Ears really do bleed

[Steve]

When Chef brought back the last bird from the first series of the Am yesterday, I saw blood all over his neck. Needless to say, I feaked out. Fortunately, it was just a small nick on the ear, probably from a thorn.

Still, it took about an hour to finally get it stopped with help from Cliff & Jeanne Garland and some vet care from Bruce Ahlers & Marlene Drag. It's nice to have folks like you around to help out when it's really needed.

[Kristie Wilder]

Yep, if you hit it just right... Apparently, there's a spot at the tip where three blood vessels come together and that's the mother lode... Had it happen one day with a client dog. I have funny pics because I put gauze around the tip of the ear (after I had applied pressure for a while) and then vetwrapped her entire head because I needed to finish training. So she sat on a tie out with a big lime green head wrap. It was hysterical....

And... If Chef hits it just right over the next 7-10 days, it will start all over again.

[Rick Hall]

One trick to recovery without relapse is keeping Neosporin or some such on it for a while even after it seems to be healed. Seems the scaring is otherwise stiff and brittle and prone to splitting again with as little as a hard shake of the head.

[Dogtrainer4God]

Glad it turned out okay for your dog. Always bring super glue along with you when you are running dogs, it will get it stopped in just a couple minutes and you don't have to worry about it afterwards. After the wound is healed up, glue will just fall off by itself.

[Julie R.]

Actually if you hit the motherlode spot on the ear, even super glue won't work. Had it happen with one of my ash Chesapeakes on a day he was entered in a show. When a friend and I went to get him from the kennel he and the kennel were covered with blood; I thought he was mortally injured there was so much blood. There was even blood in his food dish! When we cleaned him up searching for a gaping wound on his front half since that had the most blood, we found nothing til we discovered the tiny nick on his ear. We could not get it to stop bleeding even with EMT and crazy glue.

Every time he shook and flapped his ears blood would start pouring out all over again. The only thing that worked was make a vetwrap dew rag and tape his ear to his head. I couldn't get all the blood out of his coat in time for the show ring and it was pink to match his dew rag (needless to say we did not go to the dog show). And it bled periodically for next couple weeks so he had to wear the dew rag and a plastic lamp shade thing for a week or two. It took about 3 or 4 weeks before a good shake wouldn't open it up again.

[thunderdog]

A couple of my personal dogs get in a tussle years ago and one split the tip of his ear. Wife bandaged him up, wrapped his ear up around his head, the whole nine yards. We left him in the house and went to eat dinner. When we got home, I went straight to the kennel while my wife went in the house. When I got back to the house, my wife was sitting on the steps in tears. I, of course, thought something was wrong with the dog. I asked her what's the problem, all she could say was "my house, my house!". Walked in the kitchen door and it looked like someone had been murdered. The dog had managed to remove all of his bandages, open up the cut and bleed all over the house. There was blood everywhere. On the walls, on the ceiling, all over the carpet and furniture. Took a week to clean up and still had blood stains on the carpet. Learned not to let a dog with cut ear in the house after that.

[Georgia.Belle]

Super glue works but be careful that you don't glue your finger to the ear, don't ask me how I know.

Take a pair of panty hose from the wife, cut out a hole for the good ear, reinforce the hose with a couple of wraps of vetwrap. It is a pain in the backside, dogs don't seem to really care or be in any pain but they bleed everywhere.

[ErinsEdge]

I had an altercation where the tip of an ear was gone. I used surgical glue and crated him for several days, only out on lead. It healed well. You can't let them run around or they will shake the ear.

[Steve]

Actually if you hit the motherlode spot on the ear, even super glue won't work.

Silver nitrate and superglue failed. Took two sutures.

[HiRollerlabs]

Is EMT gel the same as surgical glue? Where is easiest place to purchase EMT gel, and does it go by any other names?