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Flea bites are always the worst part about having fleas whether the bites are on you or your pet. It itches like crazy and can drive you mad! Watching your pets itch is painful too because you wish you could help. But you can help!
That’s why I’m here. I’m going to show you how to take care of these bites as efficiently as I can. If you’re wondering how to treat a flea infestation click here to go to the flea treatment page.
Why do flea bites itch?
Flea bites don’t itch because of the bite itself but because of the saliva residue the fleas leave in you when they bite. This saliva is full of all sorts of bacteria and germs that will irritate the skin causing it to itch and turn red.
It’s important when a flea bite itches to not scratch it with the human finger nail. Our nails are full of all sorts of bacteria that probably won’t help the itching situation.
When you are bit by a flea you won’t ever feel it. Sometimes you feel like one just bit you because you feel a sharp pain but that isn’t the flea.
When fleas bite they inject you with a minor numbing agent to avoid detection. This prevents you from feeling the bite at all, or at least until the numbing agent wears off and the bite begins to itch.
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Flea bites on humans
Don’t scratch! You never want to scratch any sort of bite that itches that will just lead to more trouble. Your fingers are full of all kinds of nastiness that will just increase your chance of infections and itching.
Once you have the need to itch under control you can just get some anti-itch cream and put it on the areas with bites on them. Anti-itch cream works really well especially if it has a healing cream in it that can increase the rate that it heals at.
If you don’t want to go buy anti-itch cream that fine too, I have some methods they may help you to get the itching under control. These methods won’t work as well as the itch cream but it’s better than nothing!
- Wash the area that was bite with warm water to prevent the bite from becoming infected. Infection are never good and will lead to a lot more trouble.
- You can use an ice pack to soothe the skin or anything else that is really cold. (Except dry ice, I wouldn’t recommend that.)
- Neosporin is great for just about everything. It will help relieve the itching and cause your bite to heal a lot faster. I don’t consider this an itch cream but more of an all-purpose tool for healing.
- Calamine Lotion is another way to quickly relieve the itching of flea bites.
- Some researchers say that tea bags will help too. All you need to do is wet the tea bags then stick them into the freezer. Once frozen take them out and apply them to the bite. The tea should reduce inflammation and irritation.
- For very itching try taking Benadryl or another antihistamine syrup or tablet
Flea bites on pets
It can sometimes be difficult detecting fleas on pets if they have a lot of fur. I find it much easier to detects fleas on my dog than on my cats.
Its pretty easy to see that your dog has fleas because they will itch themselves like crazy by scratching and biting.
Its easier to tell if cats have fleas. You can just look at their stomachs when they roll over onto their back. If they are on the chubbier side just pick them up and have a look through their fur.
Flea Combs are a great way to check for fleas. All you need to do is run the comb through your pets fur and try to comb over every possible spot.
Get around the neck and ears the most because that’s where fleas hide the most. Once you have ran the comb through just look at the comb and see if their are fleas on it. If their are just pluck the fleas off the comb and stick them into a bowl of soupy water.
If you don’t want to touch the fleas just dunk the comb into the soapy water though this isn’t as effective at getting the fleas off.
There aren’t to many ways to help stop the itchiness of fleas on your pets. The best thing I can tell you to do is get rid of the fleas as fast as possible and comb your pet, and bathe it to keep the fleas off of them.
If there aren’t fleas on your pets then there cant be bites right? If you want to know how to get ride of fleas quickly just click here and I can walk you through the steps.
What do Flea bites look like?
Flea bites are smaller in size than mosquito bites. They are about the size of a pimple and sometimes smaller.
When looking for flea bites just look for small red, raised bumps that look like a needle mark on the skin. If you start to itch check the irritated area for marks as I’ve just described.
Most bites occur around the ankles of the host because they love to hide in your socks. Sock are warm, dark and sometimes moist. That is the perfect environment for a flea to hide. If you still aren’t sure if it’s a flea just use a flea comb on your pet (If you have one) and check for fleas that way.
