Tigger has been keeping bad company. Very bad company. He has been hanging outside the bush by my front door with a new cat. Don’t get me wrong I am glad he has got a cat friend however this cat friend has given him fleas. Ok not strictly true as he could have caught them anyway but imagine my shock when I found out he had caught the little blighters.

Let me first give you a quick low down on fleas (ok how many of you are itching already?) The traditional flea cycle used to run from April to November however with the central heating that we all have in our house fleas are pretty much present all year round. You will notice your cat/dog has fleas when they start itching and when they get up from laying down there will be little white and red/brown specks where they have been sitting. Now I saw these little white specks ages ago and rather than thinking they were flea eggs I decided that he had obviously been laying in sand under the bush (!!!!! I know there is no sand under the bush.) I now know that all you have to do to see if these are flea droppings is to put some of the red/brown flecks on a white piece of paper and rub the fleck with a damp piece of tissue. If you are left with a red line then this is flea blood and is basically a flea dropping – God I can just tells you are itching reading this and I’m sorry.

Anyway this whole red/brown fleck thing went on for weeks but Tigger wasn’t really itching so I thought nothing of it I certainly didn’t think he had fleas. It wasn’t until I brushed him and I saw a red thing crawling in the fur on the brush that the alarm bells started to ring. A quick search on Google revealed some brilliant flea sites and I was left without a doubt in my mind that yes the little rascal had fleas. I always thought fleas were brown and small but they are actually red and a couple of millimetres so easily visible to the naked eye.

I went to the vets and purchased some flea spray. The vet centre recommended a product called Acclaim Household Flea Spray that was £20.00 for a 400ml can and only available from vet surgeries. The instructions are simple and I have followed them to the letter. You need to spring clean (believe me if you think you have fleas you will do this as if your life depended on it.) I dusted, scrubbed and hoovered like the can suggests. Apparently hoovering wakes the fleas up and makes them susceptible to dying with this spray. You then basically spray your entire house, holding the can upside down about knee height and just make sweeping motions to ensure an even coverage. The can gives lots of advice like make sure you take the cushions of any sofas or chairs and give them a hoover and spray down the back of the sofa (apparently a favourite hiding place of these little critters.) You then spray the house (covering all aquatic animals, as this will kill them the can tells me) and do not ventilate the room for 10 minutes. Simple as that. This sprays works for 12 months to keep the fleas at bay and will also work on spiders, cockroaches and silver fish.

Apparently wooden or tiled floors do not need to be sprayed a quick hoover will do the job but they suggest you may pay attention to any crevices on the floor that the fleas could burrow into to. Bedding and clothes do not need to be sprayed and the vet informed me that fleas would die in a 40-degree wash. There is no need to be washing everything on 95 degrees then – although I will admit to giving my pillows, quilt and bed a quick spray as the cat does sleep on them sometimes.

Acclaim Flea Spray apparently contains Precor, which the can informs me ‘Is a long acting insect growth regulator, which prevents flea eggs and larvae from maturing into adults.’ Now just one quick word of warning the life cycle of a flea is 3 weeks. The larvae can take 3 weeks to grow into fleas so you may get the little buggers cropping up for the next few weeks. You have to chuck your animal out while you do this but when I let Tigger back in he was unbothered by anything and didn't even scratch my sofa like normal so although I can't detect a smell obviously he can't either as it had not bothered him.

I have to be honest on first impressions this can had not worked. Tigger would scratch and you would see a flea fly across the room and this went on for a few days and I was nearing the end of my tether and tempted to book into a hotel – however after a few days there was a definite improvement. Tigger was also treated with flea drops from the vet so he is quite happy now as the fleas hate him and so far I am lucky to have escaped unbitten.

That was a week ago and the can recommends that you hoover every day or every other day for a few weeks as the hoover will also kill fleas and they recommend that hoovering stops the larvae taking hold and will literally sweep them up.

The can I purchased will cover 140m2 which is equivalent to a four bedroom house so although expensive the area it will cover is immense and I have a two bedroom house but have used the whole can as I thought too much is better than too little.

I am an asthmatic however I had no problem with this product. I did however close the windows, spray the windows and then sat in the garden for half an hour before I re-entered the house – although I did not have a problem breathing the vapours of this I am sure this could get on a lot of peoples chests especially children.

So has this worked? Well the fleas have gone so I will say yes. Considering the spray gives continual protection for 12 months I think this is amazing value although lets be honest I would have paid £100 for this spray if it had worked. I have learnt my lesson now and never want to go through what I have just been through again so will continue to use the drops on Tigger every month and spray the house once a year. Just a quick word of warning however I did use flea drops on Tigger once a month but they were drops I had bought from the pet shops. They contained a lemon and ecultypus oil and were environmentally friendly however my vet said that they are next to useless and animals need something stronger. Being environmentally aware is all well and good but if a product doesn’t work then there is no point in using it.

I would recommend Acclaim Flea Spray without a doubt but prevention is better than cure. A web site I found said that if you see fleas on your cat/dog there will be literally be millions in your house already and the Acclaim Flea Spray can states that as soon as you see fleas on your pet a major infestation has already occurred within your house.

The can contains the ingredients 0.09% w/w S Methoprene and 0.58% w/w Permethrin. There is no word on the can about ozone damage or anything so I have to assume this is safe for the environment.

Ceva Animal Health Ltd
90 The Broadway
Chesham
Bucks, HP5 1EG
01494 781510.

Sorry review over so you can all stop itching now. xx