How to use all natural dog flea control in a yard

Would you like to use an all natural dog flea control to keep fleas out of your yard and off your dog? There’s an easy-to-apply forumla that can help prevent fleas, that we just started using in our back yard. It’s also supposed to be effective against ticks.

Start by mowing your grass as short as possible. Don’t cut it so short that it’ll burn, but do cut it short. Then, on a day that it’s not supposed to rain, gather your supplies and apply this mixture.

You’ll need a new sprayer that you won’t use for any other purposes–that’s because you want to make sure you won’t have any non-pet-safe residue in the sprayer from other pesticides.

You’ll also need neem essential oil, garlic, pyrethrin, water, and canola oil. You can get the neem and pyrethrin at your local garden supply store (call first in case they need to special order it for you). The oil will help the natural dog flea control pesticide to stick to the lawn and plants.

Mix together two parts water to one part canola oil. Then, mix this oil/water mixture four parts to one part pyrethrin.

In other words, you’d start with two cups of water and one cup of canola oil for a total of three cups. Then, mix in 3/4 of a cup pyrethrin with the oil/water mixture. Next, mix in the neem oil according to the directions on its package (they vary depending on brand).

Spray the yard thoroughly. And I do mean thoroughly! Get everything from the lawn to the bushes–you want to make sure there’s no place for fleas and ticks to linger. It’s safest for your pet if you don’t let him out in the yard for 24 hours after spraying the yard, so make it worth the inconvenience by snuffing out all the bad bugs.

Depending on your area and how prevelent fleas and ticks are, you’ll want to spray the yard every 7-10 days throughout the summer. This should keep the fleas and ticks at bay.

What kinds of dog flea control do you use?

Madly in love with my iRobot Dirt Dog!

I’ve had a iRobot Dirt Dog for about six months now and I gush crazily about it to everyone who visits, so clearly it was time to post a Dirt Dog review here.

Old friends know the floors in my house are the bane of my existence. They’re beautiful hardwoods (original to the house) that the previous owner refinished in a rich, dark color. It’s a great color… For someone who doesn’t have a yellow Lab.

Vance’s fur makes those yellow/white tumbleweeds that Labs’ dog fur so often does and no matter how often I sweep, it creeps under the furniture and spreads and multiplies. Ick!

But the Dirt Dog by Roomba… Ah. It’s amazing. It gets under all our furniture and works its way tightly around the legs of our dining room chairs (much more tightly than I can ever get the broom). It sucks up all the dog fur that gets all over the house, and takes itself in and out of rooms.

Because we only have hardwoods, I got the cheepo model (the Dirt Dog is actually for workshops, not for homes, but I’ve found it works perfectly on our floors), but with how wonderfully it works, I would have paid a lot more than the $150 sticker price I paid. If you have carpets, you’ll probably want to try one of the vacuum models because the Dirt Dog is actually just like a little robotic carpet sweeper–it doesn’t vacuum at all.

It empties straight into the trash, no bags needed. And it’s really easy to take care of–they include this cute little tool that gets all the hair that wraps around the rollers off in a jiff (and you know how that is–hair always wraps around the rollers!).

I cannot tell you how much time this little guy saves me, and Vance thinks it’s just a really fancy toy and follows it from room to room. Next, I’m eying their Scooba–what a luxury it would be to neither have to sweep *nor* mop ever again! But for now, I’m perfectly happy with my adorable Dirt Dog.

Heartworm treatment for dogs

So, I’m sitting out on my back deck with the laptop (yea! wireless!), and Vance is laying in the grass. Though it’s early in the season yet, we’re in the south, so mosquitoes are already a fact of outdoors life. I’ve killed six already and we’ve only been out here for a half hour or so.

The reason I bring all of this up is that Vance has had a few mosquitoes on him, too, and it reminded me that I wanted to talk about heartworm protection. If your dog isn’t currently on a monthly heartworm prevention pill, he should be–you don’t want to mess with these creepy crawlies.

Vance used to be on a heartworm prevention and also on a flea medicine, but the flea medicine was applied to his skin and caused a really bad allergic reaction. So, he now takes Sentinel instead which is a little more expensive than one or the other (heartworm prevention or flea protection), but less than the two of them together and it does both. I really like only having to give him the one monthly pill, and I love that he no longer gets a serious rash at the base of his tail (I think he likes that, too).

Lest I sound too much like an infomercial for Sentinel, it has one serious drawback–it doesn’t protect against ticks, so I have to perform a weekly check. Since he used to get the occasional tick on the previous stuff (Frontline), and I’m brushing him every few days anyway, this isn’t a serious hardship, it’s just a minor annoyance. And, truthfully, I’m not sure I don’t prefer fewer chemicals coursing through his system anyway.

If the smell of Frontline bothers you, or applying it topically is irritating your dog’s skin, I highly recommend checking with your vet to see if Sentinel might be as good for your dog as it’s been for Vance.

And, this is a really good time to say: It’s the first of the month. Heartworm day. (I’m totally stealing that from the Jet Dry commercials, but around here we do indeed give Vance his heartworm prevention pill on the first of the month, so it’s perfect.

What do you give your dog to protect against heartworm and fleas? I’d love to know what works for you! And, don’t forget you have until the 6th of June to enter for a chance to win an Omega Paws Tricky Treat Ball. With so many ways to rack up points, I hope you’ll enter more than once (remember, your first entry is a comment, then your other entries are to spread the word about the contest via Twitter and your blog, and to subscribe to this blog by RSS or email).