Do avoid the grocery store drops. I tried some one time because they were cheap. Not only did they not work at all, but the cat puked pretty much each time it ate for a week afterwards.
Now, I realize that cats puke without obvious reason–but this was just about every time they ate. I never used them again–and I never had the chronic puking problem again.
That crap’s still on the market because just enough animals don’t have reactions that they can palm the rest of it off as animals who are unusually sensitive, or as consumer error. You know, people putting too much on, using the wrong concentration, that sort of thing. And some of the cases we see, the worst ones, are from people using too strong a dosage. But we see plenty of cases where the owner has followed the manufacturer’s directions to the letter.
And trust me, every vet I’ve ever known has wanted those dratted things off the market. We don’t enjoy treating these cases, really we don’t.
I once knew a cat called Baby. Its owner had adopted it in Japan while she lived there, and brought it back to the US at great expense. The cat survived the trip just fine. Later he was caught by a dog and severely mauled, but his owner (again at great expense) got him all fixed back up. Later, she went away for the weekend. While she was away, her housemate decided to use some grocery-store medicine on the cat. The cat went into seizures and died. But the medication was a real bargain.
My wife’s worked as a vet tech, and is now halfway through vet school. She hates over-the-counter medications with a passion because she’s seen too many animals come into the vet dead-on-arrival from OTC medications. She says “People think that vets want you to use prescription medication so the vet makes more money. That’s not true; vets want you to use vet-prescribed medication because the vet cares about the health of the animal.”
As far as flea control goes, the cats in the Sengkelat household used Advantage, once a month, without fail. Five years, no fleas, and that includes when they used to be indoor-outdoor cats. We can’t get Advantage where we live now, so we use Revolution.
Advantage was great 'cause it was toxic to fleas for a month, but totally safe for the cats. The spiky-hair look only lasted a day or two. And any fleas that jumped on the cat would DIE, so even if a flea got into the house, it’d find the cat and that’d be the end of the flea.
Someone back there recommended Program. Program isn’t nearly as effective as Advantage, as Program only really works if you aren’t getting an influx of new fleas.
Also, with cats full of fleas, they’re at greater risk for tapeworms and heartworms. Tapeworms are gross (and you can get them too, eeeeew) but heartworms can kill your cat. Even killing the hearworms, if they’re well established, can kill your cat. See your vet.
I’m glad so many other folks have already told you not to use the OTC products. It can’t hurt to hear it a million times; they’re just bad, bad, bad.
Here in Florida the population of fleas can get out of hand. So I use Frontline on my dogs and cats and I use the glueboards (which you plug into your outlets around the litter box) These glueboards only cost about $6-7 and can be found at Home Depot or Lowes
Well, actually the answer is simple. Step 1- kill the fleas on the cats/dogs/pets. 2. Kill the fleas in the house. 3. Don’t let the cats back outside- ever again.
I have cats. I had one small flea outbreak in 10 years (a visitor cat- then I used Advantage, and it was over). I don’t use drops, baths (well, once a year for cleanliness), poisons, dips, traps, pills, or anything else that is bad for the environment or dangerous for my little furry freinds.
I’d never seen the flea traps mentioned above either, but we always used a homemade yet effective version when our dogs brought fleas home.
Place a pie pan with a cup of water and a tablespoon of dish soap near a light at night. Fleas seek the light, smell the soap and jump right in to their watery bubbly deaths. Empty and repeat nightly, and you’ll find the number of little corpses growing fewer each morning, you should be done within a week.
We used this effectively for dogs but the dogs never expressed any curiousity in drinking the soapy water, would cats drink it?
::sigh:: If it’s in a glass, they’ll probably drink it. Cats’ll drink damn near anything, but so will dogs. It really just depends on the individual animal. My cats would only drink it if I shooed them away from it; they’d guzzle it the second my back was turned just for pure cussedness.
Really, though, I wouldn’t worry about it. It’ll taste nasty enough that they’ll stop, especially if they have plenty of clean, non-soapy water near at hand.
Fleas are attracted to the smell of soap? Do you mean like dish soap or like Dial?
I don’t think my cats would drink it. As long as I placed it on the floor it would be ok. If it was on a table my big guy would knock it down.
I was just going to mention Hartz-my mother asked the vet about it, and they said no, under any circumstances.
I can’t remember if we use Advantage or Advantix. But I noticed the difference-when Misty and Noel were little, I used to pick through their fur and find TONS of flea dirt (not out right fleas, just the dirt they leave behind. They’re both white cats, too).
Now-almost nothing.
Frontline works great. It has never left an oily spot for more then a day. You have to get it under the fur as much as possible.
If it isn’t working for you maybe it is because you don’t start using it early enough? I usually don’t treat my cat in the winter but I always do her first treatment on the first warm day in spring. That way the fleas never have a chance to start.
Zebra we always used Dawn or Joy or whatever we had, worked fine. Apparently the fleas are not only attracted to the scent, they aren’t a discerning lot.
It’s cheap, doesn’t harm the pets and its effective. Always has been for my family anyway. Let us know how it works out for you if you try it.
Just one thing you need to understand. My big cat weighs about 25 pounds. And he really isn’t that fat. He is just BIG. I don’t know why but he does not like to have the drops put on him so after the first drop is put on his back, we then do our version of the giant squid attack from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. It’s not pretty.
Queen Tonya do you put a drop in after you fill the bowl or do you putit in before you put in the water so it suds up?
You have to at least stir it around a bit, to mix the detergent in. I don’t think bubbles are much of an issue either way.
As for your big kitty, you might have the vet shave a small area on his neck. Then you can pet him and scratch him, and just casually apply the drops before he knows what’s going on. Keep rubbing his chin or rump or whatever with one hand, pop the drops on with the other, and voila! He’s probably objecting to the restraint more than the drops, so jollying him along will probably work a lot better than wrestling him down.
I hope no one minds my re-opening this thread but I have a question about Advantage… I have two cats and one of them had a reaction when I last treated him. He was very lethargic and he was panting very hard. I was pretty worried. It lasted a for about 4-5 hours & then he was fine again. I double checked the dose I gave him and it was Ok. My other kitty had no re-action at all to the same doseage.
I am worried because I am due to treat him again at the beginning of the month & I wonder if I should switch to a different product.
Talk to your vet; he/she is familiar with your cats’ medical history and can more informed recommendations than we can.
CrazyCatLady, do you have any feel for which product (if any) would be best for cats that go outside only occasionally (less than once a week) on a leash and harness? So far, they don’t seem to have picked up any fleas, but I figure it’s just a matter of time if they’re outside. Given that the influx would be small, I wondered if a shot of Program in the spring would be the best thing. Presumably it would last until the weather got too icky to take them outside.
Do you know if vets will administer Program at the same time as routine vac’s? Or are there interactions that suggest separating them?
Go the the laundry isle in the grocery store. Buy a box of 20 Mule Team Borax. go home, vacuum your carpet & cloth furniture then sprinkle the Borax EVERYWHERE Leave it until next vacuuming. then repeat. Its cheap and very effective. It acts as a drying agent so it kills both flees and eggs. DON’T put it on your kitties, it will dry their skin.
Cats get Program shots at the same time as their vaccine shots all the time. At the risk of sounding shrill or condescending, however, why don’t you just give a phone call to your vet’s office? I’m sure the receptionist can answer this question for you very easily.
You are probably correct that Program will take care of the problem; a couple of fleas here and there isn’t really a problem for most pets (unless they have flea allergies), and picking up a few fleas while they are out would become a huge problem if allowed to breed, but a Program-med cat would leave them sterile thus no breeding and no more fleas than they picked up while outside.
Many people, however, have found that even having an indoor cat that never goes outside is not an insurmountable barrier to fleas getting inside. Using Advantage or Frontline eliminates any problems if used all year. Some people even use both Program AND Advantage-or-Frontline, to combat the possibility of fleas gaining resistance to the Advantage or Frontline, which can happen.