In the dog days of summer’s end, the last thing you want to do is to itch like a chimp
all the time and try to catch tiny acrobats around your house.
Fleas are seemingly impossible to get rid of.
But don’t rush to spread poisonous toxins all over.
There are natural ways to alleviate this tiny pest!
First things first; you need to remember that nothing will replace a good old cleaning.
All the remedies and repellents will have a much better effect if you combine them with
vacuuming, shampooing carpets, and of course, bathing your pets if you have them.
The same goes for your yard, which is probably where the fleas are coming from.
Keep the grass mowed and trim the lower tree branches.
Fleas aren’t only acrobatic, but also quite deceptive.
As soon as you’ve annihilated them from one place, like, for example, your house or
yard or pets, it doesn’t mean they’re gone; it only means that they already found
another place to breed themselves into a widespread infestation.
So, take all the following advice, not as a magic trick that’ll miraculously make
all the fleas disappear, but as cool life hacks that’ll help you immensely in your
struggle against these horrible pests.
1) Vinegar sprays.
Fleas are numerous, and it seems like no matter how many of them you put to an end, there
are always more.
But, they’re also pretty vulnerable.
Fortunately, they’re more vulnerable than babies and pets, so this leaves us with a
lot of natural weak toxins that will eradicate fleas, but won’t do any harm to you or your
loved ones.
A good recipe will contain vinegar – fleas hate it!
The easiest one to get at any time would be apple cider vinegar.
Just mix it 1 to 1 with water, and spray the areas where you’ve seen fleas.
While it’s not dangerous for your loved ones by any means, it’s also not completely
lethal for fleas.
Instead, it’ll make your cleaning much more effective, since fleas won’t be as active
and agile after close contact with a vinegar solution.
Do you know of any other interesting uses for vinegar?
Let me know in the comments!
2) Lemon sprays.
Vinegar is extremely effective, but if you don’t like the smell, you may want to try
something else.
As they say, if life gives you lemons – protect your house from fleas!
Just three will do.
They need to be shredded in thin slices and dropped into water with all the juice and
peel.
Lemon peel has another helpful effect – it has essential oils in it, which are also universally
hated by fleas.
If you let the solution steep for a while, the oils will give their repellent qualities
to the water.
Just like with vinegar – spray it wherever it’s needed.
Your pets will probably be unhappy with the smell, but that’s the worst of it.
It’s just lemons, you know.
3) Rosemary.
Fun fact: there’s a theory that in ancient times, people thought that rosemary was a
sacred resource that could drive evil spirits away from the house.
This probably has something to do with the fact that rosemary can protect a house from
fleas, which are famous for spreading some of the worst contagious illnesses in history.
While they may have been wrong about the evil spirits, it was effective against the fleas,
who avoided rosemary like wildfire.
The same method still works, hundreds of years later.
Just grind some dry rosemary into dust and sprinkle it around your house.
It won’t do much for the existing infestation, but it’ll prevent any future ones.
Hmm, vinegar, lemon and rosemary…this might also be a good salad dressing!
4) Flea trap.
It’s laughably easy to get fleas caught in a trap.
Watch this – ha ha ha gotcha!
They’re uncontrollably attracted to light in the dark, especially yellow light.
The easiest way to use this against the fleas is to set a small light right over a big dish
that’s filled with a water and dish soap mixture.
One warning though – keep this one away from kids and pets to avoid any accidents.
The next morning, you’ll see for yourself how effective this trap is; the dish will
be filled with fleas that had no chance to get out of the soapy water.
The only downside to this method is that it won’t free you from flea eggs and larva,
which like to hide away in darker places.
But once again – good cleaning is always needed when you deal with pests!
5) Cedar chips.
If letting your dog out in the yard is scary due to pesky jumpers hopping on their back,
just find those shady places where your pet likes to lay a lot.
If you can, fence it away from Fido, and then drop some cedar chips around the area.
It’s really rich with essential oils, so the fleas will want to hop away from it.
But remember, cedar chips won’t treat fleas by themselves, they’ll only repel them away
from your yard.
The fleas may just flee inside your house, where they’re likely to find more hosts.
So don’t use cedar chips alone; they’ll work much better in combination with several
other methods.
6) Diatomaceous earth.
Or just DE for short, is a fine white-ish powder made from the fossils of a special
kind of algae called diatoms.
It’s the most convenient way to get rid of fleas in your yard.
First – because they’ll stand out from it too much visually, and second - because
it’s lethal for fleas, but almost perfectly harmless to anything else.
Just spread it around the yard thinly, everywhere you can.
Pay special attention to the places where your pet likes to be most of the time.
The only reason why it’s used mostly outside is that it’s not a good idea to breathe
in a lot of this powder.
But it won’t do any harm to the inhabitants of your house if you just sprinkle it on a
specific surface, like dog beds, or in those spaces behind and in between the pillows of
a couch.
Fleas love these areas because it’s easy for them to hide and breed here, and it’s
hard to vacuum them away without the DE powder.
The way DE works is kinda strange and fascinating.
On a microscopic scale, this powder consists of very sharp, glass-like particles that can
poke through a flea’s armored legs, but can’t do anything to bigger creatures.
This causes the flea to start losing moisture from its body, and later succumbs to dehydration.
7) Baking soda or salt.
This mixture is perfect if you still don’t trust DE or other unfamiliar remedies.
It won’t be as effective, and you may need to repeat the process of sprinkling it all
over the place and vacuuming it up several times.
But if you clean your vacuum’s canister carefully, without letting the fleas out near
your house, it’ll work well.
8) Pinewood sawdust.
It’ll scare flees away in no time, but obviously, don’t try to use it in the house.
It’s more of an outdoors thing that can help you secure your house from recontamination
after you’ve cleaned it from floor to ceiling.
Sprinkle sawdust all over your yard, mostly concentrating on the places where your pets
or other animals hang out most often.
One more thing – it wouldn’t be good for either you or your pet to inhale it.
So keep a safe distance, or wear a mask while you’re spreading it around.
9) Nematodes.
Here’s a curveball for you.
How about replacing one kind of yucky thing in your backyard with another kind of even
more yucky thing?
That was a rhetorical question, because serious problems sometimes call for serious measures.
Nematodes are small and constantly hungry worms that will chomp their way through your
entire yard, eating any bug smaller than them.
What’s good about these worms is that they’ll leave absolutely no flea eggs or larva on
the ground.
On the other hand, though, they’ll also eat all the other insects that are beneficial
for the soil.
10)Sulfur or boric acid.
These are fine powders or solutions that are cheap and easy to find in any pharmacy.
They’ll be lethally toxic for fleas if you sprinkle them thinly.
But don’t forget to wear a respirator, and don’t work without protective gloves.
By themselves, these powders are natural and non-toxic for people or grown-up pets.
But you won’t enjoy their smell at all, and they can do harm to young pets under 6
months.
By the way, Pests have been known to team up against us.
Just remember this: A flea and a fly
Flew up in a flue.
Said the flea, "Let us fly!"
Said the fly, "Let us flee!"
So they flew through A flaw in the flue.
The best part, they flew through the flaw in the flue absolutely free!
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