Flea/Tick Meds?

[sassafras]

Originally Posted by Lyzelle

I've yet to see or hear of a dog drop dead from the wiff of an onion, clove of garlic, or vinegar.

I've yet to see or hear of a dog who dropped dead from a whiff of Frontline.

The chemicals in many popular flea and tick medications and products, however...well, they have quite a different track record. Many of the synthetic chemicals used actually work because they interfere with the insects' nervous system. Either by blocking chlorine and therefore causing paralysis or by simply blocking nerve transmission completely. And given how many neurological symptoms have been documented and warned against while using these products...hm. I'll personally steer clear, and that is a decision I'm quite happy with.

I don't care what decision you or anyone else makes. I just don't like fear-mongering. Let's take fipronil as an example (the active ingredient in Frontline). It is a GABA (a neurotransmitter) agonist, causing paralysis. It has a special affinity for insect GABA(A) receptors >700 times that of its affinity for mammalian GABA receptors, giving it a fairly wide margin of safety in mammals. That means that our GABA receptors are slightly different than insect GABA receptors, and it is over 700x more attracted to theirs than ours.

Again, the dose makes the poison... so at very high levels you could see the same signs in dogs as in insects, but at the levels used in flea control products, there is no concern of neurotoxicosis from fipronil applied topically to dogs. Nor have I ever seen a confirmed, documented case report where someone can actually say "this happened to this specific person and this specific dog" beyond vague internet rumors of cases when the product was used topically as directed.

Also, the safety and side effect evaluations on a product like fipronil is performed on laboratory dogs fed large quantities of fipronil every day in safety trials, not studies in pet animals who have been exposed to the topical product on a monthly basis. The dose makes the poison.

There is nothing inherently dangerous about onions, garlic, or vinegar. If there were, I would think we would certainly know and plenty of dogs would be dead by now, given how many food companies put onions or garlic in their formulas.

The dose is the poison. (There's nothing inherently effective about them as far as I know, either.)


Again, I don't actually care if you use Bug Off or Frontline or Bio Spot or a special rock you bought on Ebay that keeps fleas away. I just hate wooly logic and weasel words.

[DenoLo]

We are absolutely crawling with ticks where I live. They are everywhere. I did try to use what I thought were the least toxic methods, like the DE and garlic because I got a little munchkin. But at some point I got sick of picking ticks off her every day and now we just use Advantix. Fleas aren't usually a problem for us so I hope you can find something works.

I don't use it in the winter months but apparently the ticks this year are super special cold-resistant ticks because I found one on Lucy in January.

[Mdawn]

Originally Posted by DenoLo

We are absolutely crawling with ticks where I live. They are everywhere. I did try to use what I thought were the least toxic methods, like the DE and garlic because I got a little munchkin. But at some point I got sick of picking ticks off her every day and now we just use Advantix. Fleas aren't usually a problem for us so I hope you can find something works.

I don't use it in the winter months but apparently the ticks this year are super special cold-resistant ticks because I found one on Lucy in January.

The same with me last summer. I tried using alternatives but they didn't work. It finally came down to having my pets infested with fleas or giving them Comfortis. I gave them Comfortis.

[SaraB]

I live in a heavily tick covered area, and my dogs contract a lot of tick borne illnesses. I have used frontline and vectra in the past as well as natural sprays. Not going to lie, I'm not going to risk my dogs getting lyme again just because so-and-so's dog had an adverse reaction to vectra. I wish we lived somewhere that we didn't have the tick population that we do, however we don't. The natural stuff doesn't even put a dent on the number of ticks I pull off the dogs after a hike. One of the natural remedies I use does help with gnats though, if you respray every 20 minutes.

[AdrianneIsabel]

I said non chemical as well, I was referring to a cheaper alternative than a bottle of potion made to kill bugs alone.

The biggest part for me is the cost, the second is the toxin.

It is what it is though, my mom would use periodic frontline or advantage once a summer or so and maybe big bomb the house too but I don't have a lot of experience in the subject because for the past ten adult years I've been in Las Vegas where fleas and ticks don't live and will die when brought in.

[skittledoo]

I use diatemaceous earth... Don't know if I spelled that out right lol. I use the food grade kind and mix a little bit in their food every night. Also every once in a while I'll sprinkle some on their coats and rub it in. Again I use only the food grade kind. I've never had an issue with fleas, ticks etc since I started doing my flea/tick prevention this way.

I am curious about the spray that Fran uses too though and might try it out.

[Beanie]

I use Frontline, or now I'm buying the generic. Only in the summer months; we don't go hiking in the woods when it's freezing outside in the winter so we don't have an issue then.

Payton's breeder used I think garlic powder, and he came home with flea dirt. Never saw any actual fleas but he was an itchy puppy and had plenty of flea dirt. I have a natural spray I use when we go hiking/when I remember to use it, it seems to keep ticks away but doesn't do much for fleas. Luckily we also use Frontline so everything has died after the fact. I wish it would just keep them away; finding dead fleas and ticks around the house is gross.

[stardogs]

Frontline Top Spot here. Lots of ticks during the summer so we use it monthly then, every three months over "winter" (December through February).

Fipronil is one of the safer topical bug chemicals out there (more so than pyrethrins, which are "natural"). It's also used as termite treatment interestingly enough.

Interesting toxicity info
Fipronil:
Acute oral LD50 (rat) 97 mg/kg
Acute dermal LD50 (rat) >2000 mg/kg

Pyrethrins:
Acute oral LD50 (rat): 584-900 mg/kg
Acute dermal LD50 (rat): >1500 mg/kg

Theobromine (chocolate):
LD50 (rat): 1265 mg/kg
LD50 (dog): 250-500 mg/kg

Raisins:
renal damage in dogs: 32 g/kg

Onions:
blood changes in dogs: 15-30 g/kg

sources: http://pmep.cce.cornell.edu/profiles..._prf_0385.html and http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2984110/

[Mdawn]

Originally Posted by skittledoo

I use diatemaceous earth... Don't know if I spelled that out right lol. I use the food grade kind and mix a little bit in their food every night. Also every once in a while I'll sprinkle some on their coats and rub it in. Again I use only the food grade kind. I've never had an issue with fleas, ticks etc since I started doing my flea/tick prevention this way.

I am curious about the spray that Fran uses too though and might try it out.

I used DE last summer. I treated the yard with it 2 times and sprinkled it on my dogs all the time. It didn't help that much with the fleas. I've also put it in their food as well for any internal parasites they could have had.

I'm going to do it again this summer because its not really all that expensive but I didn't see where it helped us much. That's just my personal experience with it though.