Say Goodbye to Bed Bugs: How to Spot and Eradicate Them from Your Home

Bed bugs are tiny, oval, brownish insects that eat animal or human blood. Adult bed bugs with flat bodies are about the size of an apple seed. However, after feeding, their bodies swell and turn a reddish color.

Although bedbugs cannot fly, they can move quickly across floor levels, walls, and ceilings. Throughout a lifetime, female bed bugs can lay hundreds of eggs, each about the size of a speck of dust.

Immature bed bugs, known as larvae, shed their skins five times before achieving maturity, and each shedding requires a blood meal. Under ideal conditions, the bugs can mature entirely in a month and produce three or more generations per year.

They are not thought to transmit diseases, although they are a nuisance.

Where to Look for Bed Bugs

Bed bugs can infiltrate your home undetected via suitcases, clothing, used bedrooms and couches, and other objects. Their flattened bodies allow them to fit into small spaces about the width of a line of credit. Unlike ants and bees, bed bugs do not have nests and prefer to live in groups in hideouts. Their initial hiding places are usually bed sheets, bed frames, mattresses, and headboards, where they can easily bite people in the middle of the night.

They may disperse throughout the bedroom over time, moving into any small hole or protected location. They could also spread to neighboring rooms or apartments.

Because bed bugs feed primarily on blood, having them in your houses is not an indication of filth. They are equally likely to be found in clean residences and hotel rooms as in filthy ones.

If Bedbugs Bite

Bedbugs are most active at night and bite people while they sleep. They feed by piercing the flesh and sucking blood through their long beaks. The bugs gorge themselves for three to ten minutes before crawling away unnoticed.

Most bedbug bites are initially painless but later develop into itchy welts. Bedbug bites are on any exposed skin while sleeping, as opposed to flea bites, mainly around the ankles. Furthermore, unlike flea bites, the edges do not have a red spot in the center.

People unaware of a bedbug infestation may attribute skin irritation and red marks to other causes, such as mosquitoes. To verify bed bug bites, you must first locate and recognize the bugs.

Infestation Symptoms

If you wake up with itchy areas where you did not have them when you went to bed, you may have bed bugs, especially if you purchased a used bed or other used furniture around the time the bites began. Other indications of bed bugs include:

• Stains from blood on your covers or bedsheets
• Bed bug excrement that is dark or rusty on sheets and beds, bedclothes, and ceiling panels
• Look for fecal spots, shells, or shed skins in areas where bed bugs hide.
• The scent glands of the bugs emit an offensive, musty odor.

If you seriously doubt a pest problem, remove all bedsheets and thoroughly inspect them for evidence of bugs or their excrement. Investigate the seams in the wood framing by removing the dust cover from the bottom of the box springs. Remove the staples that hold the fabric to the wood frame.

Examine the area around the bed, including inside books, telephone lines or radios, the carpet’s edge, and even power outlets. Bedbugs can attach to clothing, so check your closet. If you need clarification on bedbug signs, contact an expert who will know what to look for.

If you notice signs of an infestation, take action to eliminate the bugs and keep them from returning.

Bed Bug Treatments

Cleaning up the areas where bed bugs live is one step in eradicating them. It should include the following items:

• Wash bedding, linens, window treatments, and garments in hot water and tumble dry on the highest setting. Stuffed animals, footwear, and other things that cannot wash should be placed in the dryer and dried on high for thirty min.
• Before vacuuming, brush mattress seams with a stiff scrub brush to eliminate bedbugs and their eggs.
• Cover your mattress and box springs with a tightly woven, zippered cover to prevent bedbugs from entering or escaping. Bed bugs can last up to a decade without feeding, so keep the lid on your mattress for at least a year to ensure that all bugs are dead.
• Repair plaster holes and glue down, tearing wallpaper to eliminate hiding places for bed bugs.
• Remove any clutter from around the bed.

If your mattress is infested, you may want to dispose of it and replace it, but make sure to get rid of bedbugs throughout your home, or they will infest your new mattress.

Extermination of Bed Bugs

While cleaning up infested areas can help control bed bugs, getting rid of them requires chemical treatment. Because applying insecticides to your bed and bedroom can be hazardous, it is critical to use products that can operate safely in bedrooms. Only treat mattresses or bedding if the label specifically states that you can. Hiring the best bed bug pest control treatment for bed bug extermination is the safest and most effective option.