5 Early Signs Of Bed Bugs: How Do I Really Know If I Have Bed Bugs?

Bed bugs are tiny and easy to confuse with other insects.

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Bed bugs arent known to directly spread disease, but that doesnt mean that they arent a public risk. These tiny bugs can reproduce quickly, and theyre notoriously difficult to eliminate entirely once theyve begun their reproduction cycles within a new house. If youre trying to get rid of bed bugs there are many steps involved.

And since they resemble so many other types of pests, it can be difficult to identify that you have bed bugs in your home even if youre waking up with red bumps every morning. Being able to recognize the facts and early signs of bed bugs can help prevent an infestation from growing out of control. Identification can take a number of different forms, and you should recognize all of them so that you can dont mistake a bed bug infestation for an outbreak of lice, mites, or even cockroaches. Here are the five early signs of bed bugs, and a bed bug infestation you should keep an eye out for.

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If youre waking up with pink marks all over your body, thats clearly a sign of something wrong. But it isnt necessarily a sign of bed bugs in your home. These bugs venture out from their homes to seek out blood at night, but it can be difficult to distinguish a bed bug bite from the bites of chiggers, mosquitos, or other insects. The strongest indication that youre dealing with a bed bug infestation rather than an outbreak of another type of insect or an allergic reaction is if the bites youre suffering from appear in a pattern. Bed bug bite patterns most commonly appear in a straight line or a zig-zag, but they can also appear together in a cluster. Bites from mosquitos and other bugs typically have no such sense of reason.

But just because you arent experiencing bug bites doesnt mean that you dont have bed bugs. Some people as many as 30% of the total population dont respond to the bites of the bed bug at all, and other people might exhibit swelling but not even notice it because they dont experience pain from the bite. In many cases, the appearance of welts doesnt happen until well after the bite was inflicted. And since most bed bugs wont eat every day, bites dont even exhibit a noticeable pattern until the infestation is already rather large. Knowing the facts about what separates a bed bug bite from another source of irritation can assist with identification, but you should also treat it as a reason to identify the problem and a solution as quickly as possible.

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If youve begun to experience itching after bringing furniture into your home and especially if you experience that itching after napping on that furniture it could be a sign that bed bugs stowed away on the trip. Practically any wood or upholstered piece of furniture can be a reasonable hiding spot for bed bugs, and theyre small enough that they can exist in practically any crack or crevice that can fit the edge of a credit card. Calculate in the facts that theyre willing to travel up to 50 feet to travel and can breed prodigiously, and an isolated infestation can quickly spread through an entire house. But the sooner you can identify the furniture that brought the infestation, the more effectively you can isolate and treat it. Start your inspection of the new furniture and work outward in search of signs of bed bugs.

Bug infestations are often associated with filth, but bed bugs subsist solely on blood for their survival and can manage to thrive in houses no matter how clean they otherwise are. The mobile nature of bed bugs allows them to spread between apartments in a complex, rooms in a hotel, and even houses in a neighborhood. They can also hitch a ride on clothing or purses to find their way into your home. If youve heard about neighbors dealing with a bed bug infestation, you may want to exercise some extra diligence in caution just in case you find yourself dealing with some stowaways.

Mattresses are often the hardest hit point of a bed bug infestation. It is usually the safest and fastest solution to simply replace the mattress entirely. While traditional coil spring mattresses make it easy for bed bugs to hide, an all-foam mattress with a gel topper and encasement sheet is a good alternative and can prevent future infestations. Our recommendations are below.

Best Mattress Encasement

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Your sense of smell can also help recognize some of the early signs of bed bugs. Like most other insects, bed bugs instinctively give off something called an alarm pheromone when theyre startled. That pheromone gives off a distinct odor in instances where a bed bug is exposed to light or otherwise finds its normal habitat disturbed. This smell has been described in a number of different ways, and its often considered to be generally pleasant at low concentrations. These alarm pheromones are frequently compared to either coriander or berries.

This smell might be apparent when you accidentally crush or disturb a bug, but they also use these pheromones to communicate with one another. If the smell becomes musty, unpleasant, or overpowering, its a sign that the population of bed bugs in your home may be starting to get out of control. Sometimes compared to rotting wood or mildew, its the result of multiple bugs using their pheromones to communicate with one another. The unpleasant odor of this smell can be further exacerbated by the presence of fecal matter from bed bugs.

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Waking up with blood on the mattress is alarming no matter what the cause, but it could give the facts you need to diagnose a bed bug infestation before it becomes too serious. Since they survive by gorging themselves on the blood of sleeping humans, theyre prone to bursting into a splash of blood when theyre crushed. And while they minimize feeding duration to roughly five to ten seconds at a time, crushing is a serious risk. A small bloom of red or pink dots on your sheets is a likely sign that bed bugs are living on your mattress. You should check your pillowcases and pajamas for blood spots as well.

Even if you arent rolling over bed bugs in your sleep, there may still be stains on your mattress from the presence of these pests. Rusty or dark-colored stains are common on mattresses and other pieces of furniture where bed bugs tend to congregate. These are the result of fecal matter, as these bugs commonly void themselves while theyre gorging on human blood. If you cant find any of these stains on your clothes, sheets, or mattress, you may want to turn your eyes to the walls. They can appear in large numbers either on the paint of your wall or even underneath the wallpaper.

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The nymphs are only about the size of the head of a pin when theyre firstborn, but they definitely leave traces of their presence behind. The bed bug will grow five times over the course of its life and each begins with them gorging on a heavy meal of human blood and ends with them leaving behind its current exoskeleton in exchange for a larger one. When you consider that a nymph can reach maturity in seven months and that a mother bed bug can lay up to 250 eggs in a lifetime, thats a lot of skeletons floating around in an infested home. Fortunately, identification is easy for these shells. These white or yellowed husks can be found where bed bugs tend to live primarily on wood or fabric surfaces like furniture.

The cracks and crevices where bed bugs hide are also the best places to go looking for bed bug eggs. Though theyll appear from a distance to simply look like tiny white dots, a closer inspection will reveal them to be insect eggs. By thoroughly combing through dimples and creases in the nearby furniture, you can often get a better sense of an infestations scale. Look beneath cushions and in as many cracks and niches as possible. Bed bugs can squeeze between spaces as narrow as a credit card, so a change of perspective is important when hunting for eggs.

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5 Early Signs Of Bed Bugs: How Do I Really Know If I Have Bed Bugs?