How to treat a house for fleas?

[Jeremy Blaze]

Well, those dang dogs of mine have brought fleas into the house!

Is there anything I can use to treat the house that will not get into the tanks?


I was thinking maybe there is a type of carpet shampoo or something?

I plan to treat the dogs with Advantage ( I think that is what it is)

[Bio-Mass]

Get rid of the dogs. It's the only way to have a flea free home. Or just live with it. All the chemicals would really help, maybe short term but they will be back. So really you only have two options.

[Jeremy Blaze]

Any dog lovers care to offer some advice?

[stlmustangz]

Burn the house down...

[eboonaman]

hi, here's what you have to do.
1) put flea powder in your vacuum bag and vacuum your house real good expecally under the couch coushions.
2). go to the vet and get Sentinal (or get a prescription from the vet and buy online, my vet will honor internet prices at his place maybe your will also). Sentinal will kill fleas when they bite and drink your dogs blood.
3) put advantage or frontline plus on your dog.
4) buy flea bombs and set thenm off in your house. then in two weeks set off another set to kill the the developed larvae.

thats what you have to do to rid your home of fleas.. you can try just the advantage and the flea powder in the vacuum but it will take a lot longer and a lot of scratching ...
HTH
Good luck....
chuck

[SeamonstersINC]

Well, I would not burn the house down right away ...
Do you have carpeting ?

[Dawson]

I use Revolution on my dogs, but regardless of which product you use... if you just keep the carpets regularily vacuumed (at least daily with an active infestation) and the dogs treated at the recommended interval, your flea problem should go away. I have amphibians and arachnids in the house as well as fish, so I refuse to use any sort of wide-spread treatment and have had to deal with fleas on my dogs in the past.

D

[SeamonstersINC]

... hmmmm ... I didn't think fleas could live in Antarctica .... but I agree. DO NOT use any foggers, and please don't mix any systemic products with the topical ones ... that could be a deadly cocktail for the dogs.
There used to be a product which incorporated diatoms and a type of boric acid into a dry powder. When spread onto the carpet, it would kill by dehydrating the hatching larvae. It was a absolutely brilliant thing, and no hazards to anyone.
If I can fing the link, I will post it for you.

[Jeremy Blaze]

Intersting. I have carpet throughout the house. 3 dogs. 2 spend a lot of time outside in a fenced in backyard. Other only goes out to use restroom. He is the one that seems to have them the worst.

[SeamonstersINC]

http://alsnetbiz.com/homeimprovement/order.html

Here is a link where boric acid alone is available in 2LB buckets at a reasonable price.
I also typed in 'diatomacious earth' for a google search, and found several sources there. This is a great thing to use on carpet, (don't have carpet any longer myself ... ) and just needs re-applied if you ever clean the carpets ... I went a year once flea-free after using the stuff, and in Florida, that's a pretty remarkable testamony.
Good luck !

[SeamonstersINC]

ooohhh ooohhh wait ....
this is the stuff we used to sell at the Animal Clinic, and I just remembered the name of it ...
http://www.growquest.com/flea_rx_3.htm
It's a bit more $$, but well worth it !!!

[gaels]

put flea powder in your vacuum bag. then vacuum every day for a couple weeks. the vibration of the vacuum cleaner stimulates the eggs to hatch. so if you vacuum daily, you force all the eggs to hatch and the adults get sucked up before they can lay more eggs. empty the bag regularly

[Jeremy Blaze]

Silly, question, what if you have a bagless vacuum cleaner? Put it in the canister?

[gaels]

hmm, i donno. but i guess that'd work just as well

[emilye2]

I think in the canister would work but definatly go with what seamonstersINC said. The stuff is brilliant on rugs, just make sure you get it all over under couches etc. Just for fun (?!) you can take a shallow pan of soapy water and set it in the middle of the room with a desk lamp over it and see how many fleas you collect over night.

[GinaSofia]

Jeremy,
For an inexpensive fix try,mixing 1 part table salt with 2 parts Borax powder and spread all over all carpeting.Work it into the carpeting and let it sit for 24 hours then vacuum.

That being said,this method has always worked for me except this year at a new apartment,vet mumbled something about a more resistant strain of fleas.I bombed three times with twice as many flea bombs as recommended,which was a huge worrisome pain with the tank in the same room and used Advantage,then Frontline(spent over $150) but still found live fleas.While walking through Wal-mart I passed some $3 home insect killer spray(Rid-A-Bug) and it worked.I sprayed the carpeting every other day and vacuumed every other day for two weeks and it seems they are finally gone.

[hubris007]

Originally posted by eboonaman
hi, here's what you have to do.
1) put flea powder in your vacuum bag and vacuum your house real good expecally under the couch coushions.
2). go to the vet and get Sentinal (or get a prescription from the vet and buy online, my vet will honor internet prices at his place maybe your will also). Sentinal will kill fleas when they bite and drink your dogs blood.
3) put advantage or frontline plus on your dog.
4) buy flea bombs and set thenm off in your house. then in two weeks set off another set to kill the the developed larvae.

HTH
Good luck....
chuck

(YOU ARE NOT MY CLIENT JUST BECAUSE YOU READ THIS, THIS IS IN NO WAY TO BE CONSTRUED AS PROFESSIONAL ADVICE)

1)Cut up a flea collar and put about a 2 inch piece in you vac bag everytime you vacuum. This is the ONLY use for a flea collar.
Vacuuming will help break the life cycle by helping to get rid of the "flea dirt (undigested blood passed through the adults that the larvae live on in you carpets) and will remove some extremely unlucky fleas. Additionally, vibration causes the adults to "hatch" from their cacoons.
2) I prefer revolution to sentinel. Sentinel is fantastic for heartworms, hookworms, whipworms, and roundworms. It does NOT kill fleas. It sterilyzes them so that they cannot reproduce. While this does break the reproductive cycle, it's (IMHO) better to kill them instead.
3) No doubt about it, advantage and frontline are both great flea products. As a rule, revolution will be cheaper than frontline plus a heartworm preventative.
4) While flea collars are practically useless, bombs ARE useless. Bombs simply spray into the air, spread out, and drop straight down. You will not get under tables, couches, chairs, entertainment centers, etc where fleas like to hide.


Ok, here's what i generally tell my clients:
Once we're positive that your dogs are negative to heartworms, begin them on Revolution. Use it EVERY month. If there is a flea problem in your house, vacuum....a lot. Your veterinarian should be able to recommend a spray for your carpets. Move all furniture when you spray or vacuum. You may even want to get a chemical treatment and do your lawn, if there is a heavy infestation there.

The idea is to break the lifecycle in as many places as you can. Kill the adults in the yard, kill the adults that get on your animal, remove the food source (flea dirt) from the area of the larvae, cause the adults to hatch out early and remove them (vacuum).

On an aside, i love people who say, "My animal never goes outside, i don't need preventative." This is true so long as fleas NEVER get into your house. Fleas are experimentally grown for studies in the following way: Put a piece of carpet in a room, crank the temp up to 75-82 degrees, lower the humidity so it's dry, and add food source (dog or cat). hmmmm...that sounds an awful lot like a living room to me. My reponse: Unless your living room is different than mine, it seldom gets down to freezing.

Anyway, just thought i'd share a little info, hobbyist to hobbyists.

[SeamonstersINC]

I have heard of the salt thing ... but have never tried it.. too much humidity down here. We can't even keep salt in the shaker

[Jeremy Blaze]

hubris007,

Thanks for the info. Will try.

[tdog44632]

I had to call exterminator to spray the house. It cost $99 but it worked after trying all kinds of things( bombs, flea collars, flea baths). The problem was just killed adult fleas and eggs still lived. they hatched and fleas come back, exterminator treatment stayed around and killed the hatches too.Got Frontline for dog now so fleas dont get in in first place. Hubris's advice seems great!

Tony