Hi Friends! Max here.

Where there’s heat, there’s FLEAS! YUK! Am I right???

Well, whether we like it or not, fleas are about a zillion years old,
and we have to deal with them. So, as my canine counterparts say,
“KEEP YOUR FLEAS TO YOURSELF!”

With that, I thought I would share some FLEA FACTS with you, as well
as flea and tick products my Jeffers family recommends.

Fleas are not only a nuisance to us animals, but to you humans, too. This specie of insect is considered an ectoparasite which means that it is a creature that obtains food from another life form (EEEWWW!) and lives outside of its host. Fleas prefer the heat, shade, and the camoflauge of animal fur, but will dine on human blood if necessary. Their salivary secretions can cause medical problems including dermatitis, tapeworms, skin irritation, and even anemia! They can transmit bubonic plague from rodent to rodent and from rodent to humans. Tapeworms may appear in children if parts of infested fleas are accidentally consumed.

I think you see where I am going with this? Good, because flea control is very important. And, as a point of interest, flea products are NOT going to work on us animals unless the infestation is under control. Here is some interesting stuff:

The cycle repeats unless broken. You can find where most of the fleas are populating by walking around with white socks on your shoes, or placing a shallow pan of water with soap about 5-6″ under a gooseneck lamp. The fleas leap toward the heat source at night. You can also use flea traps. Research shows that fleas spend nearly 85% of their time deep in the carpet where the larvae camouflage themselves in their cocoons. VACUUM REGULARLY! Boric Acid and laundry soap like 20 MuleTeam Borax contain borates which fleas have no resistance to. Sweeping these powders into the carpet is very effective in flea control.

For us animals, Jeffers recommends that you us an insect growth regulator (IGR) which is a hormone to prevent eggs from hatching and larvae from pupating into biting adults. Frontline and the Cutter flea products methoprene which is an IGR. Advantage, Advantix, and the Adams products contain Permethrin which is effective for dogs, but NOT cats. Products containing Pyrethrin are safe for cats. You can see all of the Flea and Tick products that Jeffers carries here.

Well, that is a lot of information for you to learn from. Please take a minute to let me know what you think of the flea products that we carry, and share with other readers which ones work best for you.

As always, be kind to animals and don’t forget to write.

Max

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 5th, 2007 at 6:13 pm and is filed under Pet Supplies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.