Fleas

Appearance

• Fleas vary from 1-3mm and are reddish brown in colour.
• Fleas can jump the furthest of all animals (compared to their body size) with a vertical leap of 17.5cm and over 30cm horizontally!
• Fleas are flattened from side to side with adapted mouth parts for piercing and sucking.

Biology

• Adult fleas are capable of laying up to around 500 eggs in small batches of 4-10 on or around their host.
• The time between eggs to full adult development can be between 4-8 weeks in favourable conditions.

Habitats

• Larvae will feed on digested waste and excreted blood from the adult flea, where as the adult itself feed off their hosts which range from birds, cats and dogs. However, human blood will often be the preferred food!
• Both adults and eggs can last up to a year without feeding with the eggs laying dormant until they sense their next meal by picking up upon vibrations near to their habitat.

Treatment

• It is important to treat active fleas in conjunction with frequent treatment of domestic pets.
• Single treatments can be successful although follow up visits can be required in extreme cases.
• Instant dispatch and longer term residual insecticides are both applied depending upon the history of the problem.