Over the years I have used plenty of different strategies to try to
clean the ferrets' ears quickly and without a lot of fussing from the
ferrets. They hate having the ears cleaned, even after doing it every
two weeks for years they never seemed to get used to the whole ordeal.
I must admit, eventually I stopped doing it so often because it was
such a pain. Anyway, I used to use a flushing/foaming solution and
squirt it in, then clean, but then I started just cleaning with dry
q-tips and have had much better results. For one, the ferrets aren't
as alarmed as they are when liquid or wet q-tips go in their ears, and
I get a lot more gunk out. Then, if I suspect mites, I apply a mite
solution such as Tresaderm and massage their ears, and do this for a
couple days in a row. Also, I delve quite deep into their ears, I don't
just stay on the outside! I have had very satisfying results using this
technique and the other day, I got such a big chunk out of Barry's ear
that he looked at me, sort of surprised, as if he could all of a sudden
hear better!

So that's my strategy, hope it helps someone out there!

Cheryl

[Posted in FML 6239]