- Pregnancy
- Baby & Toddler
- Parents
- Getting Pregnant
- Baby Names
- Product Reviews
-
Registry
- Community
-
More
Want a personalized experience?
Download the free app
2nd Trimester
If you use frontline on your pets......
How does it work with ticks? Does it kill it once its on the animal or is it only if it bites into the animal? We are using stuff (but its not frontline so I will have to go get that for next time) but it seems like the ticks are attaching themselves to the dogs/cat fur and making it into the house that way. Is there something we can use to bomb the house(everything I have looked at talks about flies/ants/fleas but not ticks)
Warning
No formatter is installed for the format bbhtml
This discussion has been closed.
Re: If you use frontline on your pets......
We use Frontline and it works like bug spray in that it stays on the their skin. They can still (and do) get bitten but the tick dies within 24h but you should remove them once you see them anyway.
We don't have a flea problem in our area but they work on them too.
We didn't Frontline them in the winter and both of our dogs got sick with a tick borne disease, Anaplasmosis. So its worth doing IMO.
If you don't want to do it yourself the vet will apply it for you monthly (at least mine does)
Frontline kills the ticks once they have bitten the animal- NO product "keeps the ticks from getting on", unless you put your dog in a bubble :-P
Frontline works well and that's the product that I like because it does not get absorbed into the animals system... it remains in the subcutaneous glands of the skin- so it eliminates the chance of it making your pet sick.
Older products like Hartz Mountain, Adams, etc- are actually pesticides and they do get absorbed differently... when I was a vet tech- we had more than 1 instance of an animal coming in literally from being poisoned by them, or those chemicals had a reaction to another chemical being used (sometimes a shampoo) and they severely burned the animal.
There are no 'bombs' for ticks. The best thing for you to do if you think ticks have been brought into your home is to vacuum everywhere (including under furniture). Ticks aren't like fleas- they will not reproduce and take over your home.
The #1 thing you need to do for ticks is make sure your animal is vaccinated annually against Lyme disease. It IS possible to still acquire Lyme disease even if vaccinated- however, those instances are really only if your dog has an extreme exposure risk (think hunting dogs... I had a client who hunted with his dogs and it wasn't uncommon for him to take 50-60 ticks off his dog when he came in from hunting, ew.). However, you also want to make sure you go over your animals well when they come in from inside.
Also, if you notice the dogs going to a specific place and coming back with lots of ticks (maybe a field or a patch of woods), keep them from going there.
If you have any other questions, let me know, I'm happy to give you whatever info I can.
Whenever we got our dog (from a shelter) he was COVERED in fleas and had 3 ticks. So we put frontline on him and within an hour, the fleas were jumping off him. It was insane - and gross. Anyway, the ticks eventually dropped off, but it took longer. So, it doesn't kill all of them, but it definitely repels them. Be sure and leave your dog outside for a couple hours while the stuff soaks in. Since we started using that, (3 years ago) I haven't seen one flea or tick on him (except once in the winter I saw a tick, but I didn't think I needed to use the frontline when it was cold out).
Connor - 12/15/10 Abby - EDD 11/29/13
Currently treating my Lyme-vaccinated dog with antibiotics after a routine positive Lyme test, so just wanted to jump in and point out that this is NOT TRUE. My vet, also, had a total fit when she saw the results of the test since it is so rare if you keep up with the treatments. (We live in a totally crazy Lyme area, though my dog is a companion animal in the city, not a hunting dog in the deep woods!)
Now, there is a chance my dog is a non-responder to the vaccination (according to the research I did after getting over my shock reaction, up to 15% of dogs who get the vaccine are) or her last booster was from a bad vaccine batch. The good news 60-70% of Lyme-positive dogs are asymptomatic, and that appears to be my dog's condition thus far, and hopefully the antibiotics will knock it out of her for a while.
My mother, who does not live in a Lyme-heavy area, was told by her vet that if she planned to take her dog to visit me in DC, he would recommend giving this vaccine up to every six months, because studies have shown it doesn't last the whole year.
The good news is that if you are militant about your Frontline, the ticks will die and fall off within a few hours, and studies have shown that ticd to be embedded for 6-8 hours for Lyme to be transferred.
Also, if you think you MAY have been bitten by a tick, go get tested for Lyme! For humans it's a very dangerous illness, and my vet, knowing I'm PG, was very concerned that I might be infected because my dog and I go into the woods together. (Note: dogs cannot pass their infections to you directly. You MUST get it from a tick. It's blood-borne.)
I know that's not the point of this thread, but I just thought I'd share what I've been through. I adore my little "furbaby" and the thought that she might have been sick despite all I've done to prevent it was deeply painful. Guess I should get used to it -- my human baby is going to get strep and scraped knees and who knows what.
No, about frontline:
I'm a total militant about ticks in my house (they CAN infest your house -- we had a tick infestation in my house growing up) and I live in a high-Lyme area. We have had a tick explosion this year so I've been completely anal about making sure my dog's got her frontline on. Frontline does not prevent ticks from "getting on" your dog, but they bite soon after they "get on" and then they die in pretty short order. We haven't found a tick on my dog in over a year. (I'm also pretty strict about checking her after walks in the woods). I had a Lyme scare a year back after finding a tick in my leg -- luckily, it was nothing.
Note: if you're pregnant, do NOT put the frontline on your dog yourself, and do NOT touch the dog for several hours after the chemicals are on. I make my husband do it and then we kick the dog outside for the afternoon.
Also, for a flea infestation, I love capstar. All the feals fall off in a matter of hours "whoompf." Dead.
Right... you live in an endemic area... that's a higher risk of exposure.... pretty sure that's what I said. Hunting dogs are 1 example, but there's lots and lots of other instances that put you in a higher risk.
That's why a lot of vets require you to retest every couple years, even if you do yearly treatment.
I use FL Plus.. If it has bitten her, I have never pulled a live one off of her. If it's still crawling on her, it's alive. But once it bites her, it's dead.
I don't personally vaccinate for Lyme disease. I did a lot of research and felt that the long term side effects of the vaccine were too severe. It's a very personal choice though. There is no "right" or "wrong" way to make the decision.
My BIL has Lyme disease. It sucked until he was diagnosed and he has been fine since then.
We use Frontline on our puppy and though it doesn't keep the ticks from biting, once they do bite, they die and we either remove them or they fall off eventually. K9 Advantix is said to repel ticks, but we tried that too, and the ticks are still biting. The good news is, they're easy to remove since they die immediately.
Also, I'd be wary of using any pesticides around preggos... could be damaging to the fetus, so be careful when applying Frontline or any other flea/tick medication and wash your hands afterwards!
*eyeroll*
Anyone should wash their hands after applying pesticides. And avoid touching your dog after application. It says that on the box. It's not like Frontline is specially formulated to harm pregnant women.