Fergie had a bad night.

[fergie11]

Fergie woke up around 1 am and was shaking her head and walking around with it cocked to one side. I'm thinking it's her ear but it's not warm and it's not red or dirty or anything. I put some of Lucy's drops in it - but she continued to pull and scratch and walk funny. After about 1 hr she calmed down in our bed and fell back asleep. This morning she did eat but she's still shaking her head and walking with it cocked to one side. I'll call the vet when it opens but what does everybody think this could be?

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Cathy, was she groomed recently? I had a poodle who did that once after a grooming; turned out the groomer had been too rough removing the ear hair, and an infection was brewing. Or did she go swimming over the weekend?
I'd check with the vet; short of her having suddenly developed some kind of neurological problem (Not!), the only thing that could be causing that is an ear infection or irritation, or water in the ear.
I hope it's nothing.

[fergie11]

She was groomed on Tuesday and she went swimming on Saturday but I don't think she got her ears wet. I called and I can't get into the vet until 4:00 today. She seems a little better this morning than during the night. I'll just have to wait and see. Thanks Karen.

[Linda,Yankee & Finn]

I agree with Karen, has to be ear infection. Yankee does exactly what you describe when he has one.

[Joy Originator of GiantSchnoodles]

Hi Fergie, I think Karen is right on. Over the years I've experienced both of what she describes. Head shaking has always been ears. Do you live in foxtail country? Puppy love from Joy & furry folk

[fergie11]

What do you mean - foxtail country? You know, shaking the head I know is ears what scares me is I've never seen them walk goofy from it. She cocks her head goofy, causing her to walk goofy, then shakes her head. She's pretty calmed down now - I'm going to try to keep her that way until 4 when we go see the vet. Oh, i forgot, she went swimming with my husband on Sunday too. This is more and more leaning toward ears. That makes me feel good cause that's easily fixed.

[Joy Originator of GiantSchnoodles]

Where do you live? Foxtails are weeds in certain parts of the country. If they get into the ears, they are a big deal. I just had a $240 foxtail removal. Puppy love from Joy & furry folk

[fergie11]

I live in central WI and haven't heard of Foxtail weeds. They probably get froze out here but who knows.

[Debbie and Thomas]

I have seen this in my last dog-it was water in the inner ear. Makes then walk funny-affects their equalibrium or balance. It was not an infection though-it cleared up in a few days. The funny thing is it never happened again and he LOVED the water at the cottage. Mind you-I always dried out his ears with a towel after that.

[Tricia, Shiloh, Fenway & Tessie]

The last time I had Shiloh groomed, he came up shaking his head and acting weird for about 3-4 days. When I told the groomer about it this last time....I asked her not to use that tool to pull the hair out of his ears and he was fine...I just think that has to be painful.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

The hemostat, they have to know how to use it. When my poodle was hurt, I actually saw the groomer stick in into her ear really hard and twist it really roughly. That's how I knew what caused it when she started to have a problem.
I switched groomers; my new one (not so new, I've now been using her for 10 years) used the hemostat, too, but she never hurt my dog's ears.

[Joy Originator of GiantSchnoodles]

That has happened to me too. I ended up taking my dog to the ER. I always say stay with your dog at the groomers until you really know your groomer. Take a book or take your bills or laptop and sit wi your dog. Here is my ear article

reprint of ear care
Thu Jul 3 11:28:10 2003
66.126.66.203
Poodle ears are something I have had the misfortune of dealing with for many years. The painful hair pulling that most groomers are trained to do, often just aggravate the situation and cause more infection. After much experimentation I came up with a new way to deal with poodle ears. It is so simple and humane, I don’t know why someone didn’t think of it before.
The basic problem is that dogs with floppy ears don’t have air passing through the ears. Additionally, if they have hairy ears, the air is further blocked. So bacteria grow in the wet warm dark moist ears. What seems logical to me, is that you just need to get air down there and wash them out and dry them now and again. So here is what I came up with and it is working for me. No ear infections in 11 months.
Disclaimer: It is my method and my method only. It is not approved by the FDA, a vet or any other authorized authority. It has, however grown out of experience. Such as expensive and anguishing middle of the night visits to emergency vets when overly aggressive groomers have pulled too much hair out of ears, or I have let it go too long. I make no guarantees, just that it works for me. If you try it, please let me know how it works for you.
1. Buy a scissors in a beauty supply shop for clipping people nose hair. They have little nobs on the ends.
2. Carefully Clip the hair in the ears, you don’t need to get all of it out, you just need an air passage. Use a cotton swab or just finger to wipe the hair pieces out. They usually gum up on the goop and come out in a nice gummy mass. If your dog has had ear hair pulled, you need to be very careful because s/he now fears the pain of ears being touched so start at top of the ear canal with soothing talk until you have built up enough trust that the dog won’t jerk.
3. Use a cleaning solution.. I have had good success with Amway’s LOC. Flush the ear with it undiluted using a squeeze bottle. Then flush the ear with plain water using a different squeeze bottle. Then I use Otomax. There are other solutions that people swear by. Dermavet is good. Liz(RI) rery highly recomends Zymox, Nancy at Doodlesville has a formulala that she highly recomends.
4. At night, or for a few hours during the day, pin your dogs ears up with a binder clip. Just clip the end of the hair on the tips of the ears up over his/her head. The clip will eventually fall or be shaken out of course, But for awhile, air will get down into the ears.
5. Never use a q tip in the ears. Wipe the brown gunk out of the ears with diaper wipes until the diaper wipe comes out clean.
6. Never let a groomer pull the hair in the ears. Aggressive pulling = pain = irritation of the sensitive skin = infection = expensive vet visits
7. You can pull some of the hair with your fingers, but not agressively and not if it hurts. It should feel to the dog, like your scratching an itch. If the dog minds then stop pulling.
8. Smelly ears, if they don’t respond to this
treatment, require expensive vet visits. If they smell
there is something wrong.
9. If your dog is shaking his/her head excessively or
holding it to one side s/he is experiencing pain in her
ears.
10. Don’t try to have the ears squeaky clean. A little goop and hair is normal. We have a little goop in our ears don’t we?
I hope this helps save some dogs from pain and saves you some money.
Puppy love from Joy, & furry folk
What is a "binder clip"??? (nm)
Wed Aug 6 08:20:44 2003
64.12.97.8
metal spring loaded clip made to hold paper, also
Wed Aug 6 08:35:53 2003
64.12.97.8
can use clothes pins, hair scrunchies (sp?)...
Generally recommended that these things be used around small puppies ONLY under supervision (not good for tummy!).
Joy R - methinks you need to add an addendum to the ear care posting, as this is at least the second time this question has come up :)
Ear drying solution
Wed Aug 6 10:06:03 2003
216.66.108.130
One of the problems with labs and goldens is that they have sticky ear wax that the usual vet's 'otic' ointment doesn't dissolve. You need something that dissolves wax which is a solution of 30% alcohol, 30% vinegar, 30% water. You can omit the alcohol if you want. Do NOT put this solution into a smelly ear. Smelly ear means that there is already an infection and the ear is pretty raw and hurting. Alcohol is NOT indicated. Antibiotic is.
Put solution in maybe once every other week. Maybe 1/3 of a dropper into the ear canal. Let the dog shake her head hard and then wipe the outside of the ear with some kleenex. If there is a lot of black goop, repeat the treatment the next week until no more black/brown goop is shaken out. Then do it more infrequently. there is no need to go digging in the ear canal for total cleanliness. Just wipe off what you can easily get to.
I do pluck the hair out of my dogs ears maybe 4X a year. Just squirt in R-7 powder and then go in with your fingers and get what you can. You will need a strong light source. I agree with Joy that if the dog seems discomfited, just stop. But I do think it helps to get some of the longer hair out. My little girl, Molly, grows 2" hairs in there and they come out painlessly, covered with goop. I have to assume that is helps to have the stuff out of there. By the way - despite daily swimming, we have had only 2 minor infections out of 8 ears. Not bad for mid-August

Hi Swarl, A little plucking that is not painful is a good idea. MY article and the technique I developed was after hundreds of dollars spent in the middle of the night in the ER after an overenthusiastic groomer put my poor dog in extreme pain by overdoing it. Also, many groomers still use a thing we used to all a "roach clip" in the 70's. They pull the hair out of the ears while the dog whimpers in pain. This is very different from pulling some hair with your fingers, that doesn't hurt the dog. I think a good rule of thumb is to not pull anything that hurts. Then the ear canal does not get inflamed from the pulling.
I do go in with a make up swab and wipe out the g***. Not a Qtip, Just a makeup swab on the end of my finger. I havened tried your formula, although it seems to me we used to put alcohol and vinegar in our ears when dunking in a hot tub to prevent human ear infections I am wondering why you ad the water as vinegar is already mostly water? Also, my dogs hate it when I flood the ear so I just put the dermapet on the swab when I clean the ear. I could try this formula to put on the swab. What do you see as the advantages to flooding the ear? Thanks for the great post. Puppy love from Joy and furry people

Swarl
get some R-7 powder
Fri Nov 14 12:39:18 2003
216.66.108.130
You can get it from a pet supply or groomer. It is a powder that you pour liberally into the dogs ear. It helps you get ahold of the ear hair. Start doing just a bit at a time and the pup will get used to it. The hair way inside the ear doesn't hurt. some of the hair out at the edge may pull them a bit hard. Then cut the hair at the edge of the canal and all the hair under the ear flap all the way down the side of the head. Just cut it short and the air circulation will be better. I do it about 4 X a year. That seems to be enuf to keep their ears free of infection even tho they do a lot of swimming in the summer months.
Do not pluck the ear hair if it hurts the dog. It means that they have an infection. If they are infection free it shouldn't hurt. don't use a metal tool. Just your fingers will do. What you can't reach is not a problem. After a couple of days put in some vinegar/water mix - just a few drops, if you want to be sure that the ear wax is coming out. The dog will shake its head and the wax will fly around your house invisibly !!!!! repeat the solution every few days until the ear is clear of any black g*** when you gently rub it with a kleenex.
HTMLCONTROL Forms.HTML:Text.1 \* MERGEFORMAT \s
HTMLCONTROL Forms.HTML:Text.1 \* MERGEFORMAT \s
Not sure why they call it Blue Powder as it isn't a powder. I would suggest getting Lucy's infammation down before using this as I am not certain if the alcohol will burn. I have been using this along with commercial ear clean and haven't had any problems, but watch it, it really does stain.
Have you looked into a possible food allergy as a source of her problem? Also, have her thyroid levels been checked recently?
Good luck.
Ingredients
16 oz Isopropyl Alcohol (will help dry the ear)
4 Tablespoons Boric Acid Powder (will sooth the ear)
16 Drops of Gentian Violet Solution 1% (anti-infection agent)
Mix together in bottle (use one shaped like a hair dye bottle) and shake well. You will need to shake solution every time you use it to disperse the Boric Acid Powder.
Treatment
Evaluate condition of ears before treating and if very inflamed and sore do not attempt to pull hair or clean out ear at all. Wait at least 2 days.
Shake the ear before using. Flood the ear with solution and massage for 30-60 seconds. Wipe with sterile pad or cotton. Don’t be afraid to go deep into the ear canal, you won’t puncture anything. Flood ear again, but do not massage. Let the dog shake out the excess, then wipe with tissue.
This solution will stain hair and fabric.
Schedule
Treat 2x a day for first week to two weeks depending upon severity of ears.
Treat 1x a day for the next week.
Treat 1x per month
This solution appears to work well on any and all ear problems from mites to wax to cankers. It is also effective for treating fungus type infection, cuts or hot spots.
This treatment also works well on People.
This is for external use only…don’t get into the eyes.
Quintzy is a 17-month old doodle with hairy ears. We had recurring ear infections for the first 6 months of his life, which antibiotics never quite cleared up. Then we found a product called "Zymox". It's an ear treatment composed of three natural antimicrobials - lactoperoxidase, lactoferrin and lysozyme. All three are derived from milk and have a killing action against bacteria and yeast. We followed the manufacturer's recommendation of a 14-day treatment (with no other rinses or ear flushing) to eliminate chronic infections. It worked. We have maintained Quintzy's ears clean and infection free by flushing every other day with a 50:50 mixture of vinegar and alcohol. But it's important for the ears to be completely healed and free of inflammation before using the alcohol - otherwise it will sting badly. We don't pluck Quintzy's ear hair; we follow the recommendations posted on various forums (fora?) in the past by Joy R.
A couple of months ago, we thought we were getting a bit of an ear smell, so we did another Zymox treatment. As it happened, Quintzy was due for his annual checkup and boosters shortly afterwards. His vet pronounced Quintzy's ear condition as excellent. We have made a slight shift in our treatment routine since that last smelly bit. Now we use the vinegar/alcohol flush on Mondays and Wednesdays. Then, on Friday morning, we put a couple of drops of Zymox into each ear and let it stay there through the weekend. Quintzy's ears are great; no smell and ABSOLUTELY no gunk.
We found Zymox on the internet. You should be able to locate the web site by searching on that name.
BTW, I'm a microbiologist, and I verified in my textbooks the manufacturer's claims regarding the mode of action of the three active ingredients for Zymox.

Aurora's & Riley's Mom
Our vet gave us a recipe for swimmer's ear solution ...
Mon Nov 17, 2008 6:19PM
74.77.112.50

1 part rubbing alcohol
1 part white vinegar
2 parts water
copyright Joy de la ren San Diego 2004

[fergie11]

YEP - it's a yeast infection - much worse in the left ear. We're treating it and it will be fine. Thank god that's all it is. Lesson learned - wash ears much more often. Also found a tick on her - Yes, we did use Frontline.