newspoomom

Okay, so moving on from the ever popular topic of poop...

My little Spoo has eye boogers, which, from what I've read and my veterinarian has indicated, seem to be completely normal. (Ruled out a medical condition) But, he used to let me clean/pick them off, and now he refuses and wiggles his head around and tries to bite at me. If I don't get them, they get crusty and bigger, so I really hate to let him run around looking like an unkempt heathen. He is 4.5 months old now, and I hope as he gets older he will be more complacent....

So my question now is if I am alone in this fight, or if anyone has a trick that's worked well for them. Maybe I should just get over it and let him be a pup, but I find that if I can get them off one time a day, they are manageable.

puppylove

It's probably gotten uncomfortable for him. You might try cleaning with a wet tissue, allowing the crusties to soften before you start scraping away.

And it is better to do it every day. Even if he doesn't like it, he'll take it better than if it's only done occasionally and with alot of fuss. Dogs are creatures of habit.

Olie

Yeah a quick tissue to them in the morning does halp, but should get it daily. Suri get funky eye boogers and if you miss them they can make their skin irritated too.

schnauzerpoodle

This is what my groomer taught me to do: Before every meal, gently hold your pup's muzzle, and then put down the bowl. So the holding of muzzle (and later the handling of his eye area) always follows with food (or sth he likes). After a few days, hold a non-alcohol baby wipe, hold his muzzle and wipe his face (try his eye area if he refuses, just gently wipe his face) and then put down the food bowl. After a few days, wipe his eyes and then feed him high value treat. This is what the groomer says he wants his clients to do with puppies. He said he can tell if the puppies have been handled (or crate-trained) at home right away.

Nickel hated it too but now he looks forward to it. After each eye-cleaning, he would stare at the treat jar waiting for his treat.

newspoomom

Thank you all, I truly appreciate your replies. They help me a lot.

Beach girl

Very good ideas. I'm going to try that wipe the eyes before feeding plan.

I use pet wipes that I buy at Petco. They are the same thing, I guess, as the non-alcohol baby wipes.

Also I tried Angel Eyes (a supplement put into the dog's food that changes the eye secretions), but as I posted in another thread, this made him lose a bit of bladder control. Not a good idea. I went back to manually cleaning off the eye gunk and quit the Angel Eyes.

schnauzerpoodle

Those pet/eye wipes are a lot more expensive than baby wipes you can find at Costco. I use those non-alcohol baby wipes for Nickel's eyes, face, bum bum and his after-dog-park body wipes, etc.

Beach girl

Thanks for the tip. I never really paid attention to the comparison cost; just tossed everything into the cart and had my own personal heart attack when the total bill is added up. ;-)

I've got to find a cheaper source for greenies, too.

flyingduster

personally, I encourage Paris to eat her eye boogers, so she LOVES me wiping them out; cos it means she gets to nom them up! LOL! She starts licking her lips when I'm wiping her eyes, and the instant I let go of her face she's licking at my fingers for the boogers I might have fished out. hehehehehe

LEUllman

As my daughter would say, Ewwwwww!