Dogs scratching their ears incessantly or cats over-grooming their bellies are tell-tale signs of a flea problem. Pet owners in Eugene know the struggle well.
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If these signs sound familiar to you, here’s what you need to know about fleas and how to deal with them.
Why are fleas so bad in Eugene?
Much like how crops grow with ease in the region thanks to fertile soils and temperate climates, fleas thrive in the Willamette Valley, too.
Four-month-old dog named Baby gets an ear inspection.
“Flea issues are super, super common here in the Willamette Valley because we have an ideal environment for fleas to live. Meaning that we don’t go below freezing for extended periods of time in the winter and we don’t get dried out enough in the summer to desiccate everything and kill it,” Sinkowski said. “We do see fleas year-round here in the Willamette Valley and we are helping people every single day try and mitigate flea issues here at the clinic.”
How to tell if my pet has fleas?
Dr. Jessie Sinkowski, owner of Four Corners Veterinary Clinic in Eugene, said fleas are external parasites that spend the adult portion of their life cycle on domestic animals. She said the most common flea she sees is the cat flea, Ctenocephalides felis, which is found on both dogs and cats.
Signs of fleas can include pets exhibiting symptoms such as itchiness, skin redness, flaky dander or scabbing. Sinkowski said a lot of times, pets can develop secondary skin infections as an allergic response to flea infestations. If left untreated, having fleas can lead to pets getting tapeworms.
Thaddeus Pacewicz is the owner and operator of Merle’s Pest Control. He said he doesn’t know everything about fleas, but that he sure knows how to kill them. He said the obvious signs of bites, on both humans and pets, can indicate the presence of fleas, in addition to dirt and visual cues of jumping bugs.
How to get rid of fleas on your cat or dog
With such favorable conditions leading to the prevalence of fleas in the region, it could unfortunately be only a matter of time until pet owners must manage flea control post-infestation.
Sinkowski said one of her big rules for preventing fleas is that all pets in a household need to be on flea control, preferably administered on the same day.
“You can’t just put flea control on your dog and not do it on your cat,” Sinkowski said. “All pets in the household have to be treated for fleas.”
At Four Corners, she utilizes the 30-day coverage options of pill medications like Simparica, Credelio and NexGard, the 90-day medication Bravecto or the topical medication Revolution, which is a different class of medication that simultaneously treats for fleas, heartworms and deworming.
Why isn’t my pet’s flea treatment working?
Not all flea control medications work for all pets. A Eugene vet said fleas may develop resistance to products that have been on the market a long time.
Sinkowski said over-the-counter flea control options range in efficacy and not all medication options work universally for pets. She said some flea control products have been on the market for decades and the older ones aren’t usually recommended by veterinarians anymore. Before medications became widely used, control efforts included flea baths, dips and bug bombing.
“Anecdotally, I feel that we do see pockets of flea parasites that seem to be resistant to certain products…. I’ll run into people who, for example, Frontline won’t work at their house but then we switch them to something like Trifexus or something like that and it works,” Sinkowski said. “Frontline and Advantage were the two products that came out and they were very good at killing fleas, but they’ve been on the market a really long time and we see a lot of resistance to it in small pockets now.”
If all of these mitigation efforts fail, it’s time to call pest control.
How to get rid of fleas in your house
Pacewicz said the first thing he needs clients to do when they call him for flea concerns is to make sure their pets are on flea control. He said if the house is treated but pets aren’t, that can extend the timeline of an infestation.
“Fleas will attach themselves to you or your clothes and then you go inside and they’ll jump on the carpet and then lay eggs and the whole process starts,” Pacewicz said. “They’re really more prevalent in animals, so they’ll get on the animals, they’ll lay the eggs, the animal is the vector and the eggs will drop off into your house, usually, but anything is possible, right? I mean, you leave your door open and fleas can jump in.”
When Pacewicz treats a house for fleas, he starts by spraying Cy-Kick mixed with Precor — chemicals dedicated to eradicating the pests. The Precor mix means the concoction will act as a growth inhibitor for fleas, helping to kill them at all life stages. Following the topical spray focused on corners and molding, he administers an aerosol spray to fumigate the home. He said typically after a couple of weeks, the fleas will die off and customers don’t usually call him for retreatments. He said the chemicals he uses have residual effectiveness, so even if a client’s pet comes inside with a few errant fleas, the fleas should be killed when they jump off in the treated home.
“I don’t really get calls back so that’s good,” Pacewicz said. “I know I’m doing something right.”
During an infestation, soft bedding that pets lay on should be washed daily or every other day and the home should be vacuumed at a similar frequency to try to eliminate as many fleas in various life stages as possible.
What about natural flea control for my house?
If you’re dealing with a flea infestation in your house, chemical controls are the fastest way to get rid of the pests.
Diatomaceous earth is nontoxic and has a drying effect on insect bodies.
Some websites and pet owners recommend spreading food grade diatomaceous earth, a fine powder often used for pest control in gardens, around your home. Non-toxic diatomaceous earth particles have sharp edges and a drying effect on insect bodies. But it will do nothing to rid your home of flea eggs or larvae. Diatomaceous earth will kill adult fleas, but more can keep hatching so the treatment may need to be repeated several times.
Should pests persist, Sinkowski recommends treating yard spaces with a pesticide that kills fleas in all life stages.
What if my neighbor’s house has fleas?
Additional control efforts include talking to neighbors about flea control for their pets, as fleas can move through gaps and cracks in shared dwelling walls like in apartments or duplexes.
Even if there are no pets in a home, Pacewicz said fleas can still be a problem.
How long does it take to get rid of fleas?
Sinkowski said pet owners can be frustrated by the expense of maintaining flea control but the cost to prevent fleas is much less steep than the cost, time and energy of getting rid of fleas once they’ve entered your home.
“I think it’s probably important to note that if you have a flea infestation in your house, you need to plan on aggressively working to treat your pet and your environment for three months before you’re going to see a good possibility of resolution, so it’s not a quick fix,” Sinkowski said. “You may be able to slack off your environmental cleaning from daily or every other day to weekly as you kind of get into it but yeah, it still needs to be pretty aggressive for the full three-month time period. That’s why prevention is really important.”
Both Sinkowski and Pacewicz affirmed how unpleasant a flea infestation can be, highlighting the importance of preventive care. For Pacewicz, the problem can easily have a snowball effect if not timely managed.
“It’s just going to get worse and worse because they’re just going to keep breeding,” Pacewicz said. “It’s just like anything like ants, cockroaches: if you don’t address it, if you don’t take the snake’s head off, then it’s just going to keep getting worse, and your dog’s going to be in hell.”
Sinkowski’s advice for flea prevention was concise.
“My biggest bit of advice is just to use your flea control regularly,” Sinkowski said.
Hannarose McGuinness is The Register-Guard’s growth and development reporter. You can reach her at hmcguinness@registerguard.com.
This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: Flea control in Oregon requires a year round effort