Weda's Food Allergies

Food, Fitness and how to keep them healthy.

Postby Big_Ant » April 4th, 2006, 5:24 pm

ME, I've got a pic of Weda sleeping with the prego wife on the couch. I'll post it up tonight.

I haven't been taking many pics of Weda lately. She's still trying to get rid of this damn ear infection.

I've done the medicated solution, outer cream, etc. It goes away, but then comes back within a couple of days or so. It stays a slight bit red all of the time, so I think the meds are just pushing back the effects for a short while until it returns. She's semi-bald on the back of the ears because of scratching, which I've been able to get her to stop, but the constant head shake is still there. Any thoughts?

The vet said that a last resort would be that he put her under, and go in himself and clean out all of it, but I would rather try and avoid that.

I think the problem might be that I'm not getting the med solution deep (or not enough of it) to get the infected area.

- Anthony
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Postby Maryellen » April 4th, 2006, 5:26 pm

is it in one ear? sounds like maybe an allergy. jesse scratched the fur off the back of her ear too from scratching, she is too battling a nasty ear infection, but thats because she has allergies.. maybe weda has them too?? i think you should send her to me here ,, the air is much cleaner here.... and rufus is in love with her anyway..
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Postby Big_Ant » April 4th, 2006, 5:53 pm

hmmm . . . I thought of allergies, but this didn't start up until about a 2-3 months ago.

She's on Canidae, she gets some cottage cheese, yogurt, egg, oil, on occasion, but if it was from one of those add-ins, it would go away. I don't give them consistent enough to be the problem.

What would you recommend doing to determine if it's allergy related?

The reason I was not too much thinking it was allergy was because it started up after she got a little cut on her left ear, down near the bottom of the bell. The problem mainly seems to be in the left ear, but she does has a little irritation with her right, and slight baldness, but the left is the one that she holds down and tilts her head to.

- Anthony
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Postby Maryellen » April 4th, 2006, 5:57 pm

it could be the canidae. jesse started showing her allergies when she was on the canidae. i would say cut out all the extras and start from there.. is she on antibiotics too or just ear stuff you put in her ear?
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Postby Big_Ant » April 4th, 2006, 6:04 pm

No Antibiotics, just Cream and Medicated Ear Cleaner

I just talked with the wife, seeing as you just pointed out something we should have seen, and we both decided to go ahead and put her back on BARF. We didn't have any problems with this when she was on it before, the only reason we stopped was because it was when I was out of work, and always out looking for work, so the easiest for time and financially was Canidae, without going too low on the ladder.

What is average time to notice if there is a change? Just so that I can gauge if it's working in the right direction or not.

As I said, we don't give those add-ins often, so if it was allergies to one of those items, it would probably go away intermittently when we didn't give the add-ins.

I'm thinking maybe the sunflower oil. I believe that's the one that can develop into an allergy over time, correct?

Either way, Thanks, and any other input/thoughts are appreciated.

Your Reward will be 10 pictures of Weda when we get her cleared up.

PS: Just thinking back on the whole situation, and I don't know why I didn't come to this conclusion before. She has the irritated feet (red) and is licking constantly on them. Geezuz, I guess I was just so focused on the whole small cut on the ear turning into an infection.

- Anthony
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Postby Maryellen » April 4th, 2006, 6:49 pm

if she is licking her feet and stuff it could be the canidae. jesse was on canidae and did great. once she hit 2 years old, 2 months later canidae changed their ingredients around and added/deleted things.. thats when her allergies surfaced.. i would put her back on barf now,and you should see a difference rather quickly..

and i am holding you tothe 10 pics of her too..
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Postby Big_Ant » April 6th, 2006, 6:56 pm

ok, an update.

She's not been on the Canidae since Tuesday afternoon. She's refusing to eat the Turkey, but I'm making her keep trying because when she was on BARF before she refused chicken and turkey, only wanted beef, so it's just a matter of me sticking to my guns until she realizes that she can eat it and live.

Now, today the wife calls me and said that the ears are bothering her really bad. They didn't seem to bother her as much yesterday, but I'm thinking that either A) she's detoxing and it's just doing the 'get worse before better' or B) It wasn't the food, but then I'm lost as to what it would be? Could it really be a deep inner ear infection? She's hold the ear down and cocking her head to the side, so it's similar to that of a ear infection, equilibrium being messed up.

So what are you thoughts everyone?

What options would a vet be able to provide in terms of medication to prevent her from at least scratching further until I find the cause?

I've used creams, sorry, I'm exhausted and can't think of the names right this second, and she's used the medicated ear cleanser.

Could I maybe not be getting the cleanser deep enough, or used enough?

Any thoughts on what I can do to get her out of scratching til it bleeds, just until I can find the cause. I'm still pretty sure it's the food, but I can't have her ripping her ear half off, or shaking all of the time.

- Anthony
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Postby Marinepits » April 6th, 2006, 7:31 pm

Big_Ant wrote:ok, an update.

She's not been on the Canidae since Tuesday afternoon. She's refusing to eat the Turkey, but I'm making her keep trying because when she was on BARF before she refused chicken and turkey, only wanted beef, so it's just a matter of me sticking to my guns until she realizes that she can eat it and live.

Now, today the wife calls me and said that the ears are bothering her really bad. They didn't seem to bother her as much yesterday, but I'm thinking that either A) she's detoxing and it's just doing the 'get worse before better' or B) It wasn't the food, but then I'm lost as to what it would be? Could it really be a deep inner ear infection? She's hold the ear down and cocking her head to the side, so it's similar to that of a ear infection, equilibrium being messed up.

So what are you thoughts everyone?

What options would a vet be able to provide in terms of medication to prevent her from at least scratching further until I find the cause?

I've used creams, sorry, I'm exhausted and can't think of the names right this second, and she's used the medicated ear cleanser.

Could I maybe not be getting the cleanser deep enough, or used enough?

Any thoughts on what I can do to get her out of scratching til it bleeds, just until I can find the cause. I'm still pretty sure it's the food, but I can't have her ripping her ear half off, or shaking all of the time.

- Anthony


I've used Benadryl cream in the past with some success, and you can also try a hydrocortisone cream, but check to make sure that one of the "ear creams" you're using does not have some type of cortisone in it. Don't want to overmedicate.

Have you looked into having your vet sedate Weda to do a deep cleaning of her ear? It sounds like she's very uncomfortable.

Maybe she needs a stronger medication?
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Postby Maryellen » April 6th, 2006, 7:47 pm

she could have airborne allergies, with the pollen coming out it could be affecting her more, and if she has it deep in her ear that could aggrevate it to. now if she is eating turkey and her ear is getting worse, it could be a food allergy to the turkey... canidae has turkey in it too... is she chewing/licking her feet at all??? rubbing her face on the couch or carpet after she eats???
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Postby Marinepits » April 6th, 2006, 7:49 pm

And, if you do decide to use the Benadryl cream, do not put it directly in the ear canal -- just use on the inside and/or outside of the ear flap.
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Postby Big_Ant » April 6th, 2006, 8:35 pm

Maryellen wrote:she could have airborne allergies, with the pollen coming out it could be affecting her more, and if she has it deep in her ear that could aggrevate it to. now if she is eating turkey and her ear is getting worse, it could be a food allergy to the turkey... canidae has turkey in it too... is she chewing/licking her feet at all??? rubbing her face on the couch or carpet after she eats???


Thanks ME and MarinePits,

Yes, she's licking her feet. Not chewing though.

The thing that's making me doubt allergies, is that it's only in one ear. It will occasionally be in both, but it's more because she scratches the other one while she scratches the left. Just a habitual thing, not associated with the discomfort.

It also gets better here and there. If I do the ear cleaning solution, it'll be fine for a day or so, but then comes back. I'm thinking that it might just need to be done on a more consistent basis so that it'll get rid of it all.

My assumption, and I could definitely be wrong, is that since it's only showing in one it, it's probably a deep ear infection.

Apparently she scratched it up today, so I'm going to go home and clean it up. Run some cleaning solution through it and give her my treatment. I'll be taking her into the vet on Saturday to have him give it another look.

My concern is that I'm not putting enough faith in my vet's ruling that it was an infection. He's always been a great vet and has done nothing but provide me with great care, so I think it's just a little of the pessimist (sp?) in me coming out.

The front paws are actually fine, the rears are the ones that are red and seem irritated, so I can't say for sure if it's related either.

Any other thoughts?

- Anthony
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Postby Maryellen » April 6th, 2006, 8:55 pm

jessse only gets ear infections in her one ear.. she will either chew her front feet or her back feet.... the bloodwork came back as food/air allergies . she could have an allergic reaction to the turkey or sunflower oil in the canidae. if she never had an ear infection on raw, and never chewed her feet it could be food or airborne related... you could do allergy testing or just put her back on raw and see how she does, if she didnt have any issues before on raw, and now has issues on the canidae, it could be the dry food.. or it could be airborne allergies, like grass, dust mites/house mites, etc...
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Postby concreterose » April 6th, 2006, 9:31 pm

Vicki's allergies (environmental) only really affect one side of her body. It's really weird. She scratches one eye really bad, and on the same side, scratches her mouth and under her arm. The other side looks normal! She chews all her feet, though.
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Postby Big_Ant » April 7th, 2006, 2:07 am

ok, so I got home, and did a deep solution clean.

After that, she felt much better. She still had no appetite, but I left some beef down for her. Eventually she ate the beef, and seemed to feel better. She always takes a while to get used to having to chew meat compared to kibble, but she finally did it this time, so it should be smooth sailing with the feeding.

I'm not going to feed anything other than beef for at least 90 days to rule out allergies to either chicken or turkey.

I am, however, leaning toward this either being an ear infection that is just lingering really badly, or the other possibility is that it is airborne/environmental allergy.

It's odd because she had no issues with the ear after I cleaned it with the solution, however, when we were ready to go out for our bike ride, she started getting hyped up and barking cause she was excited. After I had my shoes on and we were ready to walk out, she started shaking her head again. It seems as though the rush of blood (energy) caused it to bother her again. I don't think that would be the case if it was a food allergy.

What do you guys think?

I'm going to try and make it to the vet tomorrow before they close, but Friday traffic in So Cal is always a pain.

Thanks.

- Anthony
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Postby Malli » April 7th, 2006, 2:52 am

the ear cream may have an antibiotic in it...
most likely it does...

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Postby katiek0417 » April 7th, 2006, 1:01 pm

Labs are notorious for ear infections (the whole floppy ear thing). My dog walker has a rottie who had horrible ears, and suggested this stuff called zymox...it actually works better than any stuff my vet ever gave me for Sacha's ears....clears her up, and keeps them clear (Sacha was getting ear infections, I'd put her on the antibiotic cream, then she'd get them again within 5 days of being off the cream)...
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Postby Big_Ant » April 9th, 2006, 10:38 pm

OK, So here's the final and GOOD update.

It's been confirmed that it's a deep ear infection.

NO ALLERGIES!

We've got her back on the deep ear cleaning with a different medicated solution.

In my discussion with the vet, we found that I was misinformed on what dosage he wanted me using on her when we first noticed this, so it's been festering ever since, and could have easily been handled in the first place.

He ordered me to flush the ears once a week, just fill it once, let her shake it out, and then wipe it down.

Apparently, what he wanted me to do was flush it once every 3 days or so, but instead of just filling it once, he wanted it flushed until the cleaning with the cottonballs came out clear.

He wants to sedate her for a deep cleaning, however, I'm going to go ahead and wait on that because had I not been misinformed on his dosage suggestion, this would have been cleared up, so I'd rather save that $316 and do the flushing the proper way, and see if it'll clear up.

I'll give it some time to clear up, if it doesn't with me doing it the proper way, then I'll go ahead and have him sedate and clean.

Even though there were no allergies, I'm going to keep her on BARF since that was the plan anyway when we had to take her off of it for financial reasons.

I'd love to go pure Raw, but she won't do Chicken or Turkey (yet), so the diet wouldn't be balanced enough.

Thanks everyone for all of the suggestions and comments.

ME, I've got pictures coming for you in a couple of days.

- Anthony
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Postby concreterose » April 9th, 2006, 10:51 pm

Lucky you! Glad to hear she doesn't have allergies...they are a royal pain to deal with.
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Postby Maryellen » April 10th, 2006, 8:04 am

OMG that is awesome news!!!!!!! thank goodness its not allergies... now, you have no excuses for not posting pics of her.....
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Postby Marinepits » April 10th, 2006, 8:44 am

Great news!
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