Veterinarians report successful wound and trauma treatment with emu oil, and use it as a carrier for topically applied ingredients. And a large selection of commercial and home made therapeutic products that incorporate emu oil into their formulations. Soap customers, as well as soap makers, comment that soap containing emu oil seems to have a creamy rich feel, and leaves the skin feeling very smooth, soft and supple. As an ingredient, emu oil adds hardness, and stable lathering. Although not chemically validated, its emollient properties appear to enhance the finished soap product.
Emu oil incorporates easily into soap blends, adding no unusual behavior to the soap making process.
Physically, emu oil appears creamy white, and is semi-liquid at room temperature. At higher temps it melts to a clear oil, and at cooler temperatures it solidifies. The aboriginal people in Australia have used oil from the emu for thousands of years to treat many ailments, and heal and condition their skin. They have been raised domestically, in the U.S. and elsewhere, since the 1980's, primarily for their meat, and the oil which is rendered from their fat. Many ranches and farms in the US now raise emu as an alternative livestock, hoping to stimulate a healthier family farm economy.