Part of the problem I think with cockers is that the coat they want/wins in the show ring is not appropriate for hunting. It is so cottony that the dog could not take more than a couple steps before getting caught up in brambles. This is primarily what I see with American Cockers. The English variety does not seem to have gone to hell in a handbasket yet.

Me? I don't clip anything but mats. I would't have a dog I had to maintain constantly with a pair of sissors or a clipper.

One of my step dads kept English Sheep Dogs though. When they lived in Nevada he'd have them sheared pretty close every other year or so in the early spring.

I just cringe when I think back a few years. A neighbor was taking care of her friends Golden retriever and she had the dog shaved for the summer!

I have never seen such a pitiful site in my life. The dog was outside and curled up in a ball. It was as if the dog lost it's
confidence. It would no longer come wagging his tail, but lay there all sad.

But the real tragedy was that the bugs would bite his skin something fierce. He lost what protection his coat gave to him, not to mention it certainly helped him stay cooler too.
I guess for me, it is unconscionable to do such a thing to a dog.

I don't understand why a groomer would agree to do such a thing either. I would just say plain and simple if you want that done, you are going to have to go somewhere else because I refuse to do that, and here's why.
It is just professional integrity.

I was a hair dresser for 20 years, and many times people would come in with fried hair asking for perms etc.
It was up to me to tell them what was going to be best for their hair. It seems like the same thing to me for a dog as well.
With one exception, and that would be severe mats found on dogs that have been rescued or neglected. But shaving a dog because the person doesn't like fur or hair in the house?
Don't have a pet then!

I've been both a hairdresser and a dog groomer, and as free (and occasionally firm) as I was with advice, I know there is really just no talking to some people. Outright refusal to do what the customer asks doesn't pay the rent, unfortunately, though I'll admit to being much more likely to refuse a service on a dog than a person.

What I found DOES work is making the customer (hair AND dog grooming) sign a release relieving you from responsibility of the consequences of an ill-advised service. In creating a release, you can outline exactly what the consequences could be IN WRITING, and state that the customer has been made aware of them, but has decided to proceed anyway against professional advice. It lets the customer know in no uncertain terms that what they want is SO ill advised that it can create serious problems and puts them in a position to sign off on it. Most of the time they feel like such damned fools at this point that they'll concede, but if not, you're protected against the fallout.

I'm lucky in that I've never been asked to shave down a healthy dog's coat.

The reason I was considering this is because I DO NOT have a hose, by which I mean I have no place to plug a hose (I tried last year to my sink and out the window but I got in trouble). My complex does not allow sprinklers, hoses, kiddy pools, even a large bowl filled with water. We have a pool, there is a STRICT no dogs allowed in the pool. I was fined for walking in the pool area at night with my dog waiting at the entrance to get a ball mistakenly thrown over the fence. The apartment is not big enough to do any sort of training in apart from obedience and play is out of the question (though we can play a "light" game of tug). The closest body of water is about 2 miles away with no parking within that two miles or at the site. In the weather we've been having we made it about a mile before it was simply to hot to drag him the second mile (heavy panting, trying to lay down in the shade, general distress). I carried him home, cooled him off, he flat out refused to go outside the rest of the day, even waited till after dark to pee. Even at night it was about 85 degrees so while we did some nighttime play (complete with flashlights and lighted toys it was still to hot to stay out more than 10 minutes are hard running. Our only other option for water play is the dog park which, while nice, is a 35 minute drive on a good day and in the summer brings out the batshit insane dog owners on weekends and dangerous ones during the week. In the winter and fall it's wonderful. In the summer the tourists find it...

I was hoping that a trace clip (shorter on the bottom, let it stay long on the top) would cool him off a bit, though apparently not XD

Kinda counter intuitive I know Jamie, but all things being equal, a long or thick coated dog is generally way better off left just as they come.

Say to hell with the metropolitain life style, move up here to Maine we got water all over the place!

this might sound stupid but can you hose him down in the bathtub before you go out on a walk?
at least then he would be cool on the walk.
messy for the apartment, but cooler for the dog.

What about a cooling vest like this Ruff Wear Swamp Cooler ?

I have used the cooling bandanas and brought a spray bottle to spritz, used an umbrella to keep the sun off, but only helpful for mild cooling. An umbrella every day would be a royal pain.

I will admit I had a Keesh that developed cushings disease and a whole bunch of skin issues in his senior years and I clipped to manage the skin sores, he wasn't any cooler in the warmer mos minus the hair. And I had to be extra careful to protect the skin from sun burns.

Jamie, if you ever decide to wet your dog down before going outside, especially if it's daytime, just do the tummy and inside the legs. With a double coated dog, if you do the whole body, you can actually create problems. The water in on the top of the body, in the double coat, can create more heat...like steam heat.

leih