Dr. Anna Foreman, Everypaw Pet Insurance’s in-house vet, has spoken out against another ‘painful’ and potentially damaging TikTok trend which has gone viral, where pet owners are tying their dogs’ ears up with hair bands. The #PutItInABun challenge originally went viral in 2019 but has now gone viral once again, with one particular video amassing 3.8 million views…
What are your thoughts on this TikTok trend, where pet owners are tying up their dogs’ ears?
Looking at this video, a dog’s normally floppy ears have been tied up on top of its head with an elasticated tie. The dog looks very uncomfortable both before and after its ears being tied up.
Although there are a few situations where dogs with very floppy, heavy, and hairy ears (such as spaniels) benefit from having their ears ‘out of the way’ or inverted to expose the ear opening, often a dog’s ears are tied back for fun or aesthetics.
When a dog is being sick, particularly repeatedly, it benefits them to have their ears out of their face, so they do not become soiled. Some dogs are prone to repeated ear infections due to having poorly aerated ear canals from heavy floppy ears, and so periods of aeration (for example after cleaning to allow the ears to dry) can aid to prevent these, or during treatment. However, from a veterinary point of view, these really are the only scenarios that these sorts of actions could be deemed acceptable.
“Most dogs will show signs of anxiety and stress when having their ears tied back as it is very unnatural”
What are the potential health/physical dangers of this trend?
Tying a dog’s ears up is very unnatural for them, and can be painful, particularly if secured with an inappropriate, thin elasticated hair tie as in this video. Doing this can pull on the hairs and damage the delicate skin of the pinnae, the outer part of the ear.
By exposing their ear opening, particularly for extended periods of time, these dogs are also more prone to aural foreign bodies such as grass seeds. Dogs with floppy heavy ears are generally prone to aural foreign bodies regardless, however tying the ears up does not help prevent these, but rather thoroughly checking the outsides of the ears after a walk.
If a dog with these sorts of ears is not prone to ear infections, then tying the ears up may increase the chance of an infection due to an alteration in the ear’s already stable environment.
What are the potential behavioural dangers/consequences of this trend?
Like in this video, most dogs will show signs of anxiety and stress when having their ears tied back as it is very unnatural. Although these signs may start subtle, for example in this video the dog is showing ‘whale eyes’ (whites of the eyes seen) in the first half, and avoiding eye contact altogether in the second half, dogs can quickly escalate to growling and biting, especially if ignored.
One of the comments under the video that’s received over 1,000 likes is ‘I love how dogs just let us do stuff to them laugh emoji) – what would your response be to this comment?
In response to the comment ‘I love how dogs just let us do stuff to them’, this is a worryingly uninformed remark. As part of the innate fight/flight/freeze response, many dogs, and other animals, will freeze as a response to being threatened. This is how this behaviour could be misconstrued as ‘letting us do stuff to them’, however is in fact an inbuilt defence mechanism when an animal is terrified.
A freeze response can quickly escalate into extreme aggression (fight) if it is ignored, with the risk of growling or biting then occurring. Dogs then wrongly get blamed for ‘aggressive tendencies’, when in fact it is naïve owners or other people forcing a dog to display this behaviour.
With repeated episodes of ignoring more subtle signs of stress like this, dogs will often then escalate straight into growling or biting as a first instance rather than showing warnings. This behaviour is then misconstrued as being inappropriate to the situation, with the dog then being deemed as dangerous when this has become its learned response as the only way to stop people from doing things to them that they are uncomfortable with.
This is a guest post by Dr. Anna Foreman. Want to write for us? Visit www.dogstodaymagazine.co.uk/essay-submission or email editorial@dogstodaymagazine.co.uk
