What are the Symptoms of Dog Ear Mites?
Ear mites are blood-sucking parasites that live inside the ears of your dogs. The presence of ear mites in your pets is a major health concern because it can lead to a more severe problem such as deafness.
Being so, it is a must that you always check the ears of your dog every time you groom it. Ear mites may also infest other household pets such as cats, rabbits, and ferrets. It may transfer from one pet to another so you have to follow strict preventive measures against it.
The symptoms of ear mites in dogs are as follows:
1. Scratching
If your dog tends to scratch its ears a lot, there are high chances that it has ear mites. Scratching is a normal activity in pets. However, if your dog does it to the extent that its ears are getting sore because of the habit, it ceases to be a normal occurrence. You have to further check your dog against the other symptoms listed here.
2. Slightly tilted head
Dogs suffering from a bad case of ear mite infestation would definitely feel uncomfortable with their condition. Most of these dogs end up tilting their head to one side. They do this because they try to take the mites out of their ears. However, tilting the head is not in anyway helpful and only the right medicines can successfully eliminate these parasites.
3. Too much head shaking
Dogs would try to shake their heads in an attempt to free their ears of mites. This move is yet caused by the discomfort that these parasites bring. If your pet shakes its head very frequently, high are the chances that its ears are infested with mites and you might have to take it to the veterinarian very soon.
4. Ear odor
Ear mites feed on the fluids found in the ears. As such, it is possible that the ears of your dogs would smell bad. Inspect your dog's ear after every bath. It should be free from mucus and should not have even a faint smell of foul odor.
5. Ear discharge
It is normal for the ear of your dog to be a little moist. But if there are some discolored discharges in the ear, the chances are high that your pet is suffering from an ear mite problem. Take your pet to the veterinarian so that the real cause of the discharge is determined. There are other health concerns associated to discolored ear discharges and ear mites is just one of them.