So Your Chemical-Free Dog Gets Fleas: What Next?
How do you treat a dog for fleas when the chemical anti-flea treatment she was given before coming to the UK probably caused her focal seizures? Those were most likely caused by Bravecto tablets, but I've read about other dogs reacting badly to the treatments administered via drops to the back of the neck. Systemic chemical treatments were out.
But the Billy No Mates supplement (a natural deterrent made from mint, seaweed, fenugreek, neem leaves, and lemon balm) Molly has had in her food every day since early spring clearly hadn't worked. I'd also been spraying her with neem oil whenever we headed into an area where fleas might be lurking, particularly in the woods where deer bed down for the night. And Molly does not like to socialise with other dogs.
Where Had the Fleas Come From?
The scratching had started a few days after we got back from a trip to Europe. I realised Molly had probably picked up the fleas at our last stop. We'd stayed at a French château that was being done up—a huge, rambling place full of all sorts of animals. A donkey, a horse, the sound of chickens in the distance, and, more importantly, dogs. Five of them, everywhere. I imagine they had probably been in the converted barn we were staying in, and I can just picture what might have been living on those dogs.
But knowing where the fleas came from wasn't going to help me get rid of them.
Advice from the Health Food Shop
I asked the chap in Wareham's health food shop if they had any treatments for a dog with fleas.
He looked at me sympathetically. "Our dog had had fleas."
Brilliant. He would know how to deal with them. "How did you treat them?" I said.
"My wife made up a special concoction of all sorts of essential oils."
I was already shampooing, spraying and combing Molly, so that was doable, but I asked, "Did that get rid of the fleas?"
"On the dog, yes. But they kept coming back, because they stay in the carpets and bedding."
"So what did you do?"
At this point he gritted his teeth. "We flea-bombed the house."
Damn.
The takeaway message: chemical-free essential oil treatments and herbs are all very well for preventing fleas, but if you get them in a modern house with carpets and soft furnishings, you have to nuke them.
So I did. I set off flea bombs in each of the large rooms of the house, shut the door to the kitchen and bathroom, and we went to the…
The New Anti-Flea Regime
The stuff in those flea bombs is toxic to aquatic life (which is probably why you can't buy the flea powders and sprays that we used in my childhood. It's also why we shouldn't be using the systemic chemical treatments that are also toxic to wildlife). It is a last resort for me.
A regime of neem shampooing, cedar oil and combing seems to have rid Molly of the fleas (fingers crossed). I have switched to using a cedar oil repellent (since I was amazed to see the stronger stuff actually knocked fleas out on contact), along with a collar impregnated with margosa (neem) and lavender extract. She is now the nicest-smelling dog in the neighbourhood.
Unless you are a flea, in which case, presumably, quite the opposite.
