Grassroots flea control

I was changing the oil on the Mazda5 the other day (which was much more of a project than it should have been), and when I got up from under the car I noted a few small bugs on my legs and chest. Fleas! I made a mental note about fleas in the driveway outside my garage and left it at that.

Well, two days later and I notice some more of the buggers on the dog (of course you idiot). From what I remember of public health class, I have to control one area of the Host-Vector-Environment tripod. But of course I intend to eradicate these things by destroying all three. Critique and add to my plans if you will:

Host: Dog and humans get a good bath. Dog is already on Frontline or whatever. Will get another dose tomorrow and my Vet wife says there is some pill she will bring home.

Environment: I am spraying the concrete at first with some bug killer I had lying around. Because the dog has been inside, I am washing all linens, vacuuming, and I intend to lay down a fine dusting of Diatomaceous Earth inside and outside this weekend.

Vector: Pretty sure it's mice, rats, squirrels, all that, which have been having a regular party in my garage. I'm not too familiar with rodent pest control, would you guys recommend D-Con?

I'll be the first to say it...... Kill it with fire!

Shotgun.

pyrethrins/permethrins

Make a friend who's an exterminator. They have the good E36 M3 and are usually willing to share.

I should also mention we have a 3 month old in the house, so I'm hesitant to spray or bomb anything. Also doubtful she would survive fire or shotgun blast.

Dog bath with flea shampoo is so far ineffective - gave dog her monthly dose of Advantage early as step 2.

I appear to remain flea-free, however I cannot see my own back so I cannot be certain.

bastomatic wrote: Host: Dog and humans get a good bath. Dog is already on Frontline or whatever. Will get another dose tomorrow and my Vet wife says there is some pill she will bring home.

If the pill is comfortis then I approve!

My Bassets seem to be immune to frontline/advantage type products. Within a week after treatment they are covered in fleas. Comfortis is the only thing that works for them and it does last the whole month.

It was a crazy thing the first time we gave it to them. Dudley our oldest was just lousy with fleas. Daily baths with anti flea shampoo didn't help. I gave him the chewable tablet that he thinks is a treat and about 25 minutes later he started whimpering and twitching. I went to see what was wrong and as he was looking at me I saw what looked like hundreds of fleas climbing to the surface of his fur. I quickly escorted him outside where he rolled around on the concrete driveway for a while. After he came back inside a few hours later I went out and the spot where he was rolling was dusted with dead fleas.

Crazy stuff.

Penny rile, an herb that is useful for flea control.

I'm told dawn works well.

diatomaceous earth?

My house was infested with them when I first took possession.....took 3mo and 6 exterminator calls to get them all......damn central air system.

You've got to get them young, and nothing will kill the eggs. So to break the cycle you have to spray often to kill the newly hatched before they lay more eggs.

Do a google search on DIY pest control. They will sell you better stuff than LowesDepot will.

it was that mild winter. it never really got cold enough long enough in our area to kill the stuff that cold is supposed to kill.

the dog brought them in. we did the cutter backyard defense spray with the hose, and salted the carpets. the salt dries up and kills the eggs when they fall off the animal. it's a rampant problem this summer. my parents can't get rid of them. they ripped out the carpet, put the cat outside, sprayed the yard, bombed the house...

Doh! I recommended poisons without even thinking about what my dogs are on. Another vote for Comfortis. It just plain works. The possible disclaimer is that there is another newer pill that combines the drug in Comfortis with a few others for heartworm and such for less money.

You really need to treat the area where the dogs lays.

My dog is now 14 YO and has never had fleas. I used to work for a company that had an insecticide (Dimilin) that was hell on flea larvae. I think it also had an effect on the eggs when they were laid. It was never regsistered for that use, but it sure worked. I still have 40 lbs of it in my crawlspace.

I ain't a veterinarian, so listen to me or ignore me, YOYO.

What I do when faced with a flea issue is: Frontline or the other one, Advantage, I think, (I rotate them, one box frontline, one box the other one, etc.) applied to the house critter every 2 weeks, not once a month. You do it once a month and the fleas have time to rebuild inbetween. The house critters get it every 2 weeks until after all the fleas are gone. Dogs get ivermectin once a month at the cattle dosage which is 10x the dog dosage. The drug is safe in mammals at 100x the cattle dosage. Most mammals, of course; there are always a few deaths from anything. Besides the frontline stuff, spray the critter down with Adam's Flea Spray. That's some good stuff. I put it on my pant legs when going outside during tick season. There's 2 kinds, one with alcohol and one water based. Get the alcohol based one. You can get it at wally world, but I see they changed their modular and the packaging and it's now sold "for cats" whereas a month ago it was "for cats and dogs." Same thing. With a bad infestation, the cats get a bath with flea shampoo. Just tell them that kitties really like flea baths.

Vacuum the carpet, pitch the bag, etc. Spray the carpet with an insecticide that includes the insect growth hormone stuff. Repeat in a week. Treat the yard with a bag of the granule stuff sold at wally world.

Once it is under control, it is best to have inside critters and outside critters. If you have to have an inside/outside critter, then continue on with the frontline/advantage once a month, ivermectin once a month (dogs need that anyway for heart worm prevention,) treat the carpets at least once a year.

And the fleas in Arkansas are the toughest little buggers I have ever seen. Short of going nuclear, that the only way I found to control them.

Hess, ivermectin is a threadworm/roundworm thing....Does it also work on heart worms? If not, do you know of an Over-The-Counter-At-The-Feed-Store drug for heart worm prevention? I'd like to keep gertrude around as long as possible, but the fees the vet wants for Advantage Multi are crazy. (The googles tell me that the heartworms are kept in check by 2.5% moxidectin....anything similar at a feed store?)

Seriously-comfortis does what advantage used to: one dose=no more fleas. I am cheap and didn't want to pony up for the vet visit so I ordered mine from an online pharmacy in Australia.

Heartworms are roundworms so it will work on them. Tapeworms and flukes it will not work on.

Joey, I buy ivermectin at the feed store (usually Tractor Supply). It is sold as a horse dewormer, for use in horses only, etc. It sells for like three bucks to treat 1250 lbs of mammal (horse in this case) at the full strength (not dog) dosing. It comes in a syringe with the weight on the push part. If your dog weighs 100 lbs, you push out 100 lbs of stuff from the syringe once a month. I put it in some Great Value cheese that's like velveta, which we refer to as "Bruzer Cheese" because we started buying it so Bruzer would take his medicine. We actually prefer it to velveta, but still call it Bruzer Cheese.

Ivermectin is a very interesting drug. It interferes with the protein synthesis of the protein that only bugs make for their exoskeleton. Mammals don't make that protein, so no effect (barring allergies or rare genetic disorders or something.) It will stop any bug that needs to grow. If your critter already has the bugs, it will prevent them from growing and, I think reproducing, but not necessarily kill them, if I recall the pharm on that. If the tapeworms and flukes are not growing, maybe that's why it is not used for those, but I'd check the books on that one. It is used as a heartworm preventative, not cure.

As I said, do not consider this veterinarian advice 'cause I ain't one. It's just what I do, and have been doing for the past 20 years.

Vacuum vacuum vacuum. I google'd this a few months back and that was the consensus. Throw a flea collar inside the vacuum bag (or cylinder) and vacuum constantly. I tried the drops, bug bombs, flea baths, and sprayed the yard. Vacuuming twice a day for a week or two accomplisehed more than all of those combined. The vacuum is capable of sucking up all three stages of the fleas and the flea collar in the vacuum gasses any that survive the suction. Diatomaceous Earth should just be one more layer in the flea assault.

ditchdigger wrote:

It was the first thing our vet recommended, saying stuff like advantix didn't work as well for all dogs. Got her the nail trim as well, so the little wolverine in there wont' maim anyone.

Dr. Hess wrote: Joey, I buy ivermectin at the feed store (usually Tractor Supply). It is sold as a horse dewormer, for use in horses only, etc. It sells for like three bucks to treat 1250 lbs of mammal (horse in this case) at the full strength (not dog) dosing. It comes in a syringe with the weight on the push part. If your dog weighs 100 lbs, you push out 100 lbs of stuff from the syringe once a month. I put it in some Great Value cheese that's like velveta, which we refer to as "Bruzer Cheese" because we started buying it so Bruzer would take his medicine. We actually prefer it to velveta, but still call it Bruzer Cheese. Ivermectin is a very interesting drug. It interferes with the protein synthesis of the protein that only bugs make for their exoskeleton. Mammals don't make that protein, so no effect (barring allergies or rare genetic disorders or something.) It will stop any bug that needs to grow. If your critter already has the bugs, it will prevent them from growing and, I think reproducing, but not necessarily kill them, if I recall the pharm on that. If the tapeworms and flukes are not growing, maybe that's why it is not used for those, but I'd check the books on that one. It is used as a heartworm preventative, not cure. As I said, do not consider this veterinarian advice 'cause I ain't one. It's just what I do, and have been doing for the past 20 years.

I was told by my vet that Ivermectin isn't safe for smaller animals (such as cats) but Strongid, also a horse dewormer is. Most of my horsey friends use Strongid on their other pets.

beware of comfortis, first time my dog had it a couple hours later she puked in the cupholders of my car, several times.

We put a pan of soapy water near where the dog sleep indoors. Put the front cage from a 24" fan over it and ran a light over the pan every night for a month or so. Found no new fleas for 9 days straight after 27 days.

Twice a week vacuum cleaning as a rule. 2 years later and fleas are still gone!

Bruce