# Don't use Bob Martin flea treatment!



## AGAGE (8 July 2010)

Louis was infested with fleas, so we gave him a flea bath and 'spot on' both Bob Martin treatments. Louis is now in overnight at the vets as he had a nasty reaction to the poison that bob martin products use. 

It was touch and go as to whether he would remain stable! His heart beat became irregular as did his breathing and his blood pressure was down. He is now on a drip, and being treated for poisoning. I thought we might loose him, as a vet that I knew a while back had to have her own dog pts due to a bad reaction(same as Louis) to the flea treatment.

Having googled Bob Martin there were lots of people saying their pets had become very ill and many cats had died due to these products. There was no mention of these side effects on the packets as I always religiously check. The vet thinks that we od on the flea treatments but there was nothing to say anywhere that you could not use both the flea bath and spot on together in fact their website encourages that you use all their treatments together. The infestation was really bad and appeared in the space of a couple of days, the vet thinks Louis may have walked through a flea nest-never knew such a thing existed! Hence why we gave bath and spot on, but the funny thing is that most of the spot on went on my leg and not him and i'm fine.

Be warned that Bob Martin products have caused a lot of reactions in dogs and cats.


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## CorvusCorax (8 July 2010)

True that!

Most of the flea treatments from supermarkets/pet shops is tosh, for dogs and cats.

Glad he's OK.


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## AGAGE (8 July 2010)

By the way I don't work for frontline or any other pet pesticide companies! I'm a psychology research assistant. I have no interest in such companies just wanted to make people aware that such dramatic side effects exist despite there being no reference to them. I will be contacting trading standards re this.


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## CorvusCorax (8 July 2010)

And I don't use any flea treatment at all 
They're not a huge problem around here, we itch, they die off eventually, we get over it. No chemicals involved.
We do have Frontline and Stronghold in the Magic Bag Of Stuff, for emergencies.


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## soloabe (8 July 2010)

Same here I don't use it. I feed garlic to mine and even though we get huge flea problems here in the summer mine never get any.


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## Puppy (8 July 2010)

Yes, Popple had a nasty reaction to one of their products as a pup. It scared the hell out of me.


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## Kellys Heroes (8 July 2010)

Don't use Bob Martin anything  (just my opinion)

our GSD has severe allergies including fleas...so one flea bite could mean huge vets bills and trauma for our girl so we only ever use Stronghold and regularly 
seems to keep the little blighters away.


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## AGAGE (8 July 2010)

We've brought a nit comb and plan to use only that from now on! We used it on him last night after the flea treatment and got loads. 

We plan to use the comb every day, at least it will make his coat tangle free as well as flea free. He does seem to be particularly prone to fleas. My mums dog who he spends at least 8 hours a day with never has any fleas. His coat is too long though, he is booked in for a hair cut next week, hopefully he will be fit enough for that.

Poor boy,  vets and hair cut in the space of a week or so.


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## 1966barby (8 July 2010)

Ive just had to take my 10 month old lab to vet after having seizures and tremers today,luckily seems fine now ,vet could find nothing wrong,the only thing is he was treated with advocate and afew days later with frontline spray both on prescription from vet,I cant help wondering if either could have caused a bad side effect,any views please.


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## Rache (8 July 2010)

I was told by the bob martine rep that ture a reaction can occur but it is heighten by dogs that have been recentlcy washed due to the poures being open and the natural oils washed out, in cats it just seems to be a case of the dog one being put into the cat bottle,


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## Emma27 (8 July 2010)

All Bob Martin products are completley useless. End of.


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## EAST KENT (9 July 2010)

We`ve just had a flea thing ,I imagine a mummy hedgehog had her litter underneath one of my wooden kennels,one of the minis was trying to rip her way underneath it,and a puppy put on that run  suddenly got fleas.Anyway,we jacked the kennel up,cleared out the leaves,,full of fleas by the way..and sprayed everywhere with R.I.P,,dogs done with Advocate.Problem dealt with.

 Nothing looks more repulsive than a flea trundling along beneath a thin white bull terrier coat..yuck!

 Don`t know about Bob Martins,but we are so lucky to have effective flea treatments these days.


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## loveourdog (11 January 2017)

I so wished I had read your experience before I used the Flea Shampoo on our dog ;(

We have an experience that I so wished I did not have to share - we used Bob Martin Flea Wash on our Dog and she is not well....

Here is our experience with using Bob Martin Flea wash on our Kelpie Cross - NEVER EVER would I want anyone to go through what our gorgeous dog went through. Hubby bought the Bob Martin Flea wash on Friday. I washed our dog on Saturday morning with the wash. By Saturday night she was throwing up, by Sunday morning she was throwing up blood....on Sunday afternoon we had her at the Vets and they took blood to test what was going on. At first they thought it could have been Rat Poison but we don't have any of that here....and her blood test didn't show any rat poison in her system. We were given antibiotics and anti-nauseous medication, and told to watch her closely. She wasn't allowed to eat for 24 hours to see if the bleeding would stop - she also had blood in her stools.
On Monday I started to think about all that we had done differently and what could have caused the throwing up of blood and bleeding out of her back side - and would you believe I started to do research on the Flea wash, and the reviews were what got me to ring the vet and start to ask questions....yes the vet strongly advised me to wash our dog asap to see if we could help to get any of the Bob Martin Flea wash off her - yes it appears that she was having a poisonous reaction to the flea wash....please do not ever use the Flea wash on any animal. We are now playing a waiting game to see if she can keep down plain Rice and Chicken, to monitor her breathing and to watch for any more signs of bleeding. She is able to keep down water and is slowly recovering. Would never ever want this to happen to any dog - how can this product be sold on a supermarket shelve?


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## Moobli (11 January 2017)

Nope, would never (and have never) used any Bob Martin products.  

I don't routinely de-flea my dogs either and I can't remember the last time they had fleas.


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## Mister Ted (15 January 2017)

My cat had a bad reaction to a flea treatment at the vet .He squirted it on her neck before I had a chance to refuse.She didnt even have fleas! It seems such a common thing for vets to do,they start running a comb through the fur as soon as  they can. When I took my cat home he started yowling and foaming at the mouth  and looked so scared. He was not right until a couple of hours later.These chemicals are organo phosphates and its certainly not something I will let a vet put near my cat or dog again.My terrier has only had a couple of fleas in the past year and I use the electronic flea zapper and make sure carpets are well vacumed during the flea season and sprinkle ceaderwood oil along the skirting boards.


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## ycbm (15 January 2017)

Emma27 said:



			All Bob Martin products are completley useless. End of.
		
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I've just used their praziquantal spot on tape wormer on two cats with no issues issues at all. Definitely worked, cats are fine. Bought it from the supermarket. They wouldn't stock it if it routinely poisoned their customer's pets.

Is it not just that there are millions of cats and dogs and some are bound to get reactions, just like some horses get reactions to wormers and flu jabs?


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## loveourdog (16 January 2017)

HAVE THE BEST NEWS EVER. Spoke with IGA via facebook and private messages over the last couple of days. Today they called us on the phone. After reviewing our detailed information about Bob Martin Flea Wash Shampoo, and reading all the reviews online they have taken down Bob Martin Flea Wash products, including 8 other flea wash shampoo that Bob Martin own. They agreed they are taking Beauty's story seriously and want answers from Bob Martin Company regards how dangerous the product is to animals. This is wonderful because I never ever want any other dog to experience what Beauty went through, and now IGA stores State Wide are not going to stock Bob Martin Flea Wash Shampoos.


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## twiggy2 (16 January 2017)

soloabe said:



			Same here I don't use it. I feed garlic to mine and even though we get huge flea problems here in the summer mine never get any.
		
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Garlic is poisonous to dogs (all bulbs are poisonous for them) it can lower the immune system and cause anaemia


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## twiggy2 (16 January 2017)

1966barby said:



			Ive just had to take my 10 month old lab to vet after having seizures and tremers today,luckily seems fine now ,vet could find nothing wrong,the only thing is he was treated with advocate and afew days later with frontline spray both on prescription from vet,I cant help wondering if either could have caused a bad side effect,any views please.
		
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You should leave a minimum of 2 weeks between treatments to avoid over dosing or drug to drug reactions. I hope your your vets has explained having a break between treatments.
I hope everyone's dogs have recovered with lasting ill effects.


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## Clodagh (16 January 2017)

twiggy2 said:



			Garlic is poisonous to dogs (all bulbs are poisonous for them) it can lower the immune system and cause anaemia
		
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When we lived in Australia my dogs lived on kangaroo meat cooked in loads of garlic, I know the poisonous story now (didn't then) but we rarely had ticks and fleas and they were perfectly well.


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## Clodagh (16 January 2017)

loveourdog said:



			HAVE THE BEST NEWS EVER. Spoke with IGA via facebook and private messages over the last couple of days. Today they called us on the phone. After reviewing our detailed information about Bob Martin Flea Wash Shampoo, and reading all the reviews online they have taken down Bob Martin Flea Wash products, including 8 other flea wash shampoo that Bob Martin own. They agreed they are taking Beauty's story seriously and want answers from Bob Martin Company regards how dangerous the product is to animals. This is wonderful because I never ever want any other dog to experience what Beauty went through, and now IGA stores State Wide are not going to stock Bob Martin Flea Wash Shampoos.
		
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Well done. Is she OK now, poor girl?


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## cremedemonthe (16 January 2017)

CorvusCorax said:



			And I don't use any flea treatment at all 
They're not a huge problem around here, we itch, they die off eventually, we get over it. No chemicals involved.
We do have Frontline and Stronghold in the Magic Bag Of Stuff, for emergencies.
		
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Nor do we have a problem, since being on raw food diet as well as a few of my own additives (all natural) we've had no fleas what so ever for years.
People who do have them, steam cleaning your carpets and upholstery (especially UNDER furniture as well as your car seats) will kill the larvae, they breed and grow in the carpets,bedding, car seats etc. If you break the cycle like that as well as a good flea control if you have fleas they can be eradicated quite quickly.
I see people just putting drops on their animals without dealing with the fabrics and furnishings they breed in and these need addressing too.
Bob Martin products are well known on the dog world to be a) useless and b) toxic


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## loveourdog (16 January 2017)

waiting game, yesterday she was really bad again. Today she had a bit more energy. We just are taking each day as it comes. Thanking you for asking


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## Pinkvboots (16 January 2017)

I use advocate but not as often as they say to use it, my dog probably gets 3 to 4 treatments a year and I have never seen fleas on her she gets bathed every 3 months with just a basic dog shampoo, a friend of mine who lives down the road from me has 4 dogs and she is always having issues with fleas but guess what she uses bob Martin products. I have seen the flea treatment for sale in the pound shop I mean how good can it be if they are able to sell it for £1.


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## twiggy2 (16 January 2017)

It's one of those things that is not a problem till its a problem and then it is very difficult to do anything about it. It also thins the blood and reduces clotting so can cause excessive bleeding or internal bleeding. My dad used to feed it to his dogs and they never had fleas or worms but they never lived very long to really test the theory cos at the time Parvo was rife and he would not pay for vaccines, consequently every time I saw him he had a new puppy but that's another story.


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## Goldenstar (16 January 2017)

One of my cats had a week in the vets some of that getting intensive support to keep her alive after a spot on treatment ( got from the vets ).
I am expecting the bill to be around a thousand pounds .


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## Mister Ted (16 January 2017)

1966barby said:



			Ive just had to take my 10 month old lab to vet after having seizures and tremers today,luckily seems fine now ,vet could find nothing wrong,the only thing is he was treated with advocate and afew days later with frontline spray both on prescription from vet,I cant help wondering if either could have caused a bad side effect,any views please.
		
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I have read out of expiry date treatments for fleas products with organophosphates can cause those symptoms if the vet uses them.


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## MiJodsR2BlinkinTite (16 January 2017)

I used BM flea collars on my two a good few years ago, little dog went ballistic just ten minutes after putting the thing on, so I took it off.

Have read since about the BM flea drops, am so glad I didn't use those.

Hope OP's doggy will be OK


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## EventingMum (16 January 2017)

I recently lost a cat due to what the vet said was a stroke/vestibular disease. When I mentioned he had just had a spot on treatment to cover fleas, ticks and worms, incidently from the same vet, he said that could have caused a toxic reaction. The cat's sibling had the same treatment and was absolutely fine so there does seem to be an element of luck with it.


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## sav123 (17 January 2017)

Some years ago I used a Bob Martin flea product on my dog after seeing a couple on him. Fast forward a couple of days and I have never seen so many fleas on one animal. It acted more like a flea magnet!


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## MagicMelon (24 January 2017)

I have always assumed any flea or worm type treatment isnt going to be very pleasant stuff, after all its purpose it to kill something off so it is basically poison. Touch wood Ive always been lucky that my cats and dog have never had fleas, and I only worm when I have to (I worm count).


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## rara007 (24 January 2017)

Out of interest how much is that and does it include Baermanns MM? Do you still cover for tapes?


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