I took my 6 month old kitten (Jelly) to get fixed today and the Vet told me he has fleas! My other cat did not have fleas and niether did Jelly at his last appt, but now he has them. I feel like a bad mom, especially because they are strictly indoor cats! How do I prevent this from happening again?
Advantage. And just because your cat stays indoors, doesn’t mean you do. Fleas (among other things) can jump on you while you’re outside, and jump off when you’re inside. Then they look for a warm host. It will be ok. And if you didn’t notice he had fleas, it probably isn’t a bad situation. At least he’s not covered in them. You’d only be a “bad mom” (in my opinion) if you knew he had fleas and did nothing about them.
Flea eggs can live for over a year. A flea could have latched onto someone who lives (or visited) your house, then jumped on the cat.
It’s not like everyone who ever comes in your house is quaranteened.
There are fleas everywhere!
Don’t be so astonished – any cat that isn’t regularly flea treated is likely to have fleas. Very probably your other cat had them – if you didn’t notice them on Jelly then they could easily have been on the other cat. Cats don’t always scratch like mad when they have them, it depends how senstive they are to them.
Contrary to what everyone on here seems to think, being strictly indoor in now way keeps a cat safe from fleas – or mites, or worms or most diseases (only feline leukaemia/feline AIDS and rabies since these require direct contact with other cats). Fleas can enter houses very easily, they don’t even need to come in on clothes/shoes they can just enter through doors and windows, even through the cracks of closed doors. They can sense the presence of cats and dogs, so they enter looking for a meal.
Presumably the vet gave you some flea treatment. If you use any veterinary spot-on regularly (monthly) you will keep both cats free of fleas. Frontline, Revolution, Advantage and Advocate are all good. Just don’t use any flea treatments from a pet store, because they don’t work and you’d be wasting your money.
Chalice
If you were with another animal that had fleas, they could have gotten on you and then got on your cats. Well, get some flea meds or take the cats to the vet for a treatment and get a flea bomb. You’ll need to keep you and your cats out of the house for the next 24 hrs.
just ask your vet for advantage. you put it on the back of your cats neck once a month and it keeps the fleas away, the stuff really works. I have two indoor cats and they had fleas once. Now that I use advantage, they haven’t gotten them since.
well if you have a dog it might of gave it to Jelly and it’s alright my kittens sometimes get them. Get a flea percripson.