Dry spots on ears

[LittlePuffyTail]

Last night I was grooming Olivia and I noticed on the outside of both her ears, near the top, there is some flaky skin. There are transluent-looking flakes stuck to the skin that come off when I brush them. Then I groomed Stormy and noticed he has the same thing. There is no dandruff anywhere’s else on either bunny.

Of course, at first, I panicked “Is this mites?”.  I was worried once before when I found a dry spot below Olivia’s ear and after a trip to the vet was told it was just dry skin. 

Is it normal for bunnies to get dry skin on their ears?

[littlemissflip]

Captain Danger gets dry spots on the back of his ears (up towards where they connect to his head). I was initially worried about fur mites, because he did have fur mites last summer, but all the tests have come back negative for mites, and the dry patches aren’t scaley or spreading to other parts of his body, so my vet and I concluded that this is just dry skin. It was worse in the winter and has lessened now that we’re in the more humid summer months.

I sometimes rub a tiny drop of food-grade vitamin E oil into the dry patches, and that seems to help moisturize the skin. I’ve seen people recommend bag balm, but I didn’t think he’d like having something that goopy on his fur (and… I try to avoid using petroleum products if I can.)

[Tate]

Dry skin can be caused by diet, so maybe that’s something to look into?

[MimzMum]

Not my uppy ear buns, but Mimz has these knobby dry spots on the bottoms (well, tips) of his ears and some dry-ish areas on the inside ends that the doctor has looked at and found no mites, but they don’t heal no matter what I put on them. If you pick at the tips they will scale and then if you’re persistent, they bleed, 0_o, so what I’m thinking is with the way he washes his ears furiously and many times over the day/night, he must be chewing them a bit and the rough edges are just scabs from that. Plus they drag on the floor when he sits down, so who knows what kind of abuse they take there. I’ve seen flakes on his skin as well, but none of them walk away, and there’s no sign of bug poop. >.<
I think all my buns have had some dry skin at one time or other, but I don’t see it happening with all three at once.
Although with our weird humidity here (high one minute, very low the next) I assume they are all a bit dry. If their water intake is any indication, anyway.

[Monkeybun]

Monkey gets dry skin when she sheds.

[LittlePuffyTail]

Thanks guys. I will just keep an eye on it for now and talk to my vet if it persists or gets worse.

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