Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Today's household tip

I read somewhere on one of my many forums that, if you plug in a night light and put a dish of soapy water under it, fleas will jump toward the light, fall into the water, and drown. The soap is apparently supposed to keep them from escaping somehow(?).

Well. Yesterday morning I sat down in my teeny-tiny hall bathroom and immediately had three fleas jump on my foot. This is, of course, NOT OK! So I decided last night I'd try my little experiment.

I had to rig up the night light because there are no outlets close to the floor in the bathroom, but I took a household extension cord (one of those short white ones), plugged it in to the outlet above the counter, ran it up through a towel bar, and then let it hang close to the floor. Plugged the night light into it, put a dish under it (about three inches deep, full of water with lots of soap), and closed the door.

This morning I went in and there were six fleas in the water! Voila! It worked! Too cool! Most of them were teeny-tiny, but there were a couple of big ones in there.

Nine fleas, just in my teeny-tiny bathroom. Wonder how many there are in the rest of the house? I shudder to think...

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

A bowel of soapy (and thus especially conductive) water next to a live electrical source on the end of an extension cord?

What could possibly go wrong with that? :-)

Anonymous said...

I'm trying this. Yesterday I flea combed my cats and was appauled by the fleas. Of course they then received flea treatments which they weren't happy about. I know we have fleas and I too shudder at the thought. I.HATE.FLEAS.

kbeeps said...

Allen,

You just wish you were there, don't you? Admit it, you're going to try this, just to watch the sparks fly, aren't you??? :-)



Norma,

It works great - I promise! I was trying not to think about the fleas till they started jumping on me!

Anonymous said...

Heh eeheh heheh... Fire! Fire! ...hehehe hehe

I was thinking I'd try it near the neighbors' house. I don't want my stuff messed up. Better yet: I'll talk one of the neighbors' kids into trying it near yet another neighbors' house.

On second reading of my previous comment (preview is for wimps), I realized that I had typed "bowel" instead of "bowl." I'm not so sure I want to try it that way -- what with bikini season already in full swing. I thought waxing was painful enough.

Having dispatched that colorful allusion, my work is done here. :-)

The Alt Martha said...

Oh the fleas stories I could tell...from having a tremendous amount of pets my entire life to working in a vet clinic for several years.

1. I used to bathe all the cats at a clinic I worked in and the vet would literally have to pick the fleas out of the cats eyes while I did so (they were running for their lives and that was the only place to go).

2. I once saw a cat die, literally sucked dry from having so many fleas. The "owner" stood beside us and cried saying that she wanted to try a natural approach. While I'd be the first one to support such an idea, the fact that we have domesticed animals in the first place isn't natural and in such cases natural techniques just aren't sufficient.

3. Fleas give animals tape worms. Treat the outside of the pet or you'll end up treating the inside.

4. Fleas only use the pet as a restaurant and a bathroom so if you don't see fleas on your pet it doesn't mean there aren't fleas.

5. Interesting trick Karen...I just might try it!

6. Lecture over.

kbeeps said...

Thanks for the flea lesson, Elaine! Very informative! :-)

That's so sad about the cat dying from fleas - poor thing!