Daily Archives: November 3, 2013

Make sure you really have bed bugs, not fleas or ticks or other insects

You can compare your insect to the pictures on our bed bug Web page or show it to your local extension agent.

Eliminating bed bugs is difficult, but its not impossible. Dont throw out all of your things because most of them can be treated and saved. Throwing stuff out is expensive, may spread the bed bugs and could cause more stress.

Be comprehensive in your approach. Try other things first. Integrated pest management (IPM) techniques may reduce the number of bed bugs and limit your contact with pesticides. If pesticides are needed, always follow label directions or hire a professional. There is help available to learn about treatment options. (4 pp, 480k, About PDF)

A cluttered home provides more places for bed bugs to hide and makes locating and treating them harder. If bed bugs are in your mattress, using special bed bug covers (encasements) on your mattress and box springs makes it harder for bed bugs to get to you while you sleep. Leave the encasements on for a year. Be sure to buy a product that has been tested for bed bugs and is strong enough to last for the full year without tearing.

This reduces the number of bed bugs. Bed bugs and their eggs can hide in laundry containers/hampers, so clean them when you do the laundry.

While freezing can kill bed bugs, temperatures must remain very low for a long time. Home freezers are usually not cold enough to kill bed bugs. Putting things outside in freezing temperatures can kill bed bugs, but it can take several days when the temperature is 0 F and almost a week when the temperature is 20 F.

Raising the indoor temperature with the thermostat or space heaters wont do the job. Special equipment and very high temperatures are necessary for successful heat treatment. Black plastic bags in the sun might work to kill bed bugs in luggage or small items, if the contents become hot enough (about 110F for at least 3 hours).

Bed bugs are good hitchhikers. If you throw out a mattress or furniture that has bed bugs in it, you should slash or in some way destroy it so that no one else takes it and gets bed bugs.

Thorough vacuuming can get rid of some of your bed bugs. Carefully vacuum rugs, floors, upholstered furniture, bed frames, under beds, around bed legs, and all cracks and crevices around the room. Change the bag after each use so the bed bugs cant escape. Place the used bag in a tightly sealed plastic bag and in an outside garbage bin.

See the article here:
Top Ten Bed Bugs Tips | Pesticides | US EPA

Bed Bugs Health Risks

Bed bugs draw blood from their hosts by piercing the skin with a small beak-like apparatus. The saliva of the bed bug may be introduced to the human body during the bed bugs feeding and may cause some redness or swelling, most bed bug bites are harmless. Since bed bugs are not generally known to carry disease, they are not generally considered to be health risks. There have been some reports of allergic reactions occurring after being bitten by bed bugs, and anaphylaxis is always a concern with any type of allergic reaction.

Bed bugs usually attack their hosts at night while the host is asleep. Often times humans awake with very little or no knowledge at all of the bites for hours. Later, as the bed bug bite starts to itch or swell, it may be attributed to fleas or mosquitoes. This makes it very difficult to diagnose an infestation, until the infestation reaches considerable size.

If there is any good news, there are no confirmed cases of disease being spread by bedbugs in the same manner as mosquitoes and ticks (also common blood meal enthusiasts who can spread West Nile, Malaria and Lime Disease).

There are some individuals who are highly allergic to the bite of bed bugs and may experience anaphylaxis which is a highly allergic reaction that can lead to anaphylactic shock (much like a bee sting might in certain individuals).

Treating Bed Bug Bites

Bites and Treatments In the mean time, bed bug bites can cause welts to rise on your skin along with a patch of redness around the bite itself. There may also be scabs from where you were bit, especially if you have been scratching the bites (you might also be scratching in your sleep). If you have small, itchy red bumps, particularly ones that tend to cluster or form lines of several bites, you may have bedbugs.

If you have bites that itch, treat them with a topical antiitch cream like cortisone, and apply antiseptic ointment to any breaks in the skin to prevent infections from your scratching. If you are experiencing any severe reactions, talk to your doctor to see if you might need further treatment. You may need to take antihistamines to relieve mild to moderate allergic reactions until the infestation can be cleared up

Bed bugs can be a very creepy problem, but the bites are easily treated at home in most cases, and while the infestations can be hard to cure, a professional exterminator can help you to identify and treat your bed bug problem and get you back to sleeping tight. Bed bugs arent usually known to spread any blood-borne pathogens. However their bites can be itchy and stressful.

Read the original post:
Bed Bugs Health Risks - Bed Bug.org

Bed bugs are little bloodsucking parasites -- really, it's not a commentary on their personalities. They only eat the blood of humans and other mammals and they feed mostly at night when you're sleeping. Dad wasn't kidding when he turned your light off at bedtime and said, "Sleep tight. Don't let the bed bugs bite."

Bed bugs aren't necessarily just active at night (nocturnal) but that's most likely when you happen to be in bed. If you're sleeping during the day, however, they're just as happy to have breakfast or lunch as they are to have a late dinner.

Bed bugs like when we sleep because we're easy targets. We're like room service for them. We show up for hours at a time and quietly lie flat so they can munch away in the dark.

Often, the only way to know you've been bitten by bed bugs is to see the little red spots on your skin. Unfortunately, the bumps can take as much as two weeks to show up after the bites. Bed bug symptoms are similar to other bug bites:

Some folks can have allergic reactions to bed bugs, but it usually takes multiple bites.

Bed bugs are not picky eaters when it comes to location -- any exposed skin will do -- but they won't necessarily go farther than they have to. Expect to see bites more often on the face, hands and feet, but they can -- and do -- bite anywhere. The only way to know for sure if the symptoms are from bed bugs is to find the bed bug infestation in your room or furniture.

There are some telltale signs of bed bug infestations:

If you walk into a hotel room and it stinks, look for signs of a bed bug infestation. It's not a bad idea to take a look at your mattress and bedding whenever moving into a new hotel room for the night, regardless if it stinks and is dirty or not. Bed bugs can be found in luxury hotels and by-the-hour joints alike.

To see how bed bug bites look, check out the Bed Bug Picture Gallery.

Bed bugs are the epitome of the old saying: An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Bed bug bites aren't dangerous by themselves. Like any bug bite, they run the risk of becoming infected and some people have allergic reactions. However, bed bugs aren't known carriers of any specific disease.

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Bed Bugs - About.com First Aid