how to get 105 degrees in a home for three hours

Propane (and kero) heaters throw a lot of moisture (not to mention carbon monoxide) your walls will be dripping wet.

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Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons, for you are crunchy and good with ketchup........

You can heat it up to 150 f and you still will have fleas just use safe "green" ways to get rid of them and use all that thinking for something useful.

I did not know that! Excellent info! That certainly makes those two not an option.

So we're back to plan A. Electric heat.

Since the electric heat in this particular house is a baseboard heater in one bedroom and two coil and fan heaters in the living room .... what if I turn the breaker off and then hardwire the thermostat wires together and then turn the breaker on. I can turn flip the breaker off at 110 and back on again at 100. Thus maintain an average of 105 over three hours.

The last time I was in India it was 116 deg F in the shade. The rodents still appeared to have fleas but were thriving in the heat with their infestation. PS ...not being a cat fancier I consider them expendable. Go for it! Really that is not hot enough to hurt a cat. the mynah birds tolerated the 116 degrees by just sitting in the shade with their beaks gaping open. The people just went about their normal routine and nearly no one has A/C.

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Agmantoo
If they can do it,
you know you can!

Agmantoo,

Excellent info.

I suspect that there was a fair bit of humidity?

And I suspect that the soil temp would be much cooler. So flea eggs, larvae and pupae are probably thriving at much more comfortable temperatures with lots of humidity at the soil level? Perhaps in the mulch of plants?

Hmmmm ... what was your experience with the fleas? Did you see them? Were you bitten?

Please don't leave your cat in a 105 degree house.

Google: green ways to get rid of fleas

just by doing that I saw a lot of ways to get rid of fleas naturally, for instance:

You could try borax or diatomaceous earth in your carpets. These break down the waxy coating protecting the fleas and their eggs and kill them

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"Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another; but let him labor diligently and build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built."

116 in the shade suggests that it was over 105 for more than three hours. And that it was probably 126 or so, in the sun. I suspect that most animals would be fine with that. Especially with ready access to water. Insects, on the other hand, that get their water exclusively from the air, would probably turn into beef jerky (bug jerky?) right quick at 105 with 50% humidity.

I think the concerns about pets in cars on a sunny day are valid. I also think that you could be looking at temperatures exceeding 150 degrees. A pretty significant difference.

WHERE IS OGGIE???

I don't know how low you have to get the humidity. Low humidity will make things like diatomacious earth and borax more effective. Humidity like we have in FL renders that stuff useless. Its great to see you are testing what is called "anecdotal" information. Its probably over 105 lots of times during the summer in our concrete canyons here in FL and we still have fleas. Maybe fleas unaccustomed to high temps would be more susceptible.

The only way I would ever approve of this wackadoodle scheme is if YOU stay in the house with your cat to make sure it does not pass out, suffer brain damage or die

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"Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another; but let him labor diligently and build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built."

I think it works out to be a combination of high temp and low relative humidity.

My impression is that if you raise the temp 20 degrees, you lose about 20% relative humidity. I just tried googling to find something a bit more solid, but came up with nothing.

Since fleas cannot cope with a humidity below 50%, nor can they cope with temps over 103 (I've just read a whole bunch more stuff about this, and it sounds like the larvae ONLY die at one hour at 103) then I think it's a double whammy sort of thing.

The important thing is three reported cases of just turning the thermostat up (two sent to me, and one I found via google) for the day did the trick.

If I can get confirmed, first hand results, I can publish that and then ask for more anecdotal info.

Ah! Here we go ....

If I have a temperature of 70F and a relative humidity of 70% and then raise the temp to 90, the relative humidity is then 36%. At a relative humidity of less than 50%, fleas begin to die.

Another calculation .... Supposing we start at 70F and 85%, 90F takes us to 44%. Sort of on the edge of being effective. Besides, the humidity in the carpet might be closer to 60 for the first hour. A temp of 105 takes the relative humidity to 28%. Much better chance of permeating the carpet and killing all fleas within three hours.

I just put flea collars on my cat. Never had a problem, and it cost 3 bucks a collar. My cat goes in an out of the house all the time. I don't think 105 degrees would kill the cat as long as it had enough water. But for the amount of money you are going to spend to trying to kill fleas it would be cheaper to use chemicals. In my opinion breathing in fumes from a kerosene heater isn't going to be any better than chemicals. Not to mention it does smell after a while. I used kerosene heat for 2 winters and there isn't much you can do about that. Between kerosene and propane, propane puts off a lot more water vapor. Instead of trying to turn the whole house into a hot box why not try removing some fleas off of the cat, put them into a heat resistant dish, and then see if they give up the ghost using your parameters.

I personally seen fleas survive 100 degree plus temps so I am skeptical that your plan would work. However if your deadset on turning your place into an oven the only thing I think that would work for that would be a wood stove and lots of very dry wood. I have gotten my very poorly insulated trailer home up to 100 degrees with only a wood stove and pallet wood. The plus side is that wood heat takes out water vapor out of the air. I had a bit of it after running the propane heater for two weeks streight. The only reason why I got it so hot is because the wood stove had a tiny fire box and the fire would go out in 2 hours. So rather than get up all the time I just cooked the heck out of the house before I went to bed and turned on the fan. Another thing would be to use a de-humidifier with propane/kerosene. I am off the grid so that wasn't an option for me but it will solve the vapor problem.

I think hard wired electric heaters would be very dangerous. I have seen a cord cook on one before because it was set that way. Not to mention the wiring in your house most likely wouldn't fare much better especially if it is an older home.

How cold does it need to get to kill the fleas? There is a documentary film called "Hands on a Hard Body" (long story but it is not porn...) where a man tells about how he hooked up a Wal-Mart air conditioner to his home and can cool it to some absurdly low temp, maybe -20 F. My grandfather in northern WI says they have never had flea problems. It routinely gets down to -20 F in the winter. Ask some of the northern folks and see what they say.

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http://www.lindsayfarmonsilvercreek.blogspot.com/

I'd think letting the house get cold would be a better idea. I left my house for a month and it was -20 below for two weeks strieght. It won't solve Paul's flea problems on the cat but it will kill the rest of them through out the house. Depending on where in Washington, there are areas that get pretty cold.

Not gonna use poisons. Especially flea collars.

Fleas do survive 100 degree temps - but do they survive 100 degrees + a freaky low humidity?

The house in question is about 20 years old. Excellent points about the wiring.

You know what is easier and cheaper than buying a flea collar? Turning your heat up before going to work and turning it back to normal when you come home. Total cost might be $1 to $7 depending on lots of things. And works for your whole house and all of your pets (in theory). And it doesn't smell weird or give you the heebie jeebies about poisons.

A lot of that is already covered in my article. Fleas are almost everywhere, but the funny thing is that in a lot of places they are so rare that you just never think about them. Let the dogs and cats outside all year long for years and years and never see a flea. In other places, you let the cat out one time and suddenly you have an infestation.

I have first hand experience that fleas thrive in Seattle, Portland and Eugene, Oregon (mild temps and very humid). I have first hand experience that I have never seen a flea (despite letting cats and dogs run willy-nilly in and out of the house) in Missoula, Montana, Mount Spokane, Washington, or in several places in Colorado (very dry plus very cold in winter).

I vote for lack of decent breeding, and a head injury as a small child. Buy the poor cat some flipping Frontline!!!

How about a snorkel, a bucket full of Dawn dish soap and a fire hose? You wash out the fleas and clean the house at the same time, and the cat gets a swimming lesson.

why heat the whole house to try and kill a flea just throw the cat in the oven and watch the temp. watch and see which one pops first the cat or the fleas lol.

Is the heat in the house now baseboard heat. The thermastates are set to keep fires from happening. My gas heater when set on the lowest setting starts at 40 degrees and on the highest setting turns off at 90 degrees. If you can find a used coal heater and some coal use the fire place to vent the heater into. A piece of sheet metal with a hole for the pipe works good. Just play with the heat untill you get the burn of the coal down pat. When we first started burning coal we had windows open when it was 4 below outside and 80 inside. Good luck with you challange. Sam