How to Treat Ear Mites Naturally

If your pet scratches at their ears or shakes their head constantly, they might have ear mites. Cats are usually the ones that catch them and spread them to dogs they come into contact with. Keeping your pet's ears fresh and clean is a good preventative, but if they already have them, here is a good way to treat them with out harmful chemicals.

Things You'll Need

• Olive oil
• Vitamin E capsules
• Lavender essential oil
• Tea tree essential oil
• Chamomile essential oil
• Cotton balls
• Small bottle with dropper

Instructions

Smothering the Mites

1. Check your pet's ears. You can’t really see the mites, because they are so small, but you can see evidence that they are there. The ear canal will look dirty or red and inflamed. Cat’s ears may have an odor, but dog’s ears usually do not.

2. Break open a vitamin E capsule and drain it into a small eye dropper bottle. Add about the same amount of olive oil and mix it together. If you have a big dog, use 2 capsules, or mix enough to store.

3. Warm up the solution by running warm water over the bottle. Make sure you don’t get it too warm. Put about a ½ a dropper in each ear and massage it well.

4. Clean out the oil solution with soft cotton balls. The oil smothers the mites and you are wiping them away with the cotton balls. Discard the cotton balls by wrapping them in plastic and tossing in the trash, to further smother the mites on it.

Soothing Irritated Ears

1. Apply a mixture of essential oils to help heal and soothe the irritated ears. You’ll need 1 tsp. warm olive oil, 1 drop tea tree oil, 1 drop lavender oil and 1 drop chamomile oil.

2. Mix the oils and olive oil together and drizzle half of it into each ear. Massage your pet’s ears well to distribute the oil. Leave this in the ear to soothe and heal any irritation.

3. Wash your pet's outer ear if the mites seem very bad. There may be some clinging to the hair outside that haven’t made it to the canal yet. Use an all natural oatmeal-based pet shampoo if necessary.

Tips & Warnings

• You can find all of these natural ingredients and eye dropper bottles at a nutritional store.

• Checking and cleaning your pet's ears weekly should keep mites at bay.

• Sometimes natural remedies don't work if the pet is badly infested. If problems persist or get worse, take your animal to the vet for further treatment.