Cats Ears Smell Sour

Your cat s ears are the perfect place for a tiny ear mite to settle down and raise a family or a few dozen of them.

Cats ears smell sour.

These parasites feed on the wax and oils in your cat s ears creating a brownish coffee ground like discharge that can give off a foul odor. Common causes when your cat s ears are healthy they re pink and clean inside have no smell have very little or no wax and seem able to detect the sound of a can opener from a. The healthy discharge will have no smell and be accompanied by a pink clean inner ear canal. If you bent over to pet your cat and noticed your cat has smelly ears and possibly other related symptoms including itchy or dirty gunky ears your cat has a common ear infection.

A cat s ears have an amazing ability to clean themselves. To appropriately treat an ear infection a veterinarian first has to microscopically examine a sample taken from the ears to determine whether yeast or bacteria and. Musty smelling yeast infections sometimes develop when a cat has an allergy or other condition that alters the environment within the ear in a way that promotes the growth of yeast. If the ears have a mild odor or look a little dirty moisten a cotton ball with a mild cleaning solution recommended by your veterinarian and wipe them out.

If your vet has ruled out ear mites the culprit in about half of all feline ear infections they ll have to do some sleuthing to figure out what s causing your cat s outer or middle ear. If you clean them too often especially if they don t need it it can damage the ears health. In a healthy cat the ears will have very little ear wax and the discharge will be a light brownish color. Ear infections often cause a cat s ears to become more red and swollen than do mite infestations and the discharge from an infected ear tends to have a distinctly foul odor.

Cat ear infections like this are one of the most common reasons for vet visits for cats.