Honey is an effective treatment for many infections and worked wonders recently on a severe ear mite infection in one of my rabbits. An ear mite infection is something many rabbits get over their lifetime. A vet will usually tell you to use mineral oil or if that fails, prescribe ivermectin, which is an oral or injectable antibiotic. The problem with this is it will often cause other problems in your rabbit, just like antibiotics do in humans. Honey, however, is less invasive and less severe of a treatment yet works just as effectively in killing ear mites in a pet rabbit. Here’s how.
How to Tell If Your Rabbit Has Ear Mites – First of all, you’ll notice your rabbit scratching its ears a lot, followed soon after by a was build up in its ears that soon becomes hard and flaky. Once you can see the hard gunk in your rabbits ears, its usually a tell tale sign of ear mites. Your rabbit may also be listless and its head may be cocked to one side.
What to do First If Your Rabbit Has Ear Mites – Before you start any treatment, including using honey, you should separate your rabbit from any other rabbits you have, as ear mites spread from rabbit to rabbit very quickly. Then clean the cage and surrounding area carefully, as well as sterilize dishes and water bowls, to prevent reinfection.
Preparation for Treatment of Your Rabbit’s Ear Mites With Honey – Before you start to treat your rabbit’s ear mites with honey, inspect its ears carefully and remove any loose flaky build up with tweezers being careful not to hurt your rabbit or make its ears bleed. Once you’ve removed the loose flaky build up, it’s time to treat your rabbit’s ears with honey.
Treating Your Rabbit’s Ear Mites With Honey – Put three teaspoons of honey in a bowl and add about 3ozs of warm water. Mix the honey and water together until the honey is dissolved into the water. Now, you’ll need a drinking straw or a bulb syringe, to put the honey/water solution in your rabbits ear.
Pick up your rabbit and place it on your lap, holding it firmly with one hand. With the other hand, squeeze the honey/water solution into the bulb syringe or into the drinking straw and then release it into your rabbit’s ear. Make sure the solution covers the entire inside of the ear, holding the ear upright so the inner ear gets completely coated with honey. Repeat with the other ear, making sure the whole of the inner ear is coated. Dab any dripping honey off your rabbit, so it doesn’t end up all over his/her fur and she’s ready to go back in her cage. (I always give mine a nice cuddle afterwards. She’s deserved it).
Repeat this honey treatment again the day after, then every other day for 14 days. After this, treat just twice a week for the next two weeks. As ear mites have a 28 day life cycle, you must continue the treatment until the 28th day to make sure the ear mites have all been killed.
Honey is an excellent antimicrobial agent as well as works better than antibiotics. It also works well on wounds, which you may find your rabbit has in its ears if the ear mite infection has really taken hold. After only a couple of day though, you’ll see the wounds healing very fast and will also be able to tell from your rabbits much perkier behavior its already feeling better.
Using honey to cure a rabbit of an ear mite infection is extremely effective and doesn’t cause any of the intestinal, digestive or other problems antibiotics can cause. I’m not a vet, but after reading about the efficacy of hospitals now using honey on humans to heal wounds, I decided to try it on my rabbit and was astounded with the results. If your rabbit has ear mites, you might want to try honey too. It worked for me and my little bun.
SOURCES: University of Waikato – Honey Research Unit
