fleas...again....please help!

[micknsnicks2mom]

 
For the first time in 8 years of having my two ladies I had fleas in December. Now I'm obsessed with every move my cats make. They can't do anything and I'm thinking it's a signal of flea infestation.  They got frontline which was the most horrible night of all of our lives, I read that the fleas are super active before they die and my little cat was miserable!

Since then I've washed and vacuumed everything like a crazy person. The ladies aren't biting, or excessively grooming or anything but they do scratch occasionally, which might be normal itches we all get. I also check the girls and their bedding regularly combing with flea comb, and damp cloths no flea dirt.

So my question is, can cats have fleas but not have flea dirt anywhere?


 

my understanding (and based on my experience with ridding our home of fleas) is that it takes 3 months of flea treatment to interrupt/break the life cycle of fleas. it's not just the live fleas that need to go, but the flea eggs/larvae too.

like many others, my cats and i moved into the (first) house i bought and found that there were fleas. my cats had never even had fleas before, and they were 9 years old at that time. i took a very proactive approach to ridding our home of fleas -- in my mind, it was all out war. i cleaned using my vacuum cleaner, a (newly bought) steam cleaner (only used water in it, no cleaning solutions) -- the (repeated) steaming killed the eggs/larvae, and did much extra laundry. i started out intensely cleaning (including using the steam cleaner), daily. then gradually reduced the frequency of cleaning (including using the steam cleaner) to every other day, then every 3 days, and finally every 4th day. it took me 3 months before i was down to cleaning every 4th day. then i switched to vacuuming every 4th day, and steam cleaning once a week -- and that's what i've kept doing for over 3 years. but...i got rid of those fleas, and they haven't returned. i still treat my cats with vectra flea medicine during the warm weather months, as a preventative.

 

[stewball]

I used an exterminator. Did the job beautifully.

 

[desigirlmonica]

Do you have carpet ? If so rent a carpet steamer. They have them at my grocery store here in so cal for 24$ a day. The cleaner is like 10 bucks each. Home depot even rents em. I think the heat kills them . I had carpet n moved to a hardwood floor home but there were fleas that would jump out the couch sometimes. N I gave my kitten some frontline n I dont deal with it. But she escaped outside the other day now she has em.n I gotta give her a flea bath its cold too so she may need a blow dry