What are your options for flea and tick control if you do not wish to use sprays, pills, or injections? Several healthy alternatives exist.
• Apply herbal flea powder “sparingly” to your pet’s coat.
• Use herbal flea collars.
• Apply natural skin tonic as a general skin toner, parasite repellent, and mange treatment.
• Add nutritional or brewer’s yeast and garlic to the animal’s diet.
• Treat your carpets with a special antiflea mineral salt.
• Occasionally (once or twice a year) sprinkle natural, unrefined diatomaceous earth (which kills insects) along your walls, under your furniture, and in cracks where you cannot vacuum, but not directly on your animals.
• Use sprays or powders containing pyrethrins or natural pyrethrums, which are the least toxic of all insecticides used on pets.
• Another gentle weapon against fleas is a good flea comb with tightly spaced teeth. Your pet should be combed frequently during flea season, probably every day. When you find fleas, drop them into a bucket of soap suds to kill them and stop their spread.
• Try all-natural, preservative-free foods that are good remedies for or preventors of fleas: along with brewer’s yeast, try raw garlic, zinc, and barley grass concentrates. Check with your veterinarian regarding the proper dosages depending on weight.
• Natural repellents do exist. Essential oils such as citronella, tea tree, wintergreen, and eucalyptus have been shown to work.
• Vacuum all surfaces where fleas and their eggs may live, and wash blankets and sheets in hot water.
Adapted from The Healthy Pet Manual: A Guide to the Prevention and Treatment of Cancer by Deborah Straw (Healing Arts Press, 2005).
Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may
not reflect those of
Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.
thanks
is anything safe for us anymore?
Love that green! Sounds great...so I will give it a try. Thanks
lovely thx for sharing
thanks
138 comments
+ add your ownThanks for sharing. I really appreciate this info. Have a great time always.
N.B. The article recommended garlic but garlic should NEVER be fed to cats!! Please make a note of this!!
thanks
Nice to know this, thanks!
Thanks for the article. Would be even better if you provided links to some of the natural products to use. Beautiful DaZe to you & all our furry friends...;)
Glad I read comments I have a cat are there any other suggestion to USe or not to use my cat never had flea problems until last year he lives inside. Last year was horrible. I live in Florida NW
Great suggestions about fleas prevention thanks
Thank you for sharing.
Thank-You
Thank-You
login to add your comment
use your care2 login
add your comment