Dog Flea

Dog Days of Summer: Flea Control!

How to protect your four-legged family member from fleas!

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Dog Flea Care: Get Rid Of Dog Ticks Once And For All

Common Issues of Dog Ticks

Dog fleas are especially common during the spring and summer. With the rate at which those parasites reproduce it is no wonder it is a pain to eliminate them. In a situation like that, you are almost certainly asking yourself: What am i supposed to do?.

Here is how fleas multiply around your house.  You possibly found them on your dog first. They will spend their time on your dog skin, consuming his blood. After a period, sucking blood, the female flea starts producing eggs.  The house invasion continues as your dog moves around scratching himself. The eggs starts falling off his skin and spreading around.  Do not be surprised if you encounter some ticks or fleas on your bed, that comes as a result of your dog’s parasites scattering around.  If you are the type that enjoy having your dog on your bed, you need to bear in mind that. You might not know you are sleeping with flea eggs.

Infestation of Dog Ticks

It is always bad news for a pet owner to get to know that their dog is infested with skin parasites. Numerous pet owners don’t take the pain to check whether or not their dog has fleas within their skin. Make sure you always take precautionary measures. As you know, prevention is always better than cure.  Flea combs are also very helpful in fighting dog skin parasites, so make sure you use it straight away after you bathed your dog. Flea combs are known to be useful when it comes to getting rid of fleas.  Combing your dog with a flea comb provides you a clear idea of the level of infestation of your dog’s skin. After combing, just clean the comb with a piece of paper towel and if you see dark brownish red spots, you can start thinking there are still fleas left on your dog’s skin. The reddish spots result from the fact that the comb is crushing the blood sucking parasites.

In the above paragraph i did mention the different ways fleas are spread around your home. If you want to prevent the spread of dog blood sucking parasites in your home, you have to know more about their life cycle first. Females ticks mostly lay eggs between 25 and 50 a day.  The incubation period varies from seven days to a couple of years. For some species of ticks and fleas, 7 days is more than enough to take over your dog’s skin. If you use dog flea treatment effectively, you can get rid of those fleas forever.

Getting rid of Dog Ticks

Do not rely simply on spot treatment for your dog as the only answer to the problem. Since fleas spread around your house by means of your dog moving and scratching around, you want to make sure you clean every room and objects your dog has been in contact with.

For example: If you have observed that your favorite pet enjoys playing with strays in open yards, it is up to you to make sure the playing environment is cleaned and free of pests.  If your dog has a favorite carpet he frequently lies on at his leisure time, make sure you meticulously wash them in hot water then dry them up for very prolonged time. This help kill not just the fleas in it but also the eggs and larvae.

It is also recommended that you clean your home environment on daily basis  with a powerful HEPA vacuum cleaner and steam mop.  Take your time to clean every objects your dog has been in touch with, that includes all the rooms he has been in. Once we say cleaning, it involves the entire bedrooms, the basement, attic, yard and even the deck furniture.

At this time, there is one more factor you need to keep in mind. That is washing your car too. A lot of people forget to perform  that. Dog owners more often than not don’t mind taking their dog out for a ride. For that reason your car is probably hosting a quantity of fleas here and there. Make sure you do clean the whole environment, all the cleaning steps are critical. Forgetting only 1 step or leaving out just one area uncleaned and that is it,  your plan has failed, ticks will come back in just a a small number of days.

At all times bear in mind, you need to clean, clean and clean. So far as there are animals in your residence, you will have to make sure the environment they live in is hygienic so as to keep tick invasion almost impossible.

If you want to get more  free article about dog fleas, you just have to check this site: dog health

Secrets to Great Dog Health Care: External Parasites and Their Treatments

WHAT IS A PARASITE?

External parasites are pretty common among dogs. A parasite is an organism that lives off the resources your dog has to offer: namely, fresh blood (which most parasites drink) and a warm place to stay (in and on the skin and fur).

What are the common parasites that might affect my dog?

There are a wide range of parasites that affect dogs:

- Fleas
- Ticks
- Mites
- Lice

All of these parasites cause adverse reactions in your dog: typically, itching and inflamed skin, a dull coat, and bald spots. In advanced cases, your dog may develop anemia (blood loss) and become generally debilitated (particularly if he or she is very young, very old, or suffering from another condition).

In addition to this, many parasites convey secondary and internal parasites to your dog – for example, fleas usually carry the common tapeworm (which causes constipation and flatulence), and ticks can cause a variety of much more serious problems like Lyme’s disease and paralysis.

I’m going to be looking at fleas: what they are, how to tell if your dog’s affected, and how to get rid of them.

A CLOSER LOOK AT FLEAS

Fleas are without question the number-one most common external parasite affecting dogs. They’re small, jumping insects that are light brown in color, although humans generally can’t see them – they move much too quickly for that!

Fleas live off your dog’s blood. The life cycle of a flea moves very rapidly from stage one (egg) to stage four (adult flea), which means they’re capable of multiplying with staggering rapidity.

An adult flea lays hundreds of eggs per day. Each egg will then become an adult flea, which lay hundreds more eggs of its own. One flea becomes a major problem very quickly!

HOW TO TELL IF YOUR DOG HAS FLEAS

The symptoms of a flea infestation are unmistakable.

A dog with a flea infestation will scratch almost constantly, often at areas that fleas seem to favor: the ears, the base of the tail, the belly, and the stifle (the webbing of soft skin between the thigh and the abdomen).

It’s actually the saliva of the flea that causes the irritation, not the bite itself, and some dogs have a genuine allergy to this saliva (as opposed to a standard irritation). Dogs with allergies suffer much more significant negative reactions to a flea infestation, and usually develop “hot spots”.

These hot spots are areas of sore, inflamed, flaking, bleeding, and infected skin, caused by the flea saliva and your dog’s own reaction to it. Bald patches will sometimes develop too, from repeated scratching and ongoing inflammation.

If you think your dog has fleas, you can confirm your suspicions by taking a closer look at his skin: you probably won’t be able to see the fleas themselves, but you should be able to see what looks like ground pepper (a thin sprinkling of fine black grains) on his skin. This is flea dirt (poop).

If you groom him with a flea comb (which is like a fine-tooth comb), try wiping it on a paper towel: if red blotches show up on the towel, you know that your dog has fleas (on a white background like a paper towel, flea poop shows up red: since fleas subsist on blood, their poop is colored accordingly).

TREATMENT FOR THESE PARASITES

Because fleas only spend a small amount of time actually on your dog, and the rest of their time leaping through your house laying eggs and feeding on human blood, it’s not enough to just treat the dog: you also have to target his bedding, the entire house, all human bedding, and the yard (yes, fleas lay eggs all through the yard, too. Even if it’s cold outside, you’re not necessarily off the hook: cold weather doesn’t kill flea eggs, it just puts them into a state of hibernation. The eggs will hatch as soon as it gets warm enough outside.)

You’ll need a broad-spectrum treatment which kills not only the adult fleas (which are the ones that bite), but also any developing fleas, and the eggs.

PARASITE PREVENTION IS THE BEST (AND THE EASIEST!)

Prevention is definitely the best cure – you should keep your dog’s flea treatments up to date with the use of a calendar, and use a treatment that’s prescribed by the vet. Off-the-shelf treatments aren’t recommended, since different dogs require different strengths depending on their size, age, and activity levels. A particular benefit of prescribed flea treatment is that most are also designed to prevent other parasites (like mites, ticks, and heartworm) from affecting your dog.

FOR AN EXISTING PARASITE INFESTATION

If your dog already has fleas, you have two options:

1. You can ‘bomb’ the house and yard with a flea-pesticide. These come as foggers (which coat each room, and the yard, in a fine mist of pesticide) and sprays (which are applied manually to each surface throughout the house and yard), and although they’re very effective in killing fleas and eggs, there’s one major drawback: they’re highly toxic to humans, dogs, and the environment. Depending on your priorities, this is probably the quickest solution to a flea problem (and will effectively wipe out the eggs, too) but if you have anyone in the house with allergies or a health condition – including pets! – you might want to think again.

2. A more health-friendly alternative is to target the dog with a topical anti-flea solution prescribed by the vet (like Advantage or Revolution), and to rigorously clean the house on a regular basis until the flea problem has gone. This means vacuuming each room thoroughly each day – put a flea collar in with the vacuum bag to kill any fleas that get sucked up – and wash all human and dog bedding in hot water as often as you can (once every day or every two days is recommended). You’ll be able to tell when the problem’s gone because your dog won’t be scratching, and his coat will be clear of flea dirt when you inspect it.

WHAT NOT TO DO ABOUT FLEAS

– Don’t use multiple products on your dog – it’ll make him sick, since you’ll be overloading his system with toxins.
- Don’t forget to treat all the animals in the house at the same time: cat and dog fleas are interchangeable, and if one animal has fleas, they all will have them, even if some are not displaying the symptoms.
- Flea collars are no longer recommended as a safe option for flea prevention, since the collars are highly toxic – vets have realized that placing a toxic material directly against your pet’s skin for long periods of time (flea collars have to be worn 24/7 to be effective) is detrimental to your dog’s health.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON PARASITES AND THEIR TREATMENT…

Fleas are just one of the many, many types of parasites that affect your dog. To find out more about the complete prevention and treatment of all types of parasites (external and internal), as well as a comprehensive guide to all aspects of dog health, take a look at The Ultimate Guide to Dog Health.

This book is an invaluable resource for the responsible dog owner, and willa help you to ensure that your dog remains happy and healthy – just the way you want him (or her) to be!

-Secrets to Great Dog Health Care: External Parasites and Their Treatments-