My fuckin’ dogs have been itching like a third world whore lately. They’ve been treated with Revolution or Heartgard or whatever that shit is that kills fleas, but the vet says the fuckin’ flea don’t die until he bites the dog. So what they are right now are just free flea transportation.
The dogs are so bad that we had to shut them in another room at night because the itching and chewing are so constant that we can’t sleep.
Anyway, one of the fuckin’ pest transportation vehicles (either “fleabag” or “mangy ol’ mutt” as they’re now known) shed one of his fuckin’ fleas and the little flea motherfucker bit me right by the fuckin’ armpit and it itches like the balls.
He’s lucky I didn’t catch him. I’d have got a magnifying glass, some boric acid, some dental tools and torn his flea ass UP.
Both Advantage and Frontline kill and repel fleas without the flea having to feed on the patient’s blood. I would suggest changing flea control products before you are scratching like a third world whore.
I think one of them gets “Frontline” and the other takes a combination of “revolution” and “heartgard”.
(or one gets “revolution” and the other gets a combination of “frontline” and “heartgard”).
Point is, they’re both itching.
They actually tend to get this itchy at this time of year every year. I just never got one of their fleas. I think a lot of the other dogs at the park are pretty itchy right now too.
If they’re not better by this weekend, it’s a flea-bath.
I’m not sure what all the itching is, really. I think it’s the after-effect of the bites, like I have.
I’ve checked their “itchy places” with a magnifying glass, and there are no fleas visible there.
Fleas are not microscopic. They are the size of gnats. However, they are very fast and would jump away from anywhere you parted the fur. You have to check for “flea dirt” - i.e. their waste. If you use a fine toothed comb, it looks like black pepper in the fur. If they are pooping on your dog, they are still there.
Hartgard does nothing for fleas. It is for heartworm prevention only.
You have to treat your whole house, not just the dogs - you have to vacuum everywhere, launder the dog beds, and all that kind of stuff, or else they will not go away.
Ugh. Damn bastard fleas. I’ve discovered that the flea stuff they sell in grocery store (I believe Hartz is the brand) aren’t worth shit. I shelled out a pretty penny for Advantage and it worked on my cat. For about 2 weeks. Then the damn things were back. I apply it as frequently as I can without hurting the little guy (the cat, not the fleas, the fleas can rot in flea hell for all I care) which is about every two weeks or so. And they ALWAYS come back. And Elvis is an indoor cat!
I’m at my wits end. That Advantage stuff isn’t cheap (it’s about $40 for a 4 month supply, which is actually a 2 month supply with the frequency I have to use it) and it’s putting me in the poor house! I spray the apartment, vacum weekly and throw out the vacum bag. I don’t know where the damn things are coming from!
Honestly, can someone tell me how an indoor cat can possibly attract so many fleas, so quickly?
Well, first pass guess would be that there is a rodent problem in your building, so mice or rats are bringing them in…
Other than that, keep in mind that you have to do everything at the same time - vacuuming, laundering, etc, or they just move from the carpet to the bed back to the carpet to avoid being ousted. They sell foggers or “bombs” to treat your whole residence at once. The one time my dogs had fleas, we did that and it worked. You have to have somewhere else to go with your pets to do that, though.
Trunk, your vet has a pill called Capstar that treats massive flea infestations. My Jack Russell terrier bitch tangled with a possum and despite regular Frontline applications the fleas just took over. This pill is cheap, maybe 2 or 3 dollars, and knocks out the problem in a couple of hours. You will still need to figure out where they are coming from and deal with that but at least your animals will not be suffering.
They are coming into your house somehow. Is it a shared residence? Is there a grassy field nearby? You can treat the outdoors with foggers and such, and bomb your house regularly. When I lived in Florida the fleas were awful. I had to bomb the house once a week, but that was before Frontline. My animals (3 dogs) get it once a month and I am an indifferent housekeeper but we have no flea problem at all.
Dude, once you have fleas in your house, “internal use” flea drugs is not nearly enough to solve the problem. You’re gonna have to bomb your house to get rid of the infestation. Trust me; I’ve been through it like 6 times.
Another thing you might want to try along with everything else that has been mentioned is brewer’s yeast. We sprinkle a teaspoon or two over our dogs’ food and we haven’t had any sort of flea outbreak this year as compared to others.
I can’t cite it at the moment, but I read somewhere that fleas hate the taste of it.
Of course, the brewer’s yeast isn’t an excuse to throw out the Frontline (which we also uise) or stop the cleaning/vacuuming, but it does help a lot
We got an infestation this year, too, except… the cat didn’t have a single flea on her! Treating her with Advantage kept them off her, but they bit the shit out of me and Thomas. No amount of 20 Mule Team Borax, consumer-grade flea spray, vacuuming or laundering did the trick. We finally had to call a professional exterminator – problem solved. (We bought some foggers but I was afraid of using them because we have 3 fish tanks, so we just went with the pro and got it over with.)
Try ordering through Petshed. A 6-pak for a 9+ lb cat is only $32.00
I can relate…I had a huge problem with flea bites. For some reason, until we moved to Missouri, I didn’t have a problem with fleas. But in Mo., they were
horrible. You could see them crawling around on my poor dog. I got flea shampoo,
got flea spray to use on the dog and got a cheap brand of that stuff liquid stuff
you put on the dog between the dog’s shoulder blades. And the cheap stuff
(Zodiac, I believe) worked the best. In the meantime, I was being eaten alive by
those bastard fleas. For some reason, they gravitated to me. My ankles & calves
were so bad (at least 60 bites per leg) that when the bites started healing (after
I’d scratched some to the bleeding point), the scars that were left made me look
like a junkie. I think some of the scars are permanent. I wasn’t completely rid of
them until we recently moved to Arkansas. I used some more of the Zodiac stuff
after we got here & I have had no problem. We used to live in Memphis & I never
had a flea problem. Maybe the fleas in Mo. are like roaches…they can survive even
a nuclear blast.
dfqforever
I don’t think we have a full scale infestation. I only have one bite. My wife has none, and actually over the last couple days I think the dogs scratching has subsided.
Also, other years right at this time, I recall the dogs itching like nuts and then it eventually goes away. The vet says the stuff we use kills any biting fleas so if it does reach the point where they’re really multiplying it should subside.
