Thank you for the welcome and thanks for the replies and advice! I’m going to look into the foods mentioned ASAP, and report back immediately if things get better. Luckily, I’m pretty sure it won’t be as expensive as the raw food diet that she eats now.

I’m thinking that with Greta, she’s getting better because of the antibiotics and medication, because with our lab, Molly, she always got much better with antibiotics and the medication, but then months afterwards, it would seem to come back. Does that sound logical? I guess since you changed the food, if it never comes back, you probably know the cause. I hope she does well and remains happy.

With Bella, did you also need antibiotics as well as the ointment? I can’t remember what the results of the culture test we did on Molly. I don’t know whether it was yeast or even whether or not it was the same each time. I don’t think we did a culture every time it happened because it would increase our vet costs. I was thinking about trapped moisture also, because the first time it happened, there was a really foul smell coming from her ears, and it happened following a swim she had in ocean water.

Recently, it isn’t so much the smell, but her ears would be red and very irritated so it might be different sometimes. She hasn’t been swimming for a very long time so it wouldn’t be moisture or contaminants from ocean water. Maybe it would be moisture from our dobie from licking her ears. We also have many friends with labs and other dogs that go for swims all the time at the beach and they don’t need any maintenance for ears! I hope it is just a simple food allergy that we can fix.

One thing that really bothers me is that when Molly is having lots of fun and is really excited, sometimes she would bark very loud, and then immediately afterwards, shake her head. I think it’s because of pain in her ears. Sometimes she seems a little disoriented also, probably because of the ears. She even dislikes going up and down stairs sometimes, but then again, with the stairs, Molly’s always been like that.

Thank you again for your advice and I am going to look into the foods mentioned right now and hope it works. I’ll keep checking back here and keep you updated! It’s nice to be here!