Waaaaaaiiiiitt. BEFORE you start regularly and manually expressing glands - PLEASE know first that unless there is something wrong structurally -or- if you are feeding a food that is irritating for your dog -or- if your dog is continually having soft poos - your dog's glands *should* take care of themselves.
If you start manually expressing - you could be damaging your dog's ability to perform this themselves. A dog's firm, normal poo should express the glands as the poo passes the area (if they need emptying, that is).
If your dog's glands are filling abnormally and not emptying themselves - please consider what you're feeding. It is rare that there is something structurally wrong that actually *requires* lifetime, manual intervention. Rather, this is a natural process that the dog should be able to take care of without you even being aware.
Also, some problems can be outgrown. Nancy1999's baby needed his glands expressed sometimes as a puppy, but he did outgrow this - so it could sometimes be related to the maturity of the system.
Please though, don't force this procedure on your dog unless it's absolutely necessary and unless you've considered diet first.
