Saturday, July 4, 2009

Did You Know......?

• Some fleas can jump 150 times their own length. That compares to a human jumping 1,000 feet. One flea broke a record with a four-foot vertical jump.

• The female flea can lay 2,000 eggs in her lifetime; if all 53 million dogs in the U.S. each hosted a population of 60 fleas, we'd have more than six trillion flea eggs surrounding our pets. Laid end-to-end, those eggs would stretch around the world more than 76 times!

• The female flea consumes 15 times her own body weight in blood daily.

• If you happen to see one flea, there may be more than 100 offspring or adults looming nearby in furniture, corners, cracks, carpeting or on your pet.

Fleas are best known for spreading the Bubonic Plague. They also transmit the bacterial disease murine typhus to humans through infected rats. Their saliva is an allergen that can cause allergic reactions in pets and humans. Fleas can also transfer tapeworms and cause anemia in pets. Flea bites cause painful, itchy red bumps.

A pair of fleas can produce 400-500 offspring in their lifetime.

Fleas can live for about 100 days.

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