Hello all... I wonder if you can help

My Cavalier has gunky ears - when I clean them the wax is a dark chocolate brown. She has had this since I adopted her over 12 months ago and despite treatment for ear conditions the wax remains gunky and dark brown. Any thoughts? What colour should dog ear wax be?

Sorry for such an icky topic

Do her ears have a musty smell? Healthy ears should be virtually wax free - you should be able to see a nice clean, pink ear canal. Has your vet taken swabs of the wax? Ears can have bacterial, fungal and yeast infections and the lab will be able to say what the best treatment is once a swab has been looked at.

have you tried Thornit? http://www.thornitearpowder.com/

Many on here use it.

You can get it various places online at varying prices.

You only use a pinch of powder for each ear so it lasts a long time.

Read the instructions for using it as you don't put it in the ear but around the entrance.

My boy has gunky ears. he has an allergy or allergies Which inflame his ears and make them a perfect home for both fungal and bacterial growth. Deffo get the vet to take a look as my poor lad ended up needing his being cleaned under g a then deep cleaning and drops three times a day for 10 days. We are now down to cleaning daily or a bit less with a steroid tablet or spray backup for flare ups.

Be careful with Thornit. It's good stuff but if the ear exudate is wet or sticky, then the Thornit can set the ear exudate hard. It's called concretion and can result in needing a vet intervention to get the set muck out.

I have to 'maintain' noodle's ears weekly, I pluck all her hair out of her ears, by all I mean all even using tweezers to pull out long hairs, I use a bit of thornit powder not in the ear itself though, on inside of her ear flaps, this makes it easier to pluck, plus every week I use epi otic to wash out her ears, when this is used up I'll use clean aural, alternating the cleaners is a 'good' idea according to vet, anyway day after ear washing I use a piece of tissue and wipe inside of her ear. Noodle is a bedlington so has the long floppy ears, when we got her back in jan she had manky ears and an infection. Now lovely clean, hair free no scratching!

Thanks everyone. She has had vet prescribed drops and antibiotics and a deep clean under anaethestic in the past but nothing seems to limit the gunk. The vet hasn't taken swabs though so maybe that is a thought. They do smell musty... I have tried thornit but am worried about impacting the problem. Trip to the vets methinks

On the vets advice, I cut pork and dairy out of my dogs diet which helped a lot. Many pet foods list the meat content as meat and animal by products so I did some phoning round. The manufacturers were actually very helpful. He was on royal Canin skin support till they changed the protein from fish to duck. He now has wafcol fish and potato.

My friends old westie (now at the Bridge) was bothered with gunky ears nearly all her days and had to get them cleaned out regularly.

Thornit is great

My springer came to us with very dirty, smelly, infected ears. We treated the infection, and cleaned them regularly, so they cleared up. However, the brown wax and slight smell has remained. I have had the wax swabbed and checked out by the vet several times, but there is no evidence of infection, yeast, mites or anything else. He just has waxy ears (he might be prone to it because of the years of neglect, according to the vet). He also gets wet a lot, and swimming brings the gunk to the surface. As he has long ears, like your cavalier, they don't get as much air in them as dogs with other kinds of ears (pricked etc). The vet has advised me against deep cleaning too frequently, as she says that often encourages the production of wax. So I wipe out all the stuff that comes to the surface, and just deep clean once a month or so. One thing which has helped is keeping the hair underneath the ear (around the ear canal) very short. I use thinning scissors for that.

I also use Thornit, but not every week, as I worry about the powder becoming a paste which might block his ear canal when he goes swimming.

That's interesting...my cavalier came into the rescue in a bad way and the vet thinks she may have had ear problems throughout her life. Maybe it is just something she is prone to. I do try and keep her ears short but she is a bit fidgety when you go too close to her ears. I think the deep cleaning tip is good - maybe I am making the problem worse...

Yes I did this but on woofgangs advice, not sure if it helped but no problems since no pork, though noodle loved pigs ears! Not cut out dairy as such, but then its not something they have much, with the thornit I just use a pinch bet my finger thumb just to grab the hair for plucking, I too didn't like idea of it gunking up.

Oscar gets waxy ears from time to time and it is dark brown but i've had the vet take a look and it doesn't look red or irritated so I just clean it out with ear cleaner or olive oil every so often. It's a common problem in floppy eared dogs as air doesn't circulate as well

My old springer had terrible ear problems many of which were due to his love of swimming and the ears not drying out quickly (he had very hairy very long ears ). On the vet's advice we had to 'air' his ears out after a swim so he would wear a headband or i'd hold his ears back with a soft scrunchie so it looked like he had a pony tail.

Tizzy used to react to ear cleaners as he had very sensitive skin so our then vet recommended olive oil instead and I really rate it now. Warm a teaspoon up in a cup of boiled water, then pour oil on the spoon and wait a few seconds (the heat from the teaspoon should warm the oil enough) then pour into the ear and work in by massaging around the ear. Leave it for a bit then clean up the stuff that comes out with cotton wool - it works by softening the wax so it can be flushed out and it is soothing for the skin - Tizzy used to be in and out of vets constantly with ear problems but after we started the above as routine he very rarely had ear problems

Archie doesnt have gunky or smelly ears and his ear wax is dark reddish brown. Apparently a wide range of colour is normal......

So not only are we good at talking about poo ear wax is pretty cool too

Its quite often food related when they have bad ears

Its glamourous having dogs in your life isn't it?!

wait till you get to anal glands