By Tom Ewing

Ask your cat’s veterinarian for instructions on safe ear cleaning.

It can’t hop and it can’t fly, but it can walk. And if an ear mite — otherwise known as Otodectes cynotis — strolls into your cat’s ear, makes itself at home, and starts to raise a family, this minuscule parasite can cause major damage unless promptly evicted.

Ear mites are almost microscopically tiny — ”about the size of a very small pinhead,” says William Miller Jr., VMD, a professor of dermatology at Cornell University’s College of Veterinary Medicine. But, he notes, it’s sometimes possible to see their rapidly moving little bodies with the naked eye. They are also detectable by the general mess they make inside an infested animal’s…

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