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How to Get Rid of Fleas in Your House
You can get rid of fleas by taking steps to control them at every stage. First, you’ll want to think about treating your pets. But, fleas and their eggs may lurk in other parts of your home and yard, too. It helps to understand the flea life cycle. Adult fleas lay lots of eggs. These eggs may fall off your pet and end up all over the house. Those eggs will hatch into tiny larvae. They are so small it’s hard to see them.
Once you vacuum the house and wash the bedding, give your dog a bath. Bathing your pet regularly will also help rid your home of fleas. Any soap will kill them, so you don’t have to use a flea bath. But make sure that the soap you use is safe for a cat or dog. Some people like to finish the bath with a nice-smelling essential oil that may also help keep fleas away. Before you do, know that some dogs and cats may have problems with oils.
Ah, fleas — those universally loathed pests that infest your home and make it impossible to rest easy. Whether it’s your dog, you or your home, having fleas around is simply not okay. And, in the summer, the misery can be multiplied. If you’re getting ready to sell your home (or even if you aren’t), a flea infestation just won’t do. So, here is how to get rid of fleas in your house once and for all — whether to impress potential buyers or simply regain your peace of mind.
The first step to getting rid of fleas in your house is, well, to find out for sure if you have fleas.
There are dozens of tested ways to get rid of fleas in your house. Unfortunately, you may just have to use trial and error until one stick. If you want to avoid as many chemicals as possible, try the below options.
Fogging your home is another good way to get rid of fleas and is frequently used by exterminators. The first thing to ensure you do is to cover up all the food and dishes in your house, disable (temporarily) your fire alarms, and close the windows and doors. Then, shake your fog can thoroughly and spray. It is typically advisable to have one fogger for each room.
Once you’ve determined that your yard has fleas, make sure you keep your dog or pets away from it until you have dealt with the problem (otherwise, you’ll keep repeating the process!). You can use several different methods to get rid of fleas in your yard, including flooding it to kill flea eggs and new fleas from infesting. However, the safest methods to ensure your yard is good to go are to use pesticides. Spray your chosen product all around the yard (avoiding vegetables or flowers) and paying special attention to dog houses or kennels. If you’re looking for a more natural solution, try using diatomaceous earth (de) – a powder made from fossilized diatoms (algae). De is a toxin-free substitute for many pesticides and can be spread around your yard to kill fleas.
Whether you opt to get down and dirty and rid your house of fleas yourself or decide to call in pest control, make sure your home is completely flea-free before opening it to potential buyers. Replacing the carpet in your home is also another good option to ensure the next inhabitants of your home are starting with a clean, flea-free slate.
How To Get Rid Of Fleas In Your Yard
Once fleas find their way into your home, you’ll never completely get rid of them until you learn how to manage fleas in the yard. Every time you and your furry friends step into flea-infested areas outdoors, fleas hitch a ride indoors on your clothing and your pet’s fur. Once you learn how to manage fleas in the yard, taking control of the problem in your home won’t seem like such a challenge. Flea treatment is more effective if you first take the time to prepare the area. Fleas like to take refuge among clutter and debris, so clean up problem areas when controlling fleas outdoors. Pull weeds and mow the lawn to remove more hiding places.
Find Out If Your Dog Has Fleas
If you have a dog, they should be your first stop. Pesky fleas will make them uncomfortable and you even more so if it is not dealt with quickly. To find out if your furry friend has fleas, use a small flea comb. Start by combing your dog’s head and ears, then move to the tail area and comb backwards quickly – fleas will run away from the comb, but if you’re quick, you’ll catch them in the comb.
Fleas are so hard to get rid of because we tend to only focus on eliminating the adults. To get rid of fleas you need to treat your pet and the environment. So that means finding a treatment for your dog that kills adult fleas and then eliminating all the eggs, larva & pupa they left behind. The best way to get rid of fleas is to pick a treatment for your pet to eliminate adult fleas and then work on treating the environment. And in most instances that can be done with a little elbow grease. If you vacuum enough and clean the areas where your pet likes to hang out you might not have to treat your home with any additional treatments.
You may have noticed a large number of essential oils mentioned in the various flea home remedies for dogs in this article. When it comes to flea remedies natural essential oils can be incredibly effective, and there are a number of different scents you can use. The choice will ultimately come down to the essential oils available to you, and your personal preferences. Since dogs have such sensitive noses, we recommend first testing a very small amount of essential oil near your dog to see how they react. Just like humans, dogs will have some scents that they enjoy more than others and some that they find almost repulsive. In your quest to treat fleas naturally, you should also keep in mind your dog’s preferences and avoid spraying all over their bedding with an essential oil they can’t stand.
If you suspect your dog might have fleas despite your best efforts, here’s how to find out:
stand your dog on moistened paper towels or a damp white bath towel. Brush her. If little specks of dirt fall onto the towels and turn red or brown, your dog has fleas.
You can use nematodes to minimize flea populations in your yard. Start when soil temperatures rise above 45 degrees for at least 2 to 3 weeks
nematodes are your best friends when it comes to keeping your yard flea-free. If fleas aren’t in your yard, they’re less likely to find their way onto your dog.
If you spot a flea or two on your dog, starting her on a monthly flea control may not be enough to treat the pest problem completely. “you need to give it about three months of treatment to really see how effective the flea control is,” seltzer says. “so if you find fleas on your dog, and you start frontline, for example, then using it for three months in conjunction with treating the environment — that’s the big thing. The problem is that a lot of people are reluctant to treat their household. ”.
How To Find Out If You Have Fleas
Having fleas is certainly not an ideal situation, and it can be extra frustrating if you’ve been spreading fleas in your own house without knowing it. The best test for finding out if you have fleas is what some call the ‘ sock test. ‘ don’t worry, it’s as simple as it sounds. Put on a pair of knee-high white socks and walk around your house, shuffling your feet to create heat (which those little guys are attracted to). Spend extra time in carpeted areas of your house or other places you think fleas might especially hang out.
This can be a little trickier, but there are a few telltale signs of a flea infestation that aren’t too hard to spot. First, check for what is called flea dirt – to spare you the ugly details, it’s basically flea droppings that show up as tiny blackish specs and usually smear a rusty red colour. It can look kind of like black pepper. Another way to tell if you have fleas in your home is to look through the carpets for flea dirt or eggs (the eggs are tiny white specs). It helps to run your fingers through the carpet and see if you find either of these signs.
Another reason fleas are hard to get rid of is due to their life cycle, and that cycle happens without us even noticing. We use treatments that are effective for killing adult fleas, but those treatments don’t necessarily work on the other 3 stages of their life cycle. Fleas have 4 stages in their life cycle — egg, larva, pupa and adult. The egg stage lasts anywhere from 2 days to 2 weeks. The larva stage develops over a couple of weeks by eating “flea dirt” (adult flea poop) and other organic material it finds in the environment. The pupa stage often called the cocoon stage, lasts for a couple of days to a couple of weeks. If the environment isn’t right for the pupa to emerge as an adult the cocoon can protect the developing flea for months or years in certain instances.
You don’t have to be a pet owner to find yourself wondering how to get rid of fleas naturally. These parasites bite humans, too. This guide explains how to identify fleabites and what you must clean to get rid of fleas naturally. There is also a natural flea killer spray to protect your pet and your home.
The natural flea killer spray below combines salt to dehydrate any remaining flea larvae or pupae, vinegar to kill any remaining adults and eggs, and essential oils that control and deter fleas. The oil also counteracts the vinegar smell, for those of you who dislike it. Use this daily on soft surfaces throughout your home for two weeks. Do not use it on pet bedding, or on fabrics like silk, suede, or other materials that might be damaged by water. If in doubt, spot test fabric in an inconspicuous area to find out if it’s water-safe.
Use a Flea Trap
You can also try using a flea trap (with a lamp, hot water, and detergent or soap). This exercise has been met with mixed reviews, however, so you might need more extreme measures. If you need a bit more help, try taking the treatment a step further.
If you’re wondering how to get rid of fleas inside your home, this flea trap is an ingenious idea that doesn’t involve spraying anything on your soft furnishings. Simply fill a plate or bowl with warm water and add a few drops of your usual dish soap, then leave it on the floor overnight. The high viscosity of the mixture acts as a glue, trapping fleas onto the surface. In the morning, simply empty out the mixture and wash your plate or bowl well.
Borax has been known to be an effective home remedy; when sprinkled over the affected area and then vacuumed away, it can help to bring a speedy death to fleas. Beware; pets or children who ingest borax will become ill.
a homemade flea trap can be made by filling a small bowl with water and a few drops of dish soap. Place the bowl on the floor near a nightlight. With other lights around off, fleas will jump towards the light landing in the bowl and drowning.
How to get rid of a Flea Infestation?
Just like with many other problems, prevention is better and easier to solve than curing a flea infestation. As you can imagine, it is easier to cure a beginning flea infestation than it is to get rid of one that is already well-established and has been in your home for a longer period of time.
Naturally, there are various methods to get rid of a flea infestation. It all depends on your personal preference and whether you are treating or preventing a problem. To prevent a flea infestation, you could use one of our natural repellents, that will deter fleas from your pet and house. However, when your pet is already infested with fleas, it is quite likely that your house is already the home to the fleas as well. Only 5% of all fleas are on your pet, the other 95% is in their surroundings. For treating a current flea infestation, you could use medicines and insecticides that kill fleas.
As mentioned above a female flea can lay up to 50 eggs per day, so it’s important to repeatedly clean and vacuum your floors when trying to get rid of fleas. If any eggs get left behind they can hatch into adult fleas, and your infestation can start all over again. If you neglect to treat the pet’s environment (the premises), you will miss more than 90% of the developing flea population — the eggs, larvae and pupae. – ridding your home of fleas, university of Kentucky.
In addition to your pet’s coat, fleas like to burrow themselves in the corners of couches, rugs and carpet and other dark, warm areas in the home where they can multiply. If you notice your pet has fleas and you’re getting bites while inside the house, you may have a flea infestation on your hands. The majority of fleas do not live on your pet but rather in the environment around your pet. This makes it even more important to properly remove the bugs from your home. The following step-by-step recommendations will help you get rid of fleas in the house.
Treat the cause of the fleas first; usually, an infestation occurs because of a pet. treat your pets for fleas, including a prevention flea collar or medicine before you go to all the work of ridding your home of fleas.
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