8 FARMERS’ BULLETIN 683. 
quickly. Older fowls are more resistant, but have been known to 
succumb to very heavy infestations; and certainly the fleas materi- 
ally reduce egg production, retard the growth of fowls, and diminish 
their size. 
The eggs are deposited by the adult flea while it is attached to 
the host. They fall to the ground under the roost in chicken 
houses or under sheds frequented by the poultry and there continue 
to develop. When dogs and cats are infested the immature stages 
develop largely in the material used by them for beds. 
A few other species of fleas are occasionally found in poultry 
houses. Some of these may be normally bird-infesting species, while 
others are at home in the houses of domestic poultry. Infestations 
by these fleas have been reported from several places in the Northern 
States, particularly in the Northwest. The presence of the fleas is 
usually first detected by the adults getting on the bodies of persons 
entering chicken houses. These fleas do not remain attached to the 
host continuously as does the sticktight flea. They are seldom of 
any great importance and may be controlled by the same methods 
outlined on pages 13 and 14. 
DOG AND CAT FLEAS. 
Dogs and cats are infested by two very closely related species of 
fleas. and these appear to feed more or less interchangeably on the 
two hosts, as well as occasionally on man and other animals. While 
they cause these hosts much annoyance and, as has been pointed out, 
are also responsible for the infestation of dogs by tapeworms, seri- 
ous injury seems to be rare. However, in the case of valuable dogs 
and cats it is often desirable to rid them of fleas, and in all cases 
where these animals are closely associated with man the control of 
the fleas upon them is of importance. As will be seen by comparing 
figure 1 with figure 6, the dog flea is quite different from the stick- 
tight flea in structure as well as in size. The adults do not remain 
attached to the host in one place, but the life history is not vastly 
different from that of the sticktight flea. Breeding takes place in 
similar materials in situations occupied by the host animals. Mr. 
Theodore Pergande, working with the dog flea at Washington, D. C., 
found the life cycle from egg to adult to be completed within 17 to 37 
days. It is thus seen that a great number of fleas might be bred in 
and beneath an unoccupied house in a comparatively short period. 
Both of these species have a very wide distribution, being found in 
practically all parts of the world where dogs and eats are found. 
1 The cat flea is known scientifically as Ctenocephalus felis Bouché, and the dog flea as 
Ctenocephalus canis Curtis. The human flea also is not uncommonly found on dogs 
and cats. 
