Ear/Eye Issues

[duck duck goose]

Hi Folks,

My 1 yo Red Bone has had runny eyes and some black "junk" coming up in her ears lately. It is driving her crazy, or at least it must be, because she is constantly scratching at her eyes and ears, enough so that it's driving ME crazy.

I read some past topics talking about different drops you can use and I also found some people suggesting that the dog may be allergic to their food. I've done the drops in the past and they seem to help, but I don't want to be constantly pumping meds into her if I can avoid it.

I switched her to a new kind of food a couple of days ago, one that has no corn in it, and I was wondering how long you guys thought it would take before I saw an improvement if the issue was food related?

Also how often do your dogs get ear infections? Is this a fairly regular occurrence? What do you guys do to help keep the number of infections down? I wipe her ears out with a kleenex every couple of days and if she gets into any water I do my best to dry her ears afterwards, I was just wondering if anybody had any other tips or tricks as this is my first floppy eared dog so I'm not sure if I am missing something.

Thanks

[1bludawg]

Its either ear mites or a fungus infection in the ear .They have good medications for both in some of the dog catalogues.Both are easy to cure but still might reoccure from time to time.

[JTG]

http://www.allianceent.net/index.php?se ... 17&pid=132

[duck duck goose]

Thanks guys,
How often do you normally see issues come up with your dog's ears? It seems every couple months my dog's ears are bothering her. Does that seem like it's too often? What would you guys say is par for the course?

[1bludawg]

That's to often. Mites or fungus can usually be cleared up in about 7 days with the correct medication. There might actually be something in the ear.Sounds like a trip to the vet is in order.

[duck duck goose]

Thanks Bludawg, to the vet we go.