Dogs riddled in fleas - what to use?

[Spyda]

Suddenly my whippet, lurcher and two cats are crawling in fleas. All wear decent flea collars and are sprayed monthly with Frontline Spray. I also use R.I.P. spray around the house. Never had this problem before but am feeling really sorry for them all.

Although I resprayed them all with the Frontline spray, washed their bedding at 70degrees and resprayed with R.I.P. three weeks ago, everyone is still scratching and the odd flea is visible. *Scratches head*

I've heard that Frontline Plus pipets are recommended but am also worried about claims that some animals are suffering some nasty side effects. It's also so blinking expensive to buy. I certainly wouldn't want to be paying almost £100 towards something that might make my animals poorly.

I've got Neem Oil in the bottle here (intended for horse) but wondered if I could use this on the animals at home with any success. Does anyone use it and if so, how? Thanks

 

[Cinnamontoast]

Steam clean carpets, bedding, curtains. I sprayed everything, closed rooms for an hour, did anything made of fabric. I fed the dogs garlic, nothing since and we were crawling! It's been v effective.

 

[lillylau]

I use Bob Martin flea shampoo and there is a tablet you can give to cats to kill the fleas in 5 mins then you need to kill the eggs, Defo room spray and boil wash everything you can. vacume all gaps cracks scurtings. little buggers they are

 

[Bosworth]

Go to your vets and get a very good flea treatment for each dog and cat. Advocate or Stronghold, nothing you can buy over the counter is any good at getting rid of fleas, all too weak and actually increase likelihood of resistance. do their beds, the carpet, the furniture with a good quality flea, house mite spray. Wash their beds. You need to really get on top and kill everything. And do not buy any off the shelf treatments, you are just building up a bigger problem.

 

[piebaldsparkle]

Advocate is brilliant, worked when stopped being effective frontline. Don't bother even trying Bob Martin stuff it is useless and the tablets made my old cat sick the 1 time I used a BM wormer.

 

[justforfun]

Advocate is the only treatment I would use now, wash all the beds,treat carpets and keep up to date wth advocate.
TBH nothing you buy in the pet shops works, even frontline has stopped working on my dogs and cats, in the long run using cheap products is a false ecomomy.

 

[CAYLA]

I have alot of animals (nver had a flea infestation) I have a pick of products from work and I use Acclaim household treatment frontline spray (not spot on) I get the x large bottles and spray mine from head to toe, I then swap between stronghold spot ons and frontline spray for each treatment.
Vcate the animals and thoroughly spray the house, do the skirting boards and behind radiators and all fabrics/carpets. You will need atleast 2 bottles.
I always bath my lot and fully dry before frontlining.

Also get some flea collars and put them in the hoover (kill all the dead fleas you hoover up (hoover house once treated) after a few hours.
Boil wash the dogs beds.

 

[Kaylum]

Make sure they have all been wormed as well.

 

[Ravenwood]

As above!

When Flyn came as a puppy he was covered in fleas Poor little mite, he was red raw and covered in bites.

It took ages and ages to thoroughly rid the house and other dogs/pets. Just when you thought you had got ontop of the problem they reappeared again

It was simply a case of systematically treating and hoovering! You have to vacuum and spray every single square inch of all your upholstery/bedding/furniture/dog beds etc continuously to successfully eradicate them. It cost a bloody fortune in flea spray etc

They're buggers to kill as well, combing him through and crushing them between my nails - eughhhh!

 

[Boulty]

To treat the house I'd first of all create warm, humid conditions (turn the heating up a little, boil the kettle that sort of thing) and also hoover as the vibrations will encourage fleas to hatch / emerge. Then treat EVERYTHING with the RIP spray, so that's all your floors, any rugs (including the floor underneath), bedding, under furniture, under furniture cushions, corners of mattresses (yes really!), pay special attention to areas such as underneath radiators where it's nice and warm. After that go out for a few hours (remove the pets too) cos that stuff stinks and the fumes aren't great to breathe in! On returning vac everywhere again and then empty your vacuum and treat inside where the bag goes as some life stages can survive in your hoover.

To treat your pets I really would recommend speaking to your vet about using a product with some environmental control incorporated. Frontline Combo, Stronghold and Advocate are the ones that spring to mind but there may be more out there as new products pop up all the time and I'm sure they'd be able to advise on the most appropriate.

Be prepared for it to be a long slog to totally get rid of the little pests; nothing is effective on the pupal stages of fleas so it may take months for you to stop seeing fleas on your pets and depending on how bad a problem you have you might need to treat your house more than once. I second Kaylum on the worming

Just to add that I personally have not experienced or heard of adverse reactions to the frontline combo (have used it for many years on my dog). That's not to say they have never / will never happen as I'm sure if you look at ANY drug there will be reports of some individuals reacting to it but I've not personally heard of any for this particular product.

 

[Kaylum]

To treat the house I'd first of all create warm, humid conditions (turn the heating up a little, boil the kettle that sort of thing) and also hoover as the vibrations will encourage fleas to hatch / emerge. Then treat EVERYTHING with the RIP spray, so that's all your floors, any rugs (including the floor underneath), bedding, under furniture, under furniture cushions, corners of mattresses (yes really!), pay special attention to areas such as underneath radiators where it's nice and warm. After that go out for a few hours (remove the pets too) cos that stuff stinks and the fumes aren't great to breathe in! On returning vac everywhere again and then empty your vacuum and treat inside where the bag goes as some life stages can survive in your hoover.

To treat your pets I really would recommend speaking to your vet about using a product with some environmental control incorporated. Frontline Combo, Stronghold and Advocate are the ones that spring to mind but there may be more out there as new products pop up all the time and I'm sure they'd be able to advise on the most appropriate.

Be prepared for it to be a long slog to totally get rid of the little pests; nothing is effective on the pupal stages of fleas so it may take months for you to stop seeing fleas on your pets and depending on how bad a problem you have you might need to treat your house more than once. I second Kaylum on the worming

Just to add that I personally have not experienced or heard of adverse reactions to the frontline combo (have used it for many years on my dog). That's not to say they have never / will never happen as I'm sure if you look at ANY drug there will be reports of some individuals reacting to it but I've not personally heard of any for this particular product.

The heat thing is very interesting as my German friends air their house out everyday. They do this by turning the heating on full blast for 10 minutes and when it's hot in the house they open all the windows to air the house and get the air flow moving.

 

[Sandstone1]

Capstar tablets will kill fleas on the dog but dont stop reinfestation, indorex spray will treat the house but you really need to go to the vet and get some stronghold or simalar.

 

[Alexart]

Either frontline, advocate or stronghold and drown the house in Acclaim! Yes these treatments are expensive but they do work, buying off the shelf rubbish/flea collars etc which are flea REPELLENTS, if you look at the wording on the label, not flea killers then in the long run you'll probably spend twice the amount before having to resort to a vet bought one anyway. You can buy the spotons online to get a cheaper deal, some require a prescription but the old style frontline ones don't so do shop around, and sometimes your vet maybe able to match online deals. I have 17 cats and 8 dogs and use the frontline spot ons 3 times a year and have never had a problem, we also don't have heating though and no carpets so not the most flea friendly house anyway!!
Also as a side note - don't use frontline on a dog if you've given it a bath, you have to wait 3 days as it works by the oil in the animals coat spreading it around and bathing washes the oils out, likewise wait 3 days after treatment before bathing again if you need to.

 

[Spyda]

We don't have central heating or carpets throughout our house either and always have the upstairs bedroom windows open and generally a couple left open downstairs too. All year round. I hate being hot and stuffy. We've wooden or tiled flooring throughout the house and a single 4kw multifuel burner downstairs in the living room. The dogs and cats aren't allowed upstairs, although I do spray with the R.I.P. spray throughout the house, regardless when I do it.

Guess I'm going to have to bite the bullet at find some Frontline Plus for everyone! Thanks for the input everyone