I don't know where these fleas are coming from, but perhaps it's from a stray cat. They're everywhere in our home. I have even found some in my hair! What's worse are the number of bites our family gets each day. How do we get rid of these fleas in a fast, easy, or efficient way?

We haven't had them in our house for so many years that I almost forget what we did. It's such an awful thing when you get infested like that, and I sure remember the bites, etc.

I do know that we got our dog free of the fleas and that we sprayed outside and inside with a flea killer. Then we did the entire thing again in 10 days to catch any eggs that had been missed. It was expensive and horrible, but we did get rid of them.

I remember that we had to do her bed, thoroughly, and places where she'd lie in the house and/or yard. You have got to stay with it whatever you do or you'll be right back where you were. Not good news, I know.

Nowadays don't they have a medicine that cats and dogs can take which prevents fleas? I've heard something about it on TV.

Good luck. Perhaps someone who has been through it recently can help you more than I did. I hope so.

Lorace

Edited to add this: Sorry, I didn't realize that you don't seem to have pets of your own! This should make it easier, but you'll still need to do the yard and the house since it's bad in there. Their eggs hatch in 10 days as I recall.

Lorace's advice is good. We found that Sevin Dust (5) was the key to getting rid of fleas our dogs brought back from the park.

It's kind of messy and you have to do it all at once but, use a spreader to cover your lawn and spread the dust over your garden area, too. Inside the house, we used the same Sevin Dust like a carpet freshener powder and left it on the carpet for about fifteen minutes and vacuumed. On bare floors, just clean with a 2% bleach solution, if your floor can handle bleach. If you do it all in one day and repeat it ten days to two weeks later, you should be flea free.

It worked for us.

Helen

I'm in now in the same boat as you with your flea situation although I do have two dogs and a cat. The fleas infested our basement because I was opening the windows for air. The animals never go down there but the fleas came through and infested our entire house. I tried everything on my own and wasted a lot of money for nothing. I finally called an exterminator. He sprayed the entire inside and outside of the house. He put something throughout the yard and garbage area. It has been 24 hours since the extermination and only a few fleas are hopping around. This stuff continues to kill them for a few days though. The exterminator also comes back in two weeks to do it all again. My advice is get a pro to do it. Don't waste your time with foggers and junk that doesn't work. For $291.50, I am almost flea free, and he will be back again. Good luck

We had a big flea problem here and bombing wasn't working..I picked up a spray called Mycodex from the Vet which is also available on Amazon.com. you just spray on the carpet and bedding in your place and it kills them instantly.

I have had to use twice..each time in a different house and each time the problem was elimated after one shot.

Hope this helps some.

We were infested with fleas all over our house; so bad that you could watch them jump. We tried bombing to no avail. Fleas have four stages and the bombs only work on one or two stages.I knew their had to be a natural way to get rid of fleas: I found it and it's cheap too. This will be hard for the clean freak to follow, but take heart it works. I used an old 'Carpet Fresh' container. Fill it 1/2 way with table salt and 1/2 borax laundry booster. Mix (shake) well. Sprinkle over carpet, any flooring, and furniture that is infested(put sheets over the furniture so the stuff doesn't get all over you or your clothes). Leave it for two days DO NOT VACUUM!!!After the 2nd day vacuum and throw out the bag if you have one. I have been flea free for 4 years. It only took one time.

You all are coming up with some fantastic remedies.

I'm sure someone will be helped. Fleas are horrible. I'll never forget the year I got bitten by them while sitting on my neighbor's carpet watching basketball.

I even went to the doctor, thinking I had hives or a horrible disease. I felt like a fool when he told me they were flea bites. Talk about itch! Yuk.

The worst thing was that they came home with me and promptly infested our place.

Thanks for the tips,
Lorace

with just good old-fashioned vaccuuming and flea preventative on my cats.

I vaccuum everything that stands still--rugs, floors, couches, curtains, tops of molding, etc. several times a day and dump the canister in the outside garbage can after each use.

You also need a good flea preventative like Frontline or Advantage when an infestation is bad.

We've recently had a big problem with fleas.. they're pretty much attacking us all the time. We're wearing bug spray indoors, which helps some but not too much. We set off foggers/bug bombs in every room and that didn't even help.

What finally does seem to work is this:
Get a cake pan or some other dish, fill it partially up with water, put a small ammount of dish detergant in the water, and shine a lamp or nightlight over the water. The light attracts the fleas, they jump in the water, and the soap somehow keeps them from jumping back out. In just 20 minutes we got a good 40 fleas (in one room!).. and after that we stopped counting.

Do this every night as long as more keep jumping in.. it should help.

This wont get rid of all the fleas.. and we're still looking for a way to do that, but for a non-chemical method it works very well for at least controlling the flea population in a room. (We had them really bad in the dining room and downstairs bathroom, so we setup a pan+light in each.)

we took in some cats trying to protect them from the cycle of life of nature and ended up with fleas.
we have sprayed, fogged, sprayed some more.. we are seeing some dead, but still seeing some alive. it is driving me insane and I don't even want to be at home any more. I am exhausted from fighting them. I hate bugs.
I am not sure if we are beating them. my husband thinks so.. but i am interested in what others have to say.

We have had the exterior and interior of our home sprayed/treated by the Orkin Pest Control company TWICE in the last TWO weeks to rid the property of fleas without the results that we had hoped for.
They claim that once the eggs hatch the new fleas will not be able to hop. Well, they do and now we are getting ready to treat again.
Our property has 10 eucalyptus trees on it and they say that the leaves are a preventitive for fleas. No such luck.
I really hate chemicals and have a bad sinus reaction to them but my baby is being bitten badly and I can not take it any more.
I dont think there is a sure cure to the flea problem at all.
I am going to try every remidie that has been posted and figure out what works.
If something does then I will post it for those who suffer as we are.
Stay posted for the results.

I have found that bombs, sprays, and exterminators do not seem to help as much as getting rid of the wild animals living in the neighborhood. Fleas breed on the ground, so squirrels don't seem to be much of a problem. However, I have been shocked at how many raccoons I have caught in my own back yard (in the middle of the city). They are nocturnal, so you don't see them during the day.

I had a horrible flea problem and was trying everything with no luck. Once I got rid of the stray cats and raccoons, the fleas went away. I started noticing raccoons and cats again a few weeks ago. Then, shortly later, I started noticing fleas again, too.

Now I'm back to catching cats and raccoons.

Won't your city or humane society help you out with the raccoons and cats?

This is awful, and no wonder you have the flea problem.

I'm hoping someone will come up with a sure-fire cure and let us know about it.

Lorace

We had a flea prob. about a month ago. Our vet told us to clean the entire house for 1 week. Laundry everyday, vacuum everday, spray everday. It was awful. The cat was treated with a flea shot that would kill the fills within 1 hour. Then we had to put frontline on him. We did the 2nd treatement last night and this morning I notice the feces of the fleas (my cats dry blood). I look on my cats skin and there is nothing moving, i guess the frontline works for the cat. Its impossible to clean our basement, there is just too much in there. We thought we were in the clear but we're not. I have no clue what to do. I also have a daycare in the house so I want to make sure everyone is ok. Should I fumigate. Please give me some advice. Can these fleas hurt humans? I am really paranoid about bugs, I hate them and i am so grossed out by this. Dont even want a cat if its going to be like this every single month. We had a dog for 10 years and never once had this issue. I kind of wonder if its really a big deal, in other coutnries I dont think they treat this thing, and people are just fine as are animals, not saying that I want to keep the fleas, but I wonder if its really a huge prob. Please let me know what I can do thats quick and easy. I work all day and things are always very hectic.

According to a few sites that I looked up in Google, fleas aren't dangerous to humans even if they're allergic to them. I know from experience that their bites itch like nobody's business and I never want to go through that, again.

However, to animals - fleas are parasites and over time and quantity can bring about severe anemia.

You may like to read this article

Hope this helps, and good luck!

Lorace

Anybody ever hear of fire and brimstone? Well, you don't have to be quite that radical, but the brimstone does work very good. Go to a local hardware store and purchase sulfur candles. You'll have to set them on bricks (they burn very hot), seal the rooms tight, and vacate the premises as soon as you light them (you don't want to inhale the poisonous fumes). Plan on spending the night somewhere else for a day or so, then return and air out the rooms. There won't be a surviving bug of any kind, and best of all, none will return for a long time. That goes for spiders, bed bugs, roaches, and termites as well. The sulfur fumes can tarnish chrome fixtures, but they will clean up. I've seen one treatment last several years in a home. Three sulfur candles will cover about 1200 square feet, just space them evenly. Sometimes, old inexpensive treatments work the best - even better than a pest service with their chemicals. Those sulfur fumes will even run off mice, rats, and snakes and keep them away.