It is crucial to start protecting Your Pet Healthy and your home from mosquitoes, ticks, and fleas as the warmer months approach. These disgusting parasites don’t just make Fido itchy; they can also give him illnesses like Lyme disease or heartworms.
The best known among these insects are certainly the renowned fleas. After a restful winter, the fleas will return outside in the spring when the temperatures are warmer and will stay with us until the following winter.
However, in colder areas, such as San Diego, fleas can overwinter in your home. Fleas thrive in warm environments and are therefore able to survive in your home. Fleas and their eggs are usually found in carpets, bedding, and furniture. In addition, they prefer to live on wild animals such as squirrels, rabbits, groundhogs, and skunks.
Fleas will therefore lodge in their hair and bite it. This sting is a bite caused by their mouthpart and therefore allows them to take a blood meal. The small lesions caused by flea bites can cause itching, excessive scratching, and subsequently causing skin irritation Your Pet Healthy. Bacteria already present on the skin can then invade the deeper layers of the skin barrier and cause infections, perpetuating the itching. Thus, your pet does not scratch because of fleas, but rather because of their bites. Fleas can also transfer tapeworms and spread other infectious illnesses like feline hemobartollenosis.
Ticks on dog
Ticks, on the other hand, live by drinking the blood of mammals. They can transmit life-threatening diseases, including Lyme disease. These affect animals and humans, so good prevention is important for you and your pet.
Lyme disease can be a disease that is painful and potentially debilitating. It is much easier to prevent disease transmission from embedded fully ticks on dogs than the disease itself. In addition, when symptoms appear, treatment can become long and complex since these diseases can affect several systems (kidneys, joints, etc.).
Some signs to discover the presence of ticks or fleas on your cat or dog:
- Red, inflamed, scratched skin near the neck, ears, belly, or back legs
- Intense itching, biting, excessive licking, or scratching by your pet
- Tiny black specks that look like dirt or dirt but are digested blood (feces). Place these spots on white tissue paper and add a drop of water. If they turn the paper reddish-brown, you have fleas.
- Climbing ticks in your pet’s fur or attached to the skin (feeding).
The least common but not least is the mosquito-borne parasite, heartworms. With this disease, the parasites attach themselves to the pulmonary artery and heart and can cause symptoms such as persistent cough, fatigue, reduced appetite, and weight loss. Cats can exhibit signs that mimic other feline-specific illnesses, but chronic clinical signs of heartworms in cats include vomiting, difficulty breathing, lethargy, and weight loss. It is important to know that the treatment is expensive, long, and may involve significant risks for your dog. Prevention remains the best solution to avoid the worst.
What can be done to control or reduce the chances of tick and flea infestations?
When you return from outdoor activities, inspect your pet’s skin and fur. Removing ticks with tweezers designed for this purpose within 24 to 48 hours can help prevent disease transmission. You can also use tick remover for cats or dogs to get the job done. The use of anti-parasite prescribed by your veterinarian is the best solution to have an effective, optimal and appropriate treatment for your animal. It is crucial to know that some elements are not good for cats.
Consult your vet if you have both cats and dogs at home. Environmental management, such as building fences and cutting grass, can also help protect against the spread of ticks. For heartworms, your veterinarian will prescribe preventative medications for your pets. To avoid a flea infestation, your pet should take flea preventative medication and receive the prevention consistently for six months in a row. For optimal prevention, there are different possible combinations to ensure that Fido and Tigger get complete prevention.
Aside from a few YouTube-famous dogs who know how to say “I love you” perfectly, most of our pets don’t yet can verbalize how they’re feeling. It makes it tough to know if they are comfortable and healthy. Watch for any changes in the behavior of your pet: lethargy, stiffness, fever, loss of appetite, etc. These could be early signs of infection and are good reasons to visit us for a veterinary examination. Routine vaccines are very good at keeping pets free of preventable diseases. And remember, the sooner you detect an infection.
