Fleas
Top 7 ways to make fleas flee
by Ann Brightman

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3. Grooming

Frequently brushing your dog or cat removes the dead hair, mats and tangles that provide a perfect hiding place for fleas. Ideally, your animal should be brushed daily, but once or twice a week will suffice if you do a thorough job. Invest in a flea comb as well: this fine-toothed grooming tool is designed to snag adult fleas. Be sure to get the comb as close to the skin as possible and pay special attention to areas where fleas n congregate: under the legs, around the head and tail, and the belly area.

4. Bathing

Regular bathing is a highly effective way to help keep fleas off your animal. Just be sure to use a gentle shampoo with natural ingredients that won’t dry out or irritate his skin – aloe and oatmeal is an excellent choice. For dogs, you can also select from natural shampoos, conditioners and rinses that contain flea-repelling ssential oils such as lavender, rosemary, tea tree, mint, neem and citrus. These oils offer the added benefits of soothing and refreshing the skin and cutting through odor and grease without drying the coat. Remember not to use essential oils on cats – they’re toxic to felines. When bathing your animal, soap him well, especially around the areas where fleas can collect, and try to leave the lather on for 10 to 15 minutes, to drown existing fleas. Rinse thoroughly.

Control measures
What if you already have a serious flea problem? The above suggestions are still crucial, but you’ll need to take a few additional measures. Fleas reproduce prolifically and rapidly, which means you need to break their life cycle in order to get rid of them. And although adult fleas lay their eggs on your animal, the eggs drop off into the environment before hatching. Once the larvae mature into adult fleas, they jump on the animal and start feeding. As you can see, it’s a vicious circle, and while flea-repelling products can help, they don’t actually kill the fleas, eggs or larvae. So as well as looking after your animal’s hygiene and health, you also need to tackle his environment in order to have a real impact on the fleas.

5. Inside the house

Go on a major cleaning spree. Thoroughly vacuum all carpets and upholstery, taking care to get into all those dark corners and crevices and along the baseboards. Dispose of the vacuum bag promptly. Launder in hot water anything that can be washed, such as cushion covers, curtains, or bed spreads. Frequently wash your animal’s bedding and regularly clean all other surfaces he lies on. To help keep fleas from returning to the bedding, try sprinkling some cedar shavings or lavender seeds in and around it.

You can also carefully sprinkle natural, unprocessed diatomaceous earth on carpets, along walls and in cracks in the floor or corners. It will damage the fleas’ interior functions and kill them. Sodium-based flea-killing products, meanwhile, act as a dessicant and break the life cycle by drying out flea eggs and larvae.

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Published in the April/May 2007 issue of Animal Wellness