We've been battling with fleas the last 2-3 months!! Any ideas on how to rid the house of them??
How to get rid of fleas???
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Rots o Ruck. They are a pain to deal with. The problem is you can kill them off by fogging and other methods, but the unhatched ones can lay dormant for a looong time.
Once it gets cold up here we don't have a problem, but after it warms up, it's a constant battle.
We use the drops on the dogs, spray their kennel outside, dust the carpet etc etc etc and we still find a few.
Once it gets cold up here we don't have a problem, but after it warms up, it's a constant battle.
We use the drops on the dogs, spray their kennel outside, dust the carpet etc etc etc and we still find a few.
There is some powder that you spread on your carpets and vacuum later that seems to work. make sure you treat your pets too. tmm
We've tried foggers, the powder, spray, shampooing all the carpets. They're not as bad since we moved the cats out but we wanna get em all gone then bath and treat the cats b4 we let em back in.
May need to spray outside too.
rtee007
Deplorable Texan
You have to kill all four stages of the insect.
AND TREAT THE HELL OUT OF THE YARD!
[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcHzKYZG15Y"]Home Pest Control : How to Kill Fleas in 24 Hours - YouTube[/ame]
AND TREAT THE HELL OUT OF THE YARD!
[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcHzKYZG15Y"]Home Pest Control : How to Kill Fleas in 24 Hours - YouTube[/ame]
As long as it's warm and you have or had them, there are still unhatched eggs in the carpet, furniture etc. It's a battle for sure, just stay the course with the sprays, powder etc.
Once it gets cold they will go dormant for a few months, then you need to treat with stuff that kills the eggs.
Once it gets cold they will go dormant for a few months, then you need to treat with stuff that kills the eggs.
Oklacarcollecto
Life is an experiment
Dehumidifiers, salt water spray and vacuum. Fleas can't live in areas that have less than 50% humidity.
Oklacarcollecto
Life is an experiment
Hmmm............ I hadn't heard that. How do you keep the humidity down with the windows open?
67dart_drop_top
Well-Known Member
I went through hell with them. I finally got rid of them a month ago. I have a stray pop up about once a week, but that is quickly nipped in the bud. The thing you have to remember is that it is going to take a month to get rid of them. The eggs lay dormant and will sometimes survive the vacuuming.
1. Use blue Dawn dish soap to bathe pet. I couldn't believe it either, but it works.
2. Have someone vacuum carpets and furniture before pet returns.
3. Repeat daily. I would sometimes do this twice a day if I were home or could get wife to do it.
4. Treat yard where pet spends most of time. Flea treatment sold at Lowes.
5. Remember, the fleas need pet blood for nourishment, so if you can keep them on until the bath, you can kill them. The adults that can lay eggs cannot survive multiple baths. They may survive one but not many.
6. The hardest part is not letting the dog out much for the month. It is hard enough getting rid of them in the house, we did not want to worry too much about the outdoors visitors. Besides, if there is no pet out there for them to eat off of, they cannot survive.
1. Use blue Dawn dish soap to bathe pet. I couldn't believe it either, but it works.
2. Have someone vacuum carpets and furniture before pet returns.
3. Repeat daily. I would sometimes do this twice a day if I were home or could get wife to do it.
4. Treat yard where pet spends most of time. Flea treatment sold at Lowes.
5. Remember, the fleas need pet blood for nourishment, so if you can keep them on until the bath, you can kill them. The adults that can lay eggs cannot survive multiple baths. They may survive one but not many.
6. The hardest part is not letting the dog out much for the month. It is hard enough getting rid of them in the house, we did not want to worry too much about the outdoors visitors. Besides, if there is no pet out there for them to eat off of, they cannot survive.
That's what we use, lather em up and leave it on for about ten minutes.
We also use this, which works pretty well.
http://www.richsoil.com/diatomaceous-earth.jsp
Diatomaceous Earth (food grade): bug killer you can eat!
I have heard two explanations of how diatomaceous earth works.
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One is that on a microscopic level, the diatomaceous earth particles are very sharp looking. These particles stick to an insect and get stuck between its exoskeleton joints. As the insect moves, it gets physically cut up.
The other explanation is that diatomaceous earth sticks to the insect and somehow causes them to dry out. I think this approach involves scratching the insects waxy layer which then allows precious moisture within the insect to get out. So their teeny tiny bug-innards turn into teeny tiny bug-innards-jerky.
It's completely non toxic.
How do you use the diatomaceous earth? My wife got a bag of it but do you feed it directly to the cat to kill fleas? It's food grade. We've always bathed them with Dawn soap as they've had fleas long before they were old enough for any chemical treatment. My wife just sprayed the entire house with a spray she got from the pet store that's guaranteed to kill all stages of fleas for 7 months. Haven't noticed a decrease at all
No, you spread that stuff around on the floor, carpets etc and it gets on the fleas and irritates them to death, literally. It supposedly gets up under their shells and cuts them and dries them out. It does work, but I think the key is what was mentioned above, do it a couple times a day for a couple of weeks.
You have to either remove or contaminate their food source.
Which would be the kittens, they've been outside for about a week now. And since they've been outside we've, shampooed the carpets and couches, washed the sheets, sprayed all the carpets and they continue to laugh at us!!
rotest:
You have to do one of two things. Either make the cats dedicated inside or dedicated outside cats. Letting them in and out is the problem. We have some that stay inside and some outside. I cannot remember when I saw a flea last. We do use some flea stuff that goes on their neck. You have to be really careful what you use though. Some flea stuff has pyrethrum in it and that can kill cats.
Trojmn
Well-Known Member
besides diatomaceous earth, 20 MuleTeam Borax (sodium borate) is safe is NOT boric Acid works well. essentially dries them out. Dust the floors, under sofa whatever, leave on several hours/over night vaccum up. Dispose of vacuum bag outside immeditely. Repeat within a week. seriously, it works well.
Read the MSDS for it, as long as you don't eat it in large quantities, no worries. id MUCH rather have "soap" residue than a flea bomb with humans in the house.
Read the MSDS for it, as long as you don't eat it in large quantities, no worries. id MUCH rather have "soap" residue than a flea bomb with humans in the house.
D.E. or Boric Acid in the carpet - but...if you have allergies...
We had 'Flea Busters' treat our house when we lived in So Cal...I coughed for months afterward because of all the dust (IIRC, they used boric acid - which also solves your roach problems, btw).
We moved to AZ and haven't seen a flea in 20 years now...ticks a couple of times, but no fleas. (So I guess maybe that backs up the 'fleas can't deal with low humidity' idea?)
We had 'Flea Busters' treat our house when we lived in So Cal...I coughed for months afterward because of all the dust (IIRC, they used boric acid - which also solves your roach problems, btw).
We moved to AZ and haven't seen a flea in 20 years now...ticks a couple of times, but no fleas. (So I guess maybe that backs up the 'fleas can't deal with low humidity' idea?)
My ex wife was a cat hoarder. she used to let them in and out all the time and they would bring fleas into the house. My son wanted to adopt one of her cats, so I told him that he would have to help me bathe the animals every week until we could get rid of the fleas.
We used Zodiac Flea & Tick shampoo for Dogs and Cats. This stuff will kill the fleas. You can see them crawling to the surface trying to escape the shampoo and dying. It also makes the fleas and flea eggs sterile. It's supposed to last 28 days.
We adopted a cat with fleas. We gave the dog and cat a bath once a week. Even after a bath, we would find a couple, but we stuck to giving them a bath once a week, and after the third or fourth week, we couldn't find any more fleas on the cat and none on the dog.
After the bath, follow up with Frontline flea and tick treatment that we got from our vet. it also makes the fleas and flea eggs sterile and they can't keep reproducing on you. By the fourth week, we weren't finding any more fleas on them, We kept the weekly baths going until the fifth week and then were good.
Here's the Zodiac flea & tick shampoo:
View attachment Zodiac Shampoo.jpg
http://www.petco.com/product/3056/Zodiac-Flea-And-Tick-Shampoo-for-Dogs-And-Cats.aspx
Here's the frontline:
https://www.google.com/webhp?source...&ie=UTF-8#q=frontline flea treatment for cats
I would also try using some of the zodiac shampoo mixed in with the rug shampoo solution when you clean the carpets.
I would also recommend using a flea comb to check them with. You just comb them with it, and it will pull out the flea eggs and flea "dirt" if there are any fleas, then you will know if you still have to bathe them or not.
View attachment Flea comb.jpg
http://www.petco.com/product/118813/Petco-2-Sided-Flea-Comb-for-Cats.aspx
By making the fleas and the flea eggs sterile, you can keep them from reproducing, and the eggs will no longer be able to hatch.
We used Zodiac Flea & Tick shampoo for Dogs and Cats. This stuff will kill the fleas. You can see them crawling to the surface trying to escape the shampoo and dying. It also makes the fleas and flea eggs sterile. It's supposed to last 28 days.
We adopted a cat with fleas. We gave the dog and cat a bath once a week. Even after a bath, we would find a couple, but we stuck to giving them a bath once a week, and after the third or fourth week, we couldn't find any more fleas on the cat and none on the dog.
After the bath, follow up with Frontline flea and tick treatment that we got from our vet. it also makes the fleas and flea eggs sterile and they can't keep reproducing on you. By the fourth week, we weren't finding any more fleas on them, We kept the weekly baths going until the fifth week and then were good.
Here's the Zodiac flea & tick shampoo:
View attachment Zodiac Shampoo.jpg
http://www.petco.com/product/3056/Zodiac-Flea-And-Tick-Shampoo-for-Dogs-And-Cats.aspx
Here's the frontline:
https://www.google.com/webhp?source...&ie=UTF-8#q=frontline flea treatment for cats
I would also try using some of the zodiac shampoo mixed in with the rug shampoo solution when you clean the carpets.
I would also recommend using a flea comb to check them with. You just comb them with it, and it will pull out the flea eggs and flea "dirt" if there are any fleas, then you will know if you still have to bathe them or not.
View attachment Flea comb.jpg
http://www.petco.com/product/118813/Petco-2-Sided-Flea-Comb-for-Cats.aspx
By making the fleas and the flea eggs sterile, you can keep them from reproducing, and the eggs will no longer be able to hatch.
That's the Frontline flea & tick treatment that I referred to in my post above. It works pretty well.
I am on my phone at the time, look up coconut oil that goes in our
dog's & cats food, it helps in many ways.
dog's & cats food, it helps in many ways.
You CANNOT use this on cats. Most anything that is also for dogs has either pyrethrum or permethrin in it. Permethrin is clearly listed as an ingredient.
http://www.zodiacpet.com/downloads/topical.php
READ HERE: And most everywhere else.
http://www.icatcare.org:8080/permethrin/vet-info
Here's the tip off. If the product is for cats AND dogs, don't use it on your cats. READ the label. If either "P" is an ingredient, don't use it!
http://www.zodiacpet.com/downloads/topical.php
READ HERE: And most everywhere else.
http://www.icatcare.org:8080/permethrin/vet-info
Here's the tip off. If the product is for cats AND dogs, don't use it on your cats. READ the label. If either "P" is an ingredient, don't use it!
famous bob
mopar misfit
:tool:
this "will" help w/ fleas in the house, also spiders, put a night light at the entry doors, unrestricted,put a pie tin or platter under it on the floor, full of water w/ 3-4 drops of dawn dish soap in it. the critters wil jump at the light at night and fall into the soapy water-dead bugs!! just make sure these are the only lights on in the house at night.---we haven`t had a problem w/ them so far this yr. but we keep the nite light platters on 24-7 yr round----bob
We have used in on cats without a problem before. I know one of Cudachick's cats was messed up by it, but luckily it didn't harm ours.
It did work for us when we took in a cat with fleas. We were able to get rid of them in 3-4 weeks. Maybe we got lucky and it didn't get in the cat's mouth to harm him when he got his baths. Or maybe our cats were not as sensitive to it as hers was.
Luckily, I haven't had to use it in 4 years now. Our cat stays indoors, and the dog doesn't go outside for very long. He looks for something to chase, then chases it (never catches it) and then does his business and wants to come back in. We use frontline on them just in case.
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