Milou's Breathe Right Strips!

[saraja87]

At 5 months and 3 weeks, we finally caved and decided to try the breathe right strips. We've had them sitting around with a tube of eyelash glue for a couple of weeks and while her ears looked like they were going up-ish, I figure a little help can't hurt.

She's always had good strong bases but very floppy tips, so she would only put both ears up fully when she heard something really interesting. Her left ear was much stronger than her right and was up the majority of the time on its own, sometimes with the tip flopping down. Since we were already gluing we decided to just do both.

Another one of our concerns was our family dog Tintin, an 11 month old sheltie who takes great pleasure in slobbering/chewing/tugging on her ears. He's always gentle and has a very delicate mouth but we didn't want his mouthing to cause any future problems.

I'm not sure what the typical GSD inner ear looks like, but Milou is a long haired GSD and has very fuzzy ears. One friend suggested just shaving her ears bald so they wouldn't be weighted down by all her floofies. While that would probably have worked, we love her fluff so we didn't want to shave them but we did contemplate shaving her inner ear. I wasn't sure if it would be better for the strip to stick to skin or fur but since we're not 100% committed I left them as is and just glued the strips right onto the fluff.

Both ears only required one strip along the edge to tip in order to stand. I added another one on top for security, one in the desired X shape and the other kind of like a V. She barely paid any attention to me while I was putting them in aside from checking to see if the "thing" in my hand might be edible and hasn't given any indication that she can feel them in her ears. I thought for sure she'd try to scratch them out but I guess gluing them onto a mix of fur and skin means they're just not very noticeable.

Are these okay for a first attempt? How long are they likely to stay in? I'm assuming we should replace them immediately if they fall out and not let her play with Tintin.

And you can really see the "V" shape in her left ear:

[Lucy Dog]

With eyes like that... who needs ears?

The inserts look good though. Good luck... hopefully they work out.

[Gilly1331]

My guys ears didn't stand up until about 8/9 months..we never taped and they have been standing ever since. Sometimes it just takes a little longer. Whereas when we got Kimber at 4 months her ears were up already. Enjoy~

[bianca]

Oh my goodness she is so pretty

Good luck with the strips - sorry I have no advice, I tried but had no luck.

[saraja87]

Thank you everyone! We think she's insanely adorable with upright or floppy ears, so we're okay either way if they stay up or fall back down. We were on the fence about doing anything when my mother bought us the box of breathe right strips to try out so we figured we might as well give it a shot. I was actually really surprised that they held in there and didn't immediately fall back out and since they aren't bothering her at all and she can still lay her ears back if she wants I don't mind putting them back in when they come out.

[saraja87]

I am happy to report that 8 days later all breathe right strips are still holding strong! Even the tip of one I left poking out and not glued to her ear is still in place and thus far they show no signs of falling out. Her ears also look great, no irritation from the strips or the glue. I'm hoping that the cartilage is getting nice and firm in those ears, we've been giving her lots of bully sticks in addition to her deer antler and chicken leg treats!

[k_sep]

She looks so adorable! Good to hear that the breathe right strips are holding up. How long do you leave them in for?

[saraja87]

I'm honestly not sure! They've been in for 10 days now and show no signs of coming out so I figure as long as they don't irritate her ears, I'll leave them in until they fall out. I used extra strength breathe right strips and DUO waterproof eyelash adhesive.

[FG167]

She is so cute!

[saraja87]

So Tuesday night I ended up taking out Milou's strips. They weren't ready to fall out but Tintin had chewed/ripped them half out while playing so I figured it was time for that batch to go. One strip in each ear (the top one) was only hanging on by some fur so I cut those out easily. The other two were sort of half stuck half unstuck. I tried cutting them in half first but I was afraid the cut side would poke her so I went ahead and carefully cut them out with a pair of nail scissors. She was REALLY good, I'm sure it was really uncomfortable (her ears were red from where I had tugged the strip) and she had to lay still and let me hold and cut for an hour. She got a really nice beef back rib afterwards and I put a little antibiotic ointment on her ears.

In the morning, the tips felt soft but stayed up. Her ears are super expressive and she moves them all around (back, forward, yoda) but they seem to be staying up when she holds them up. I'll take a picture this evening to get opinions, I was going to do one more round of strips but now I'm not sure if she needs them!