What about the inner ears?

[JerZeeGin]

I've read through all these discussions and didn't see comments on the ears...specifically pulling the hair out of the inside.  With my poodle I always trimmed her once or twice in between groomings and since Q (that was her name) always had a poodle puppy cut, it was easy.  But I never ever pulled the hair out of the ears and I never trimmed the nails (well I did once and couldn't see clearly on her black pigment and cut into the quick...ouch...and after that had the vet do the in-between trims). 

 

So with the doodle I know I can trim in between like I did with Q, and to actually take over the entire grooming seems do-able except for the nails (which I probably would be OK with because she is fair but I think I still would have the vet do it), but what does everyone do with the inner ear?  I can't see myself pulling the hair and it does get very woolly. 

~Thanks, Cathie

[Lorraine Bromley]

We do Neely's ears all the time. I started by pulling the hairs in the outer area. That way you can see down in further into the ear with the flashlite. Neely is really good to lie down for me to get it done. It isn't really comfortable for someone to be sticking things in there but he has grown to be good about it.

I have a pair of longer handled tweezers that I us to get the forest out of the ear. It was really bad down deep when he was younger but now the deeper hairs are fewer. I have to maneuver his ear so that I can see down the shaft as far as possible. The deep ones are usually covered with black dirt and wax so it is slippery to pull out so try and get a good grip. You usually only see a bit of the deeper one and when you do get ahold of it you would be amazed at how long they are.

I do this after I have cleaned out his ears. I use makeup remover pads with cleaner on them to clean as far down as possible with my finger.

Now this part I will likely get flach for, but I then use Qtips to go deep into the canal to get the rest of the dirt out. I continue until there is little to nothing coming out. Now I would NOT do this the first time you start to clean thier ears. Neely is extremely good when I am doing this and does NOT move while I am doing this. It would be far to dangerous to do this with a struggling dog. He has to have head shaking breaks where I tell him shake so he knows its ok to shake. We taught him the shake command so that he would shake off the water IN the shower instead of all over the house!

He will shake his head for the rest of the day after having this done. He gets treats after word.

He had one ear infection in two years. And that was when he was still pretty little and I wasn't quite as aggressive in my cleaning. 

The powder helped when I was plucking the outer ear hairs by hand but I found it just made more of a mess with the wax and dirt so we don't use it anymore.

I just look at his ears when I pet him once in a while. Sometimes if you squeeze the base of the ear when you are rubbing his head you can hear the fluid down there. Then its time for a clean up.

[Barb @ Gemstone Labradoodles]

If you don' t put too much powder in and you use the Q-tip to 'stir' the powder and make the hair stand up, you will find the powder works better when you are cleaning deeper.

[Nancie & Gracie Doodle]

To avoid the mess of ear powder in the ear, I just put it on my fingers.  I too put some in Gracie's ear and then I noticed a few days later all the gunk where the ear powder just clumped up and sat there.  So now I also never put the powder in her ear.  Helps on the fingers though for plucking!!

[Barb @ Gemstone Labradoodles]

It is important to pull the ear hair. It's not deeply rooted and comes out easily. It is slippery though, so you need ear powder to put on the hair first so you can get a grip. You can probably just use your fingers and not worry about using a hair pulling tool. The only time it hurts, is if the ear is infected and tender before you start. The ear can get infected from lack of airflow, so keeping the ear clear is important.

The reason you didn't find anything is because people forget to put tags on their discussions. I try and do that now, but in the past I didn't.

[JerZeeGin]

Thank you Lorraine and Barb,

I do clean Ginger's ears regulary and that has been going well, she is so good natured and lays very still...it's the hair pulling that I'm so wiggy about.  I hate even the thought of it.  But I will try to be brave and I will look for the ear powder at pet store today.

[Cynthia and Magic]

..I just reach in and pull a few at a time - and he doesn't seem to even notice. My vet however, said there is a new feeling about this, and they don't need to be pulled out at all!

Has anyone else heard this?

 

I don't do his nails....I take him to Petsmart about once a month....

[Shelly Gouvas]

My vet was'nt that concerned either about pulling hair out

[Nancie & Gracie Doodle]

Cathie...pulling the hair out of the ears was the last thing I tackled.  I just had a hard time bringing myself to do it.  But I finally started doing it a few months ago.  Prior, I would take Gracie to our groomer just for the nails and ears.  Then I started using the Dremel on her toes...she still is not good about it and we have a constant tug-a-war but I always win!  With her ears, when she is laying on our bed I will work on them.  If there is a lot then I don't do it all at the same time.  If you just randomly do it then you will eventually have the ear pretty well cleaned out.  Just don't wait to let them turn into birds nests before trying again.  I was told that the hair is not deeply rooted and therefore it is not like plucking hair out of their body.  The trick is to use some ear powder on your fingers so you can get a grip and then take very small amounts at a time and do a quick pull.  The faster the better.  For the deeper hair you use hemostats so you can clamp down on the hair and pull.  Don't go too deep into the ear.  You do NOT want to clip the hair.  It can fall back inside the ear canal and cause problems later.  There are two schools of thought...to pluck or not to pluck?  Some feel that plucking irritates the ear and for a while there are open areas where the hair folicle was and that they can get an infection through the microscopic break in the skin.  Well, it closes up pretty darn fast so you would have to be in the wrong place at the right time for that to happen.  Some are more prone to hairy ear canals than others.  It is the Poodle gene in them.  If it gets too massive then the ear canal can't breath and ear infections happen.  Between plucking, using an ear wash once a week or so and clipping the hair on the neck under the ears, you will probably never have ear problems.  Gracie has huge floppy ears and she hasn't had an ear problem since she was a puppy and I took over her ear maintenance.  There is a video that was posted a few months ago here on DK that showed how to pluck ears.  I will see if I can find it.  Otherwise, do some "searching" in the grooming section.  Darn...it was a new member who had a cute little black Doodle...he was posting lots of videos for a while.  I will think and get back to you...

[Lynda Kamrath]

OH, one more thing about ears.  We place cotton balls in the ears when we are batheing our  dogs and that helps keep the water out.  The ears can be a problem and I suggest starting to pluck out the hairs when they are little puppies, very little at a time.  All of our dogs were very accustomed to having their ears plucked from an early age and have no problems with it.  Since we had one poodle who had lots of ear problems, I also shave (or clip closely with scissors) the hair on the inside of the ear flap.  That way it doesn't get thick and start causing ear problems.  We have had no ear problems since we started plucking early and putting cotton balls in the ears during batheing.

[Nancie & Gracie Doodle]

Ah ha...it was Denis and Hogan but the video was showing how to clean the ears.  Here it is.  I think the plucking was a YouTube video...I'll check it out.

http://www.doodlekisses.com/video/keeping-labradoodle-ears-clean

 

[Nancie & Gracie Doodle]

Here is a good video for plucking out the ear hair!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPzD9QTpYJc

[JerZeeGin]

Excellent!  Thank you all.