Has anyone else heard of the controversy around "spot on" flea/tick preps?

[MoonandBean]

Some of my dogster friends are using garlic capsules as a natural remedy. Although, some other dogster friends say garlic can be linked to IMHA...proving that it certainly isn't easy to protect our animals in a way that everyone agrees is safe. Here is the link for the garlic: www.springtimeinc.com

We have a huge tick problem and even with the frontline plus, I pull one or two out of her fur everytime she comes in from the woods (Frontline doesn't repel them; just kills them within 48 hours of attachment). If they are already embedded, sometimes they're still alive and sometimes they're dead. She got her lyme vaccine last year but I still want to protect her from the ticks and fleas. I still don't know what I'm going to do with Sunny (my dog). Bean (my cat) goes outside and has never shown any untoward effects from the frontline so I will continue to use it on him.

[pomtzu]

Years ago, before the popularity of the spot on treatments, I would put garlic powder in the food for my Lhasas. It worked "fairly" well,, but I think that as time went on, it lost some of it's effectiveness, and of course it never did the job that the spot on treatments do. The dogs never had any ill effects from it tho.