Flea Facts
Fleas have been around for a very long time, infesting both animals, pets and homes. Listed below are some interesting flea facts:
- Carpets, bedding, pet beds, and upholstered furniture make cozy homes for fleas, flea eggs, and flea larvae. Fleas can also live in the cracks and around the edges of wood, laminate, or tile floors.
- Pets usually bring fleas into your house, but they can also hitch a ride on clothing, and have even been seen to jump right into the house on their own.
- If your pet or your house had fleas during the warm months, you're likely to have fleas during the winter months as well.
- The female flea can lay 2,000 eggs in her lifetime.
- A flea can jump up to 8 inches high, or approximately 150 times its own height.
- Fleas often target the legs and feet of human victims.
- Fleas are approximately 2.5 mm in length. Their bodies are flat and they have six long legs.
- The life cycle, or stages, of the flea is composed of the egg, larval, pupal and adult stages. Cycle length is largely dependent upon environmental conditions and usually ranges from several weeks to several months.
- Once the flea has fed just once it can survive for up to a year on that single meal. Yet if the flea feeds 24/7, it will actually only live for about two weeks, and this is usually the case.
- Fleas love to live in areas where it is both moist (slightly humid or wet areas are ideal) and typically warm.
- Scientists have shown that fleas can jump up to 1.2 meters!
- For every flea that you find in your home, there are statistically about 80 others hidden from your sight.
If you suffer from a flea infestation in your home contact your local pest management professional. A thorough inspection of your home and yard and a pest control program will quickly get those fleas under control plus any other pests that you were not aware of inhabiting your home.