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| Flea preventative is NOT optional. Take it from me. |
This is a sponsored post.
The warm weather brings about special considerations for our dogs. First and foremost, dogs must be provided with fresh, clean water at all times and never, ever be left behind in a car with no air conditioner. Those are no brainers, and vital to our dog’s health and safety.
The warm weather brings about special considerations for our dogs. First and foremost, dogs must be provided with fresh, clean water at all times and never, ever be left behind in a car with no air conditioner. Those are no brainers, and vital to our dog’s health and safety.
On a positive note, warmer weather also affords us with many
enjoyable activities with our pups: park excursions, hikes, swims by the lake, etc.…
When we spend more time outdoors, so do our dogs.
Since I live in New York City, our outdoor excursions aren’t as woodsy as others. Usually, it’s the yard or the park. Our park is a flat-surfaced one, no high hills or wooded areas, just a clean, grassy surface to run and walk. Our yard is concrete except for a very small space in the back where there is dirt, which measures about a foot long.
Given these circumstances, I was surprised, OK, shocked and
horrified, when my daughter called me one night while I was at a concert to
tell me she had found little black bugs on our Chihuahua. Grossed out doesn’t
even begin to describe it. While I adore my pups, I detest fleas and ticks. We
took a trip to the vet the next day and began the hideous process of de-fleaing
every surface in our home.
I quickly morphed into some sort of mix between an OCD
affected cleaning woman and an itchy hypochondriac. This went on for weeks
between Thanksgiving and Christmas of 2010. I vacuumed at least 5 times per day,
sprayed natural flea killers throughout the house, and checked Hayley
incessantly. The poor thing was itchy and she had passed the critters to our
three cats, one of which became allergic to the fleabites, which caused another
trip to the vet.
Worst part of it all? It was my fault.
I had let the flea preventative go lapse. Since it was
November, I had a false notion that the cooler weather would somehow protect my
pets from flea invasion. Besides, the monthly medication had become
increasingly expensive. Let’s just say that the price of the preventative
nowhere came close to the price it cost to clean up the whole mess and get the
fleas gone once and for all.
Paying for all of your pet’s needs is no easy task in today’s
economy. If you’ve ever had a sick pet, you know exactly how quickly the cost
of a trip to the vet and medication can add up. And even if your pet has never
been sick, mere regular health maintenance, such as heartworm and flea prevention,
can be a draining part of a family’s budget, but luckily, companies are now making medication available at retail stores.
When Vet Guard, approached me and asked me to test out a new
flea preventative called VetGuard Plus by
Vet IQ, I was both excited and leery. I was excited because the price of
the medication was much lower than normal, but cautious because I knew that without
proper protection, one encounter with a stray cat (which there are many on our
yards on my block) could result in a house filled with fleas, again.
What I like about VetGuard so far is that I can buy it in
local stores, like Rite Aid, Sam’s Club and Walmart, and it costs less than
half of what I was paying for Frontline and Advantage. I even found it on Amazon.com. Just make sure you select the appropriate package for your dog's size according to weight. Packages are available for small dogs (5-15 lbs.), medium dogs (15-33 lbs.), large dogs (33-66 lbs.), and extra large dogs (over 66 lbs.).
VetGuard promises that
it has “92% control of fleas within one day of application”. It also maintains it breaks the flea life cycle and kills lice and mites. If you have ever had fleas, you may have learned (as I undoubtedly did the hard way) that the life cycle of a flea is punishing. Adult fleas can live for months on end without eating and you may mistakenly think they are gone, only to watch them quite literally pop up again.
This month, I am
going to give it a try for my 16-pound Chihuahua mix and 50-pound Lab. If you have tried VetGuard, I’d love to hear from you. I’ll
let you know how Hayley and Django like it and what kind of job it does this
summer.