When you suspect that you may have a bed bug infestation, your best move would be to find it quickly. This is to ensure that you can get rid of bed bugs before the problem spreads. As you may already suspect, it is far more comfortable and costlier to treat a minor infestation than when the outbreak spreads and becomes established.
Ironically, it is a lot more tasking to discover hideouts that are still budding correctly, and this is as a result of the sizes of bed bugs. Insects like carpet beetle are often mistaken as bed bugs. Unfortunately, misidentifying the hideouts of bed bugs gives the bed bug ample time to disperse around the house or even hitchhike to the home of others in a bid to establishing a new outbreak.
Visible skin bites could be a poor way to indicate the outbreak of bed bugs. Bites from bed bugs are often similar to the stings of insects such as; chiggers or mosquitoes, rashes like fungal infections, eczema, or it could even be hives. However, not everyone will react to a bed bug bite.
Bed Bugs Indicators
The best means of locating the abode of bed bugs is to search for their physical signs. When changing bedding, or being in a place that is not home, or cleaning, search for the following:
• Reddish or rusty stains on mattresses or bedsheets caused by crushed bed bugs.
• The excrement of bed bugs with marker-like bleeding on the fabric creating dark spots.
• Tiny bits of pale yellow eggshells, egg, and skins are usually cast off by nymphs, and this happens when they get bigger.
• Living bed bugs
Hidden Places to Discover Bed Bugs
Bed bugs tend to hide in different places except when they are feeding. When hiding close to the bed, they usually stick close to the piping, tags, mattress, and seams of box spring, and also in cracks found on the headboard and bed frame.
For a room that is densely infested, bed bugs may be found in the following places:
• Drawer Joints
• Seams of couches and chairs, curtain folds and between cushions.
• Underneath wall hangings and loose wallpapers
• Meeting point (junction) of the ceiling and wall.
• Electrical appliances and receptacles.
Because a bed bug is a pretty small insect with almost same width with a credit card; this small nature allows them to squeeze into small places to hide comfortably. If cracking is extensive enough to house one credit card, the chances are that it could also accommodate a bedbug.
Bed Bug Practices
A proper understanding of the habits that bed bugs keep helps in aiding the discovery of their different infestation points. It is therefore essential to take note of how they feed, their life cycle; mating and development, along with their living conditions as this will help in monitoring your home is cleaned of their infestation.
Eating Habits
• They predominantly feed off humans. However, they may feed on birds and other mammals as well.
• To go for a feed, they can travel as far as 20 feet.
• Despite their nocturnal lifestyle, the want for food makes them seek hosts during the day.
• Feeding may take about 3 to 12 minutes.
Mating and Development
Generally, the life cycle of bed bugs come in six stages. And for development to take place in every phase, feeding on a blood meal is required.
Bedbugs need to forage for mating and the production of eggs to continue, and this must be done at least once in 14 days.
Individual females can lay from as much as three eggs each day and about 200 to 500 in her lifetime – which is usually within the duration of six to twelve months and it can be longer in some cases.
The bed bug life cycle for eggs usually lasts for four or five weeks.
Life Cycle
The lives of bed bugs are so conditioned that they can continue living and keep being active in shallow temperatures. They are, however, not able to withstand very high temperatures of 45 degrees and above.
Heat can be used as a means to get rid of bugs irrespective of their hiding, but for it to be effective, the room temperature should be or exceed 45 degrees.
Common bed bugs can be found just about anywhere their host is located.
Tropical bed bugs (Cimex hemipeterus) are found in subtropical and tropical areas, and they usually require a much higher average temperature than the common bed bug.