If your dog is itchy, or they have a cheese / 'wotsits' smell to their ears or paws, or they have hay fever symptoms, this blog may help you.
Firstly, licking / nibbling excessively can be an indication that your dog may be experiencing pain somewhere in their body. In fact, over 80% of behavioural changes in dogs has been proven to come from a place of pain.
Have you assessed with your vet whether your dog may be experiencing a form of pain?
If you haven't had a vet check regarding this behaviour, we would recommend you do in order to rule out pain or illness.
If your dog has hay fever symptoms that are not itchy skin or red paws or ears please scroll down to the hay fever section
The second step is to ask your vet to carry out some simple steps to determine the cause of this irritated skin /ear
To test for mites, vets have to carry out a skin scrape test.
To test for yeast or bacteria being the cause, a simple swab test can do this.
The reason we ask for this is simple. Without knowing exactly what you are dealing with, it is incredibly hard to get the right support to best help your dog. This can result in you spending a lot more money than you need to whilst you try to find the best product to help your dog.
Confirmed via a skin scrape to be mites:
Ear mites can be contracted by your dog from outdoor environments. However, they are typically transmitted through contact with other animals such as dogs, cats, or ferrets. Outdoor cats frequently carry these parasites. While foxes are also susceptible to ear mites, it’s unlikely your dog interacts with them.
Once infected, ear mites rapidly multiply within your dog’s ears. A female mite has the capacity to lay between 15-20 eggs throughout her lifespan of several weeks. These eggs hatch within 4 days, and the new mites soon begin their own reproductive cycle. The complete cycle from egg to egg spans approximately 18-28 days.
It’s important to note that ear mites can easily spread among pets. Therefore, if your dog is affected, it’s wise to examine and possibly treat your other pets, such as cats or ferrets, as well.
Detecting ear mites with the naked eye is nearly impossible, and their symptoms often mimic those of other ear conditions.
You might notice some of these signs of ear mites in your dog.
Ear scratching
Head shaking
Dark discharge
Ears may smell bad
Skin lesions around the ear
Left to their own devices, ear mites can cause some worse problems:
Hearing loss
Loss of balance
Damage to the external or inner ear
Ear hematoma
Ear sensitivity
And more
Mites complete their life cycle in approximately three weeks, and commonly available treatments are effective only against adult mites. Consequently, eradicating mites from your dog may require an extended treatment period, potentially necessitating prolonged medication prescribed by a veterinarian.
While there are natural remedies available for mite infestations, these often involve applications within the ear canal, beyond mere surface cleaning. Therefore, it is advisable to pursue one of the following options:
Seek treatment through traditional medical methods from your regular veterinarian.
Consult with a holistic veterinarian for guidance on natural treatment approaches.
Bacterial Ear Infection:
If the swab test deems your dog's ear issue is an infection (bacterial), there are of course some natural remedies for this, however as this involves putting things into the ear, not just cleaning the visible parts, we recommend you either:
Take the medical management route via your conventional vet or
Contact a holistic vet for help in a more natural manner
Ear infections can be painful or itchy, so here are some common signs you’ll know something is wrong with your dog’s ears.
Head tilting towards the side with the infection
Head shaking
Scratching or pawing at ears
Rubbing ears
Hot ears
Smelly ears
Waxy discharge
Crusty, scabby or red, irritated skin inside the ear flap
In severe cases your dog may experience …
Hearing loss
Loss of balance
Walking in circles
Dry eye, nystagmus (quick side to side eye movements)
Drooping of eyelids or mouth, drooling
Dropping food, difficulty eating or drinking
Yeast Overgrowth
If the swab test confirms the issue to be a yeast overgrowth, there are a few steps you can take, however it is most important that you consider whether you prefer the long-winded but natural route, or the medical management route. We cannot decide either way for you, it must be your decision. Whichever way you prefer, the good news is that you can still opt for medicine if natural doesn’t work, or look at natural support following the medical route.
Medical management may include drops from the vets for you to administer, or the option for the vet to administer a drop there and then that gradually helps over the course of 4 weeks or so.
Natural pathway involves looking at all of the triggers and learning ways to mitigate these as much as possible
Natural Pathway
Have you already transitioned to raw? If not, we highly recommend you do as this will allow you to control the ingredients that you feed to your dogs, and identify any common causes whereas in other foods it is nigh on impossible to isolate the causes. Please see our blog on The Transition for details of how to switch your dog's diet to a species appropriate diet
Do you feed any tripe, root vegetables or fruits? Or any food containing these? If you do, you need to stop for the next 12 weeks at least to see if these are triggers. The reasons for this can be found in our blogs: Root vegetables & Tripe The Good & The Bad - tripe from wild venison tends to be lower in histamines than other forms of tripe, but we would still recommend removing this for 12 weeks whilst you get the inflammation / overgrowth under control.
Do you give any treats that have ingredients on the packaging that are not 100% meat? Even the treats that claim to be All natural or name a protein, can contain ingredients you would not expect. Treats are often fed that contain tripe or root vegetables, or pro-inflammatory ingredients such as salmon oil. If any of your treats are not 100% meat based, you need to consider switching to 100% meat based. Please see our blog on Tasty Treats & Dehydrating for some great choices.
Do you use any flea or worming products from a vet or supermarket? Or has your dog been vaccinated recently? Many dogs react in various ways to toxins, flea and wormer products, and vaccinations are all common causes of itching or yeast overgrowth as the body can react in order to fight the product given to the dog. For natural ways to prevent parasites, see the blog Parasite Prevention and our blog on vaccines
Do you feed any supplements that the ingredients are not 100% natural / known food sources? If so, you will need to consider switching to 100% natural products that are holistic vet approved. The term natural sadly does not necessarily mean it is a great choice. See our blog on Supplements - Not All are Equal for more information
Do you use any non-natural products in your home such as floor cleaners or air fresheners? If so, you will need to look at switching to natural cleaning products that can support your dogs health such as Ingenious Probiotics
Do you give your dog any fish oils that are not in the form of small oily fish? This is a major factor, it can be in a tablet, in a supplement, in a food or even a treat - or added by you - no matter what though, fish oils that are not in the form of raw oily fish are at risk of instability and therefore, becoming proinflammatory. Please see our blog on Fish or Fish Oils for more information
Another consideration is to look at testing your dog's microbiome. Since the pandemic hit in 2020 research by the team at Pet Biome has shown a reduction in the variety within dogs microbiome. The exact reasons why are not yet known but we all know a widely varied microbiome is a healthy microbiome. Did you know that all itchy skin stems from the gut? This simple test can help you to get to the exact cause of your dogs itching / yeast / irregular stool formations. It is a bit of an initial cost, however, in the long run this could actually save you money by getting to the root cause. It does take about 2-3 months for the testing to be run so if you choose this option we would advise doing the test and then whilst you wait for the results you can look at the other options listed here to try to help your dog in the meantime.
Cooling Chamomile: Chamomile is the most gentle herb known to humans. It has both cooling and soothing properties so can help to calm irritated skin. To use this we recommend making a jug of chamomile tea using any chamomile tea bags (just as if you are making a cup of tea, with no milk or sugar). You can then let it fully cool, and once cooled use a 100% water based wipe to wet with the chamomile tea then gently wipe over the visible skin that's irritated. You can also do this over your dogs outer ears, paws, legs, belly and back to remove pollen and dust particles that may cause environmental based itching.
If your dogs issue is confirmed as yeast by a swab test, you can also look at the DogsFirst Propythium Range
Another product that may help to support your dog through this journey is from Prodog Raw, called Protect - By supporting your dog’s gut and immune health, this innovative dietary supplement helps to maintain an itch and discomfort free skin condition
What about if my dog is suffering from Hayfever?
Pollen Chart UK
As we can see from the chart, the UK pollen season actually runs from January until September.
Recognising what trees, grasses and weeds are in your garden and immediate environment can help you to determine the pollens affecting your dog, and enable you to ensure a plan is in place moving forwards to help to relieve their symptoms.
Millions of dogs suffer from hay-fever symptoms each year, just as us humans do
These symptoms include:
Itching after being on grass
Sneezing
Rubbing the face
Watery eyes
Reverse Sneezing
Up until recently with some changes to veterinary regulations, some vets would advise the public to buy human medications - if your dog is using human anti-histamines in a non-emergency situation, please see our blog on Dangers of Human Medication - see below for how to naturally support your dog through this.
What are the more natural pathways we can take?
Do not worry though, there are a few things that you can do to help your dog through what can be a difficult time, without breaking the law, or risking your dogs overall health.
Follow our Gut Reset Protocol, or transition to raw if you haven’t already. This will rule out other causes and help you to get your dogs gut health nice and strong
Using a Holistic vet approved supplement for allergies from our Supplements List, as the supplement market is unregulated it is vital you only use products from companies who work with not only herbalists, but also holistic vets to formulate their products thinking of the overall health of dogs, and ensure you prepare for 12 weeks of monitoring progress as you need to allow time to see if a product is effective enough. Remember when starting a new supplement or food, start low and slow at ⅓ of the dosage for 1 week, the ⅔ of dosage for a week before finally moving to the full dose in week 3. If you see any adverse reactions, immediately stop and consult a vet for support.
Use cooled chamomile tea to wipe down your dog after any time outside. This will remove any dust or pollen particles from their coat whilst also soothing itchy skin. This can be any chamomile tea at all from the shops or home made.
Use our pollen chart in this guide section to understand what may be triggering your dogs allergy symptoms
Look into Ingenious products for as natural a home as possible
Another product that may help to support your dog through this journey is from Prodog Raw, called Protect - By supporting your dog’s gut and immune health, this innovative dietary supplement helps to maintain an itch and discomfort free skin condition
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