Flea Comb Advice

[saitaina]

So, in December I got a young kitten (whom in a moment of brilliance I named Christmas), whom also brought with him a lovely present of a flea infestation.  We've been battling with it, but it's a hard road.  Unfortunately, Christmas is also the sort of boy who gets into EVERYTHING, and managed to get fly paper wrapped around him the night before last.  He got it off, but he was left quite sticky (thankfully it was JUST a glue strip and had no pesticide in it).  After several failed de-sticking attempts, tonight he got an oil bath (and a regular bath to remove said oil) and thus begins the main problem...

How the heck do I get the dead fleas off of him?!  I've tried the flea comb, but I don't know if I'm some how not using it right or the water is hindering me or what, but I can comb over a flea a dozen times and it Won't. Leave. His. Fur!  I know it's dead (or stunned, either way, sucker ain't moving) and it just...won't comb up.  This has happened repeatedly to the point where I have to pluck the fleas out with my fingers, but as well we know, that is nearly an impossible task, especially when it's a great many fleas (they breed fast, even with medication and daily combing).

So...help?  How can I get them off of him and should I wait and see if they fall off or something when he's dry(?).

And yes, he's been medicated with flea treatment, as have my other two cats (whom he infected) and a pest control guy came through today to treat everything else (so, so nice to be able to put my feet on the floor and not be bitten a bazillion times...).

 

[red top rescue]

It is hard to get the fleas out of a wet coat, but once he is dry, they will blow right off with a hair dryer on cool setting, if he will tolerate it.  When we bathe flea infested kittens, we first try to comb out all the fleas we can get while they are dry, and THEN we bathe them.  We usually dry them with a hair dryer on low setting, and as they dry, the fleas blow out.  (We comb as we blow dry.)

There is a lot of advice in the various threads here about fleas.  Just go to the search box at the top (right under the brown bar) and type in fleas and search.  You will have lots f threads to pick from and cn learn from others' experience.