they think of for a husky.