Fleas!

We found one.

There is now a three-part plan for flea genocide in place. The three-step plan goes like this:

1. Flea shampoo. Blue got a 20-minute dog bath where every inch of his of poor, over-scratched body got attention with a flea-killing shampoo. We even washed his face in it. Normally we leave that to the wipes. Not this time. (Don’t get any shampoo near the eyes!)

2. Flea-killing carpet/furniture spray. Everything in our house that the label said was safe to spray got sprayed. The dog now seems to dislike laying on the floor — he piles up our laundry and lays on that instead. We think it’s that he doesn’t like the smell of the spray, but tough. The fleas will get exported to Flea Heaven even if it means stinking up the joint for a bit. (Side note: J says he read somewhere that simply vacuuming will get rid of 50% of fleas in a carpet. If we ever find actual proof of that, we’ll come back and link-out.)

3. Frontline/Advantix/Advantage. This is the one we’re having trouble with. Frontline and Advantix were sold out everywhere. We hear not-so-great things about Advantage. (Does anyone know about the skin hot spots? A friend said Advantage burned a sore into her pet’s skin. We’re going to watch and make sure that doesn’t happen with Blue.)  The saleslady said that Advantage does the same thing as the others, but isn’t waterproof. I found this write-up generally says what we had been hearing through the grapevine on the difference between the products.

After steps 1 and 2 of the plan, I can report the puppy is no longer scratching like a fiend and he generally acts happier.  We’ll keep you posted as we monitor step number three — we’re going to have to go with Advantage for now, since there is no other option except waiting. And that, as anyone who has found fleas before knows, is not an option.

Count fleas as one of the drawbacks of going to dog parks. We’re convinced that’s where he picked them up.

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