# Dry skin/ratty ears



## supercocoa (Feb 22, 2009)

My oldest hedgie, Junie, has a bit of a problem. She's got a little dry skin on her face, and her ears are also looking a bit mangy. The edges are frayed and there are little black spots (not hard or anything) towards the edges as well. What do you think this could be? I've heard that you can use vitamin E cream for the ears, but I'd like to know what to do about dry skin.


----------



## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

Flaxseed oil is popular for helping with dry skin. You can either put it directly on the hedgie, on their shoulders, or you can put it on their food. You can also rub it on their ears, it's not as sticky or smelly as Vitamin E oil. Make sure if you buy some, though, that you buy capsules, not the straight oil. It goes bad quickly, and you only need the amount of oil that's in one capsule for each time you put it on their back or in food.


----------



## supercocoa (Feb 22, 2009)

Lilysmommy, you always seem to help me with these posts.  And thanks a bunch for reccomending the flax seed oil! That should be of great help. However, her dry skin is only on her face... is it okay to rub it directly there? I'm afraid I'd get it into her eyes. I'll probably just rub some on her ears and then put the rest into her food or something.


----------



## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

Hehe, glad I can help!  I think you might be able to dab on a tiny bit from your finger, on her forehead or nose, just be careful to not get it in her eyes, as you said. Just having it in her food will definitely help dry skin anywhere, too.


----------



## Immortalia (Jan 24, 2009)

Random wondering...What kind of litter are you using? 

A little while back, someone's hedgie had really dry skin around the face and ears, and it seemed that their hedgie was burrowing too much in the litter(in this case, carefresh) and because of it's absorbancy, ended up drying out their hedgie's natural oils faster.

So, does your hedgie burrow a lot with their head? Just because we all know how much they LOVE to burrow ^_^


----------



## Nancy (Aug 22, 2008)

Dry skin on the face can be an indication of mites. A vet check would be a good idea to rule mites out.


----------



## supercocoa (Feb 22, 2009)

Sorry to revive this topic. Junie's face got better, but she's starting to look a little more ratty now. I'm pretty sure she doesn't have mites as she looks nothing like the pictures I've seen of it amd has no quill loss. We use softsorbent bedding, but it doesn't bother our other hedgie.


----------



## Chinchi (Jul 8, 2009)

I know that when dogs get mange, you can often tell by how the edges of the ears start to get dry skin.
Not sure hedgies can get this, but it might be worth checking out.

If I get it wrong, then by mange I mean the little parasite that makes dogs, foxes and so on lose hair and scratch them selves.


----------

