Hiya
Ive just groomed Dylan & was horrified to find loads of fleas. When we collected him from the breeder he had been frontlined, but I still found a couple of fleas on him. So when we took him to the vets 4 weeks ago (hes 12 weeks old) I got a frontline sachet & did him again. Why are we still finding them, they look all big & red like theyve had a good munch on him. I feel so sorry for him, & Ive sprayed all round the house & his bedding & stuff. I'm off to buy some more frontline, but wondered if I could do anything else. The breeder swears by garlic, so perhaps I'll get some of that too.
Any help would be much appreciated :-)
Penny

Hate to break the news but garlic is a myth!! The only advice I can give about fleas is that the life cycle has to be successfully broken if not then in the autumn the problem could be worse than it is now. Eggs will stay dormant on your carpets until the central heating goes on and then you'll have another healthy flea population. You say that you sprayed the house - did you use 'staykill' - the rather expensive product from the vet! I would probably go for another blast of frontline to kill adult fleas and then the house again at the same time, but really get in everywhere under radiators, carpets doggie bedding bottoms of curtains etc etc. Also do you get hedgehogs and foxes in the garden? Because they are flea city Arizona :)

Hope this helps.
Sarah.

Hi Penny,

Use the Frontline Spray instead,this stuff works much better !
It is a lot more expensive than the small kernels you get to put on the back of the neck , but it works a treat!

Also only use a household spray prescribed by the vet , most of the ones sold over the counter in pet stores dont work.

I used to use Programe Tabs before , which are good , but Frontline Spray is brilliant the fleas die almost instantly.

HELEN

When we had fleas many years ago from my cat (now sadly gone) we treated the cat then moved on to the house, it did take a day or two but it is worth it. We bought a steamer and steamed every noak and cranny. The stairs skirting moved the bed wardrobes clothes, everything . And it worked. I think that because steam is very hot it basiclly cook every single eggs that i could not see. And then a vigourous hoovering then clean the hoover after.
Just thing of it as a early spring clean but you have to do everything before the central heating gets truned on soon, like some else said.
They other way of doing the house if you have not got the time is to get a company in the does it for yoy.
Good luck with the little so and so's

Cordelia

I'm off to the vets tonight, so I'll see if they have Stay kill or if not what ever they recommend. We live next to open fields here so get all sorts in the garden. I think the foxes cant get into the back garden at the minute because its like a prison since we had the pup. Hedgehogs & squirrels are regulars though. I hadnt thought of them passing fleas on, but of course they will.

Ooh I just read Cordelias post. Ive got a steam cleaner, I can have a good old blast round with that, boil the little blighters! (was going to use a much stronger word then lol)

lol they are great for the little beep beep beeps :-)
Can i just recommend a site they have staykill house spray for £9.89. Not sure if that is cheaper than the vets.
http://www.hyperdrug.com/store/
they also do wormers that the vets sell but cheaper

Well spotted, thats much cheaper than my vet! :D

Ive just had a look at that site. I recognise the name Nuvan, I think thats what I used to get from the vet a while ago, but it was called Nuvan top I think. I'll try the steaming then get that if theres no improvement. Ive been to the vets tonight, they were great stocked me up with a couple of free puppy pack frontlines, so Dylan is all flea free now ....hopefully! I just wondered if the flea stuff on that site was as good as frontline? Has anyone tried it??

Sorry don't use any flea stuff as we are a flea free house. We had a cat when we first had a GSD six yrs ago and unfortunatley the dog had a flea allergy (so we and the vet thought at the time) tried all the treatment on the market which she developement and allergy to then we done the house but cats being cats go through long grass and bushes play with hedgehogs etc etc, he always bought them back so all it took was when bite and we were straight back to the vets. So we had to make a hard dicsion (spelt wrong) and rehome our beloved cat, well after two weeks Ice finally settled down and started to eat again then came the battle of the house, steamed topp to bottombathed the dog several times and finally a flea free house. But after years of thinking it was a flea allergy we have since been told it is a food allergy, well i was horrified to think we got rid of the cat Ice's best friend.
So sorry i don't use flea treatments anymore :-)

I had the same problem with my puppy, after frontlining every month and treating all the cats with frontline and treating their bedding, the carpets e.t.c they eventually went. However the vet told me it would take a little time, i guess because Frontline only kills the fleas within 24 hours and you have to wait for any eggs and such to hatch, but she is flea free now. It was awful as she is a golden retiever and you could see the horrible things walking down her nose and then hiding in the hair again, ugh!!!

I have found Aclaim to be the best household fleaspray, but don't have to use it now, as the dogs have been frontline sprayed every three months for years, and no fleas, much to the releif of my eldest who is flea alergic, and used to get awful hot spots/wet excema!

I've just spent £26 on Frontline. When I told the receptionist she said all the dogs in the area had them. There's an epidemic countrywide because of the hot weather. I haven't seen fleas for over a week now, so here's hoping.

As long as there are animals there will be parasites that feed off of them! True the hot weather will speed up the flea life cycle, thats because they are invertebrates and therefore temperature dependant...The hotter it is the more active fleas and other insects become. Its worth remembering that fleas dont actually live on dogs - only jumping on to feed - the emphasis is on the environment, its possible to find stages of the flea life cycle in a house that has no animals! Frontline spray and spot on is great and will kill the adult form on the dog, however this recent weather means it wont take the eggs and larvae long (possibly days) to replace their parents!! Yuk.
Sarah.