Flies eating dogs ears

We have a rottweiler and we live in Oklahoma. For the past three summers we have had problems with these large slow moving flies chewing on his ears. We have asked veterinarians about it and have had some success in keeping the flies away but nothing really satisfactory. Apparently these flies are commonly called cattle flies (different from horseflies) and are a problem with livestock and large dogs.

One idea a vet had was to coat the dog's ears with mentholatum. This really doesn't work at all. The dog hates it and the flies just start chewing on his tail instead. Our vet also suggested we get a medicated cattle tag and attach it to Maxx's collar. This worked like a dream one summer. Then last year we got a new tag and it was much less effective. A rancher I know said that they stopped making those tags as potent.

We tried a different vet, who recommended this bug spray for horses. It's called Bronco. It works pretty well but we have to spray Maxx every day and he's a real wuss about having things sprayed at him. :rolleyes: It's quite the ordeal to get an amount of the stuff on him because he runs when he sees the bottle. Sometimes I spray the stuff on my hand and then rub it on him but . . . I was just wondering if anyone had any other ideas they can suggest.

Hi,
This is not a answer to any question but another question about my dog's ears. My dog has wounds on his ears as if something has bite him or eating at his ear, could it be flies...he's outside dog and I noticed many regular size flies on him, we had the same problem last summer but then it was inside his ear, it's outside the ear this time. Last year, I put perxoide on it but it made it look worst but after that it healed. Trying to save a trip and expense of a vet for now but it may be what I should do. What do you think.

That sounds like what's happened to my dog. The flies we see are slightly larger than what you usually think of as houseflies, but they are not as big as horseflies or anything like that. They pretty much just look like regular flies. You can try some of the things the vet told us to do -- the most effective thing we ever did was to attach the cattle tag to the dog's collar. I'm thinking that maybe last year we just got a bad one. I'm going to go ahead and buy another one this year. I'm also going to pick up more of that 'bronco' spray. It is meant for horses, but my dog is quite large. If your dog is less thatn 100 pounds, you might check with someone to be sure it is safe. It does have dog instructions listed on the bottle.