The Battle of the Fleas

My name is Jasmine and I have fleas. I am officially starting Fleas Anonymous so that I can find the help and support I need during this trying time.

I can’t believe that Jasmine got fleas! I was warned about them when I started looking at apartments. One of the apartment managers said “Oh people never get their pet deposits back. We almost always have flea infestation.” Even on an indoor cat! Now I have to admit that I haven’t seen a flea yet, or at least I haven’t seen a flea and known it was a flea. Living in Flagstaff, Albuquerque, and Colorado Springs my family and I have never had flea problems, so I don’t even really know what one looks like. Sure I’ve seen the close up pictures of their ugly little bodies, but I don’t have any magnifying equipment around to see if that little piece of dirt is actually a flea. Luckily Laura was able to help me out since she was from Ohio. So how do I know that Jasmine has them? She has been scratching like crazy! She never scratches and fleas seemed to be the answer. So yesterday I went to the pet store and asked them about indoor cats and fleas. “Oh yes” she said “my indoor cat gets them every summer, but this summer is particularly bad because we had a mild winter.” I got the flea remedy (Frontline Top Spot for cats) and went to work de-fleaing. I put the toxins in between Jasmine’s shoulders and so far she seems to be scratching less. She didn’t like having the stickiness on her fur, but has gotten over it.

After I did this I felt like I had creepy crawlies all over me. I took a long bath with lots of soapy water and tried to feel like I wasn’t being bitten all over. (Even though I don’t think I’ve gotten a bite yet.) The soap seems to be the key ingredient here. Fleas can bounce, jump and walk on water because of the surface tension. As soon as you put soap in the water the surface tension breaks and the fleas sink to the bottom and drown. Hahaha. I’ve been looking up ways to get rid of fleas and found this flea trap. A plate with some soapy water placed somewhere close to where the pet will be in the dark, with a light above the plate. The fleas like the light, jump to it land in the water and meet their watery end. I tried this last night and didn’t get any fleas! Just lots of other little bugs. Yuck! I hope that it didn’t work because all of the fleas are already dead, not because it’s a lame trap.

So it’s time to go back to de-fleaing by vacuuming and throwing away the vacuum bag. These fleas have picked the wrong apartment! They didn’t know who they were going up against!