Flea, tick and worm treatments for dogs

Here at Dragonfly, we have a natural approach to flea, worm, and tick management. Many dog owners today are unaware that there are many natural ways to approach pest management on their puppies, dogs and cats.

Whilst some owners prefer to have a monthly prescription from their vet, we believe that treating our dogs with highly toxic flea treatments and worming tablets for dogs without consideration of whether they are actually needed is costly to both your pocket and detrimental to your dogs health.

We believe that a natural approach to flea, tick and worm treatments is the way forward. Each pest has their own set of complications but by approaching pest control in a natural way, your dog will benefit greatly without the monthly onslaught of toxic treatments.

We can both prevent and treat fleas naturally. Prescription flea treatments are traditionally applied to the back of the neck on a monthly basis to prevent flea infestations. But the chemicals in these treatments can cause burns to your dog's skin and upset the delicate balance within your dogs system.

Prevention of flea and tick infestations

A natural way to prevent fleas and ticks is to use something like Billy No Mates which is added to the food and builds up in the system to repel fleas and ticks. It can take around 4-6 weeks to give your dog optimum protection as an effective flea repellent.

Natural flea treatment for dogs

If your dog already has a flea infestation, you can use a shampoo containing tea tree oil to remove the fleas by lathering your dog up and combing through with a flea comb.

Or you could use a natural flea treatment such as Flea Protect Tonic which is a fast acting formula and is applied to the back of the neck daily to deal with the flea infestation. Both of these solutions are natural and won't harm your dog in any way whilst removing the fleas.

If your dog does have a flea infestation, the best way of killing fleas is to ensure you treat not only your dog but their bedding. We recommend washing their bedding at a high temperature to kill off the fleas and flea eggs. It is wise to treat your carpets and soft furnishing too - a natural way to do this is to sprinkle diatomaceous earth on them and then hoover off.

Tick treatments for dogs

Ticks are difficult to prevent, particularly if you live in an area where ticks are prevalent or you enjoy walking your dog in long grasses and there is no specific tick treatment on the market, only repellents.

You could spray your dog's coat with an Apple Cider Vinegar and water solution before the walk to repel any ticks that may be around and offer your dog some protection from these critters. We also recommend you keep a Tick Twister tool on hand to remove any ticks that may appear on your dog.

Our Flea Off Tonic can be applied directly to ticks which will cause them to detach themselves from your dog and be easily removed.

Easy-to-use liquid treatments for worms and intestinal parasites

Intestinal parasites such as worms and giardia can be successfully treated with Grapefruit Seed Extract BUT, and this is a big but, we don't recommend treating dogs on a regular basis for worms 'just in case'. Monthly worming tablets are highly toxic and upsets the natural balance of your dog's digestive system. So why do vet's recommend we give them if we are unsure whether or not our dog has worms? Because it's EASY!

Most intestinal parasites are not visible to the naked eye so you are unlikely to see worms in your dogs poo. We recommend undertaking a regular worm count test for your dog to see if there is any evidence of worms in your dogs stools. If it is clear, you don't need to treat with chemical or natural wormers, you just repeat the worm count test at the next interval (we recommend ever 3-6 month). If your worm count test comes back with a positive result, you can choose to treat naturally or chemically with a prescription from your vet.

To treat worms naturally we recommend 1 drop of Grapefruit Seed Extract (GSE) per 1kg of weight for 10 days. For example, if your dog weights 10kg it would be 10 drops per day for 10 days. And then repeat your worm count test to ensure the worms have been eliminated.