I am kinda in the same boat as you are so I hear where you are coming from.  And I have 4
to care for and I do not like putting any more stuff on them then needed..

First off, depending where a person lives, I do not use it during the Michigan winter
months unless I actually see fleas on my babies or I am around a cat that has fleas.  I
would make sure you have a flea comb to use to check them.

I usually start using it around June and use it until it starts turning COLD out.  I
usually use it for about 4 months during the hot summer months.

I do not know how your babies are about baths but I give mine a flea bath at least every
month and usually more often when not using flea meds on them and maybe dust your carpets
regularly with a flea powder.

I recently watched a show on Animal Planet called The 10 Most Amazing Blood Suckers (The
flea was #2 and the tick was #1) that said one of the most effective ways to control fleas
is to keep carpets vacumed regularly because the flea larva hatches there and waits for a
warm blooded host to come along then jumps on!!

Lastly from what I hear, read & from experience do no use the el-cheapos or off brand or
Hartz!!!

Check out my babies at http://members.aol.com/larrystark/

Your lowest cost is to buy the largest dog size and split it.

Advantage ... imidacloprid

9 lbs or LESS 0.4 ml
10 lbs & Up 0.8 ml
One tube of large dog Advantage contains 4 ml. Using this formula you
can treat 10 cats under 9 pounds.

I apply the minimum effective dosage which is about .05 ml per pound
of body weight, so 4 ml will treat 8, 10 pound cats. If your vet
won't sell it to you, buy it online. I use KV Vet a lot.

http://www.lisaviolet.com/cathouse/advantage.html

BarB

I use revolution and it's pretty cheap.  It's only about $12 a month.  I
only use it during the summer months in Ohio so it's not that bad and it's
for all sorts of parasites.  I highly recommend it.

A friend of mine is also in tight circumstances and has two cats.  I
told her about using a syringe (no needle) to meter the proper dose
for cats from the largest dog size Frontline package.  She did some
searching and found it for $26.95 (US, three tubes) at
<http://www.petsuppliesnet.com/list.htm> - this comes out to $1.06 per
cat per month (a bit more for her very large one and a bit less for
the tiny one). $3.99 shipping per order.  The site, and I think, the
store are in Australia - delivery took about a week and a half.  She's
happy with the deal, and I expect that Sebastian and Friday are happy
without the fleas. (Note: yes, the same Sebastian that I had for some
time - she needed a black cat and I needed to rehome him because of
aggression issues with the large number of other cats here.  He's
doing very well as an indoor cat with just the much younger and much
smaller Friday.)

Have you tried "bubble wrap"?