FLEA CONTROL

Blood feeding arthropods such as fleas are of great concern to the public not only because of their annoying and often painful bites, but more importantly because many are vectors of pathogens.

The common Cat Flea, our primary flea problem in the United States, can jump about 13 inches, which turns out to be 100 times its body length. This does not appear to tire the flea out too quickly, as a newly emerged flea, seeking its first blood meal, is capable of jumping 40,000 times without stopping. Other types of fleas found in the U.S. include dog fleas, mouse fleas and squirrel fleas. Besides coming into the house on our cat or dog, fleas often enter the home by catching a ride on rodents in the attic or crawlspace, raccoons or skunks in the yard or under the deck, perhaps bats roosting in the house.

• More than 2,400 species exist worldwide.
• Attracted to animals by body heat, movement and the carbon dioxide that animals exhale.
• Adults feed on blood; larvae feed on organic debris.
• Found on cats and dogs year-round, but most common during warm and humid weather.
• Life span on dogs is typically more than 100 days — enough time for a pair of fleas and their descendants to produce millions of offspring. Under ideal conditions, assuming no mortality, a pair of fleas has the potential to produce more than 20 trillion descendants in one year.
• Found on opossums, rats, other rodents and humans.
• Can transmit tapeworms from dogs and rodents to other animals and humans.
• Can jump up to 150 times the length of their body.
• Transmit several major human diseases including plague, murine typhus, Bartonellosis and tapeworms.