Flea Problems in SW11

Fleas are quite visible to a regular human; you will most often observe them when they jump from or to a host. If you own a dog or cat, cat or dog, or maybe you’ve recently moved into a home in SW11 that has had pets, then you are at risk from fleas and flea bites.

There are 2 main types of fleas that cause problems with homeowners and tenants, and these are the Dog Flea (known as Ctenocephalides canis –https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_flea) and the Cat flea (known as Ctenocephalides felis – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_flea).

Both species of flea are between 1-3mm in length, the cat flea is more of a reddish brown in appearance, whilst the dog flea is a slightly darker reddish black in colour with long tapering legs, allowing them to jump significant distances and as high as 16cm.

From feeding on just a single blood meal, a female flea can lay over a hundred eggs (larva) attaching to the fur of your pet.  These eggs are very small (0.5mm in length) and whitish in colour, once the larva hatch small maggots will emerge, these will then fall off your pet into their carpets or bedding. The larvae build a nest in which they mature and, up to two weeks after, the adult fleas will emerge.

Flea droppings can be best described as looking like ground black pepper, and a careful search of the property may indicate an infestation of fleas.