Stephen's Flea Page
(or lots of flea facts you don't want to know)

• Fleas have been around for millions of years, but are so good at their work (sucking blood) that fossil fleas are practically identical to today's fleas.
  
  
• Fleas do not jump off their hosts - you can confine two cats together for a week, one with fleas and one without, and that's the way it stays! This is because of the flea life cycle......
  
  
• Flea infestations arise from the environment - ever wondered why you get bitten on the lower leg? Fleas can jump about a foot out of their cocoons in the carpet. (Get those galoshes / stilts on now). In fact one test of flea treatments is to load a room with fleas, apply the treatment, then send in volunteers wearing white socks- count those fleas....
  
  
• In fact, this is how things stack up: If you have 100 fleas in your house:-
  
  
  

  On the pet- 5 per cent
  Cocoons in the carpet - 10 per cent
  Flea larvae (in the carpet again) - 35 per cent
  Flea eggs (guess where) - 50 per cent

  Fleas have a life cycle just like a butterfly - eggs turn into grub-like larvae which then turn into cocoons or pupae. In the pupal stage the adult flea develops inside the cocoon, then sits waiting for something warm and moving to go by When an animal (or human) passes by, the flea unzips its cocoon and jumps. This happens within 3 seconds!
  

FIRST: FLEA EGGS THEN THE EGGS HATCH INTO LARVAE

THEN THE LARVAE FORM COCOONS WHICH LIE DORMANT UNTIL SOMETHING WARM AND

INVITING WALKS BY, CAUSING THEM TO HATCH INTO:
THE FLEA WILL THEN SEEK OUT A MEAL OF BLOODAND LAY MORE EGGS WITHIN 48 HOURS.
CLICK TO GO STRAIGHT TO THE NEXT RIVETING FLEA PAGE AND FIND OUT HOW TO DEAL WITH THEM