Best Flea Spray and Flea Killer for the Home

How Does Flea Spray Work?

Flea spray for the home is applied to all areas of your house, especially upholstered places where fleas, larvae, and eggs can easily hide and live. Flea sprays work by repelling and killing fleas and other small insects at all stages of their life cycle.

Flea sprays can be found in either a chemical based formula or a natural product based formula and each of these has different active ingredients. Chemical based formulas can contain a wide variety of active ingredients. These chemicals may be any combination of the following types:

• Permethrin, an adulticide which is responsible for killing adult fleas quickly
• Piperonyl butoxide, which strengthens the action of permethrin
• Pyripoxyfen, which helps to control the growth of larvae and eggs from fleas as well as house dust mites
• Methoprene or Nylar, an insect growth regulator which prevents young fleas from developing into adult fleas
• Phenothrin, which helps to kill fleas as it is toxic to fleas, ticks, and bees
• N-Octyl Bicycloheptene dicarboximide, which helps to increase the effects of other active ingredients

A natural flea remedy will obviously contain quite different active ingredients. In many cases, the active ingredient will be lemongrass oil, cedar oil, or a combination of the pair.

Cedar oil repels insects such as fleas and ticks; it causes them to die on contact with it. This is due to its ability to block octopamine, a naturally occurring compound which often functions as a neurotransmitter. When this substance is blocked, a flea’s metabolism, heart rate, and movement cannot be regulated, and they die as a result.

Lemongrass oil, which is often used by humans as an insect repellent, is also effective at repelling fleas and other small insects when used on animals. The aroma is unpleasant to ticks and fleas, and it also has soothing and healing properties when applied to bites or irritated skin.

Best Flea Spray for the House

There are a huge variety of flea sprays that are currently available. Trying to decide on the best product for your needs can be rather difficult. Let’s take a look at three of our favorite flea sprays for the home, along with their features, benefits, and prices.

Wondercide Flea Control Spray

This naturally based flea spray for the home is both safe and effective against flea infestations. It kills fleas, mosquitoes, and ticks at all stages of their life cycle, from eggs to adult insects, without the use of harsh and potentially dangerous chemicals.

With no need for bombs or sprays containing pesticides, the active ingredients in Wondercide Flea Control Spray are lemongrass oil and cedar oil. Four different aromas are available: cedar, peppermint, lemongrass and rosemary. All of these scents are uplifting and invigorating. It is recommended that you do not use the peppermint product if you have pregnant pets, as the peppermint oil can reduce the production of milk.

The Wondercide Flea Control Spray will not stain fabrics or surfaces, so you can use it on all kinds of bedding, carpet, flooring, and furniture, as well as on your pets directly. This product does not contain any toxic ingredients, so it is safe to use on all ages and sizes of cats and dogs. It can also safely be used around young children.

The Wondercide Flea Control Spray is pH balanced to help give your pets a healthy coat and keep their skin in optimal condition. It is made in the USA from all naturally derived ingredients that are human grade, however, it is also the most expensive of the flea spray products that we looked at.

The smaller four-ounce size is recommended for cats and smaller dogs. If they are afraid of the spray nozzle you can spray the treatment into your hands and massage it through their fur.

The Wondercide Flea Control Spray is a gentler and safer alternative to many strong chemical treatment sprays for fleas. While the active ingredients including cedar oil and lemongrass oil may have a slightly strange smell and not be as effective at killing fleas as harsher chemicals, this product has the benefit of being safe to be used on all pets and around children.

Enforcer Flea Spray for Homes

The Enforcer Flea Spray for Homes is a chemical based flea spray, and contains the active ingredients are permethrin, which helps kill adult fleas, and nylar, which affects the growth of young fleas.

This spray kills flea eggs as well as adult ticks and fleas, and it also acts as a flea growth control regulator. This is a little bit like birth control for fleas; if a young flea is unable to mature after exposure to Enforcer flea spray, then it is not able to reproduce successfully. The life cycle is therefore broken, and you will no longer have endlessly reproducing fleas in your house!

This product also helps to prevent further flea infestations in your home for up to seven months when used correctly. It is excellent value considering the large amount of product you receive for a minimal price. A 128 ounces container of Enforcer flea spray will treat around 1600 square feet.

This product does not stain surfaces, fabrics or carpeting, so it can be used almost anywhere in the home. It also has a water-based formula, which means it is capable of reaching fleas that may be hidden in drapes, upholstery, rugs, carpets, cracks in floorboards and pet bedding. On top of all of this, the Enforcer flea spray has a pleasant aroma, despite the strong chemicals that it contains.

This flea spray has been found to be fast acting, with significant results apparent in one to three days after just a single application of the product. The spray pump that is included with the product is not the most durable, so you may prefer to purchase a separate, smaller bottle.

It is important to follow the manufacturer’s instructions to ensure you are using this product correctly; failure to do so could result in your pets becoming sick through excessive contact with the applied spray.

Zoecon Precor 2000 Plus Premise Spray

The Zoecon Precor 2000 Plus Premise Spray is another chemical based formula with a number of active ingredients. These are n-octyl bicycloheptene dicarboximide (two percent), piperonyl butoxide (1.4 percent), permethrin (0.35 percent) phenothrin (0.3 percent) and methoprene (0.85 percent).

This product is capable of killing fleas at all stages of their life cycle, and it also contains an insect growth regulator which helps to prevent young fleas from maturing into reproductively capable adult insects. The Zoecon Precor 2000 Plus Premise Spray is effective at preventing a build-up of fleas, and it also guards against further flea infestations for up to 210 days.

This flea spray is effective on all kinds of hard surfaces, and the droplets from the spray nozzle penetrate deeply into upholstery, carpets and all other kinds of soft furnishings. The water-based formula ensures thorough coverage on all surfaces.

Although this product is supposed to be able to cover a 2000 square foot area, it is a very small amount that you receive in one container (16 ounces), and you may well require further cans of product to treat your house thoroughly and effectively.

The Zoecon Precor 2000 Plus premise spray is made up of strong chemicals and has an intense aroma, so it’s important that you follow the recommended directions for application to avoid any unpleasant reactions for yourself or your pets.

How to Use Flea Spray Effectively in Your House

When you choose to treat your house with flea spray, there are required guidelines that should be followed in order for the procedure to work most effectively. These differ slightly from product to product, but the general process is as follows:

Firstly, If the chosen flea spray for your home is not suitable to be used on pets then treat them with an alternative pet flea treatment before proceeding with your home treatment. Natural products can be used directly on your pet’s fur, however, chemical-based products are usually too harsh.

Secondly, gather all bedding and washable fabric items that your pet has come into contact with Wash these at a minimum of 140 degrees Fahrenheit. Then you should vacuum your entire house to remove any accessible fleas. If your own bed has a flea problem, then this should be vacuumed too.

Next, ensure that your pets and any children are not in the house, close all of the doors and windows. Proceed to spray your chosen product in each room and any other places that your pets may come into contact with.

After this, wait for 30 minutes so that the product can have an effect. Then open all of your doors and windows to allow for ventilation and help to dry all surfaces.

Finally, you must vacuum your house again to remove further fleas. Continue to vacuum regularly for the next seven to ten days to catch fleas as they emerge. Remember that it can take as long as three months to completely eradicate fleas from your home following an infestation.

Flea Spray Risks and Precautions

A chemical based flea spray for the home has a higher number of risks and precautions than a natural product based flea spray, due to the amount of harsh and toxic chemicals contained in the treatment.

Always make sure your pets are not in the rooms or areas where you are using the flea spray. After applying the product, it is important to follow the manufacturer’s instructions on how long you should wait before you can bring your pet back into a treated area.

If you have cats and you are wanting to use a flea spray in your home, check that the product you have chosen does not contain permethrin. While this chemical is very effective for treating fleas on dogs, it is toxic to cats and can cause them to become very ill or even die. They can come into contact with permethrin simply by licking a dog which has been treated with it, so it is essential that you avoid any flea treatments which contain this chemical.

It is also vitally important to ensure that any small children in your home are not overly exposed to the flea spray. This can easily be achieved by applying the product to affected areas in your house while your child or children are not at home. Ensure that all treated areas have been sufficiently ventilated after the product has been absorbed.

If you are using any other form of flea treatment, like one of the popular ‘behind the neck’ cream applications, ensure you tell any children who come into contact with your pet to avoid touching it, or that they must wash their hands thoroughly after doing so.

If you also have a flea problem outside, there’s a list of appropriate flea sprays for your yard here.

Summary

As unpleasant as it may be, having to deal with a flea infestation is an inevitable occurrence in the life of any pet owner. You may treat your pets diligently, but then find a friendly stray animal is responsible for carrying the unwanted extra creatures into your home. As they are usually a cause of great discomfort to your pets, the sooner the fleas can be eradicated, the better.

Luckily there are many solutions available to eliminate the problem of infestation and flea sprays for the home are one of the most effective, in the short term at least. While it may seem like a huge and complex task, the best flea spray for your house will ensure that all fleas are eradicated in a safe, efficient and easy manner.