I found a couple of fleas in my bed. Chaucer kitty needs DU advice.

I need some advice from the DU cat family. Chaucer has turned up with fleas. (The suspected source of contagion is the Girl Scout Leader's infested house and a sleepover there a couple of weeks ago...)

He is not gonna accept a flea comb, nor will he deal with a flea bath or dip (not that I have ever thought much of them, if you want the truth...)

He was due for his annual exam in late June or early July, and i have not had the cash to take him in yet. If I HAVE to, I can maybe call Tuesday and beg his vet for a script for a spot treatment (Frontline or whatever she uses) but if I can buy something from a pet store that will work without making him sick, I'd like to get started treating him NOW.

None of the humans are manifesting flea bites yet, and the cat doesn't appear to be scratching terribly much. I think we are early in the game, and can probably avoid it getting any worse if we get him treated sooner rather than later.

What say you, sage cat lovers of DU? Is there an over the counter flea spot treatment that is safe for our beloved kitty that will work?


Laura

which works well, but it isn't inexpensive. Vets stock it, but you can buy it online in 3, 6, and 12 packs. Figure $10-$11 a month for it, depending upon the volume you buy it in. Instead of getting it online, I buy it from a local no-kill shelter which sells it for less - I save a couple of bucks, and they make a couple of bucks which they plow back into their operations.

I've had three different vets tell me the high dose is stupid and potentially dangerous for smaller animals. We found some fleas a few weeks ago and used the cheap stuff and what few we find now are barely moving. All FrontLine does is give you a warm fuzzy by killing a bunch of fleas quickly. In the long run, it is no more effective - just more expensive.

and you might try DE on the floor/edges of rooms.

most vet products can be purchased without prescription on line from farm supply companies (I order from Jeffers' Vet Supply - no real reason, just habit from many years of mail order)

I have always had dogs, but fleas is fleas. Advantage has worked very well for me. I don't even use the whole tube and it does last longer then a month. And the fleas are real bad here in FL. As Kali said I buy it at the farm and ranch supply store.

You don't have to beg for flea medications. As long as your kitty is one of their patients, odds are that if you walk in, they'll sell you some Frontline, or whatever. Mine had a case of fleas last summer, and we tried Vectra, which is fairly new. It worked well, even on my then-14-year-old asthmatic old man with no side effects. If the fleas are really bad, a Capstar pill to kill off the adults might also be in order. Follow it up with the vacuuming and borax as suggested. Vacuum frequently, as any eggs that may remain will probably hatch eventually. You'll probably need to keep kitty on the flea treatment for two or three months to get rid of all of them. Good luck!

They even kinda like him (he's a big old sweetie.) Anyhow, I'm thinking that may be the best bet, but we are gonna take a trip to the local Farm and Fleet and see if they have any of the Frontline there. Hadn't even thought of it, if you want the truth--we used to buy our vaccines from there back in the day when we had a whole house full of cats and dogs and we were dirt poor. We kept everybody healthy and did it for a whole lot less money than it might have cost us.

I am not looking forward to the next couple of months, and yeah, I know full well this is gonna be a longer thing to treat than just a one time application.

Thanks everyone!


Laura

They sell Frontline for dogs. I didn't see any for cats, but your local store might be different.

I would just call the vets and see if you can buy the stuff without making an appointment.

even if you buy it elsewhere. I know it can be a mistake to use stuff made for dogs on cats without knowing about any possible downside. I wouldn't use anything from the pet store. They continue to sell stuff even after it has been shown to be harmful (at least up here in Canada) so they are not in the vanguard of pet protection.

as far as I know.

but I could not remember enough details to be more specific. And my vet has told me that some pet store remedies are actually harmful...something I was thinking of using for cleaning ears. I just learned enough to realize that you really do need to ask a pro before you do something that seems to make sense ...the consequences of a mistake can be so huge. And I can always get advice from my vet for nothing over the phone.

and at $20 less than Petco. Check prices with your vet before thinking it's better to get it at a pet store.

:hi:

but it's still not over-the-counter yet as far as I know. You can walk into some stores that have a pet hospital attached, such as PetSmart, and talk to the counter at Banfield pet hospital inside, and tell them your cat's name and information and they will sell you Advantage there without having to bring your cat in. It's expensive but it does work. You put the drop on the back of their neck where they can't lick it off. Wash your hands after applying it and don't touch the cat for 8 hours. I always do it just before bed. The cat may act funny or skittish the next day, because they can smell it and you can't. But they will be normal the next day. And they will not be bothered by fleas. You do this once a month during the flea season (summer months). Also wash the sheets and vacuum the rugs and couches where the cat has slept to eliminate any stray fleas. Advantage is the only thing I have tried that has worked, although I have not tried Frontline so it may work just as well.

It literally saved my kitties' lives when we rescued them because the dose is calibrated for kitty's weight, and the fleas die pretty much immediately. Safe and very effective.

has worked well for my kitties....
I buy it online.
Lots of years I only have to use it once.

it's another spot treatment med. we started using after
the fleas here developed a tolerance to Frontline Plus,
which we had used for years.

Revolution did the trick.

Good luck.

put a plate of soapy dish water on the ground and train a high-powered light source on it.....fleas will jump in because of the heat, can't get out because of the soap

After many ineffective flea shampoos, I discovered a simple fact.

Fleas drown immediately when immersed in water.

I used the shampoo as well, but a quick dunking, with the emphasis on quick, as the cat's head must go underwater, will take care of all fleas. If it is not quick, all the fleas run up to the cat's head.

This is when I lived in Los Angeles, which has a bad flea problem. My cats, INDOOR cats, became infested, as fleas are tracked in from outside, apparently. I became intimately familiar with flea baths, and flea-bombing my apartment.

They are little dead dots, that's all.

It is mostly just dealing with a wet cat, like any cat shampooing.