Flea Treatment Diary Part 1: Flea Free in 2015

I’m not a great one for making (or sticking to) New Year’s Resolutions but I’m going to try very hard to make 2015 an exception because there is one resolution that I am simply determined to keep: To apply flea treatment to Stanley and Cookie every single month.

Important date in the calendar

According to vet Charles Cullen of Deepdale Veterinary Centre in Bedfordshire, a cat who has been treated with an effective flea treatment like Frontline Spot On is “a flea killer”. Any of the bloodthirsty critters that attach themselves to passing cats (or dogs) who’ve been treated with the stuff will be killed within 24 hours before they’ve had a chance to lay any eggs. And if no fleas lay eggs on your cat, there’s no risk of an infestation starting in your home.

However, you have to treat every five weeks in order for your cat to retain this level of protection. My co-cat butler and I learnt this the hard way last summer. It was a busy time of year, we went on holiday, had builders in, did lots of DIY, attended weddings and barbecues at the weekends, etc. and before we knew it, two months instead of one had passed between flea treatments and Cookie was spotted scratching her ear a little more vigorously than usual.

Sadly, the security blanket had to be washed

After several months of obsessive washing, vacuuming, steam cleaning and spraying the house – not to mention the number of times I had to wrest poor Stanley’s security blanket out of his paws and bundle it into the washing machine, while he folornly watched it spin round – I think we finally got rid of the problem. But with the thermostat still turned up against the cold, now is the perfect time for any surviving flea pupae to hatch… And I want them dead before they can start the cycle again.

The heating goes up, the fleas come out…

So how am I going to keep this resolution when applying flea treatment feels like such a chore and there are so many other things that demand my attention? Well, for starters I’ve signed up to Frontline Spot On’s text messaging reminder service and I’ve adorned the new wall calendar with treatment reminder stickers on the appropriate days. These methods should help, but if I receive a text when I’m out there’s a danger I might forget about it by the time I’ve got home, plus the calendar also contains my relatives’ birthdays, which I still usually manage to miss, so I might need to try something else too.

As it happens, Cookie and Stanley’s last dose coincided with the arrival of the January edition of Cat World magazine, for which I have a monthly subscription. So, if all else fails, fingers crossed, when the February issue hits the doormat, I’ll know it’s time for the next treatment.