Just What Are Bed Bugs?

If you wake up one day with itchy lumps on your body, you will probably think that you had been bitten by mosquitoes or ants the night beforehand, but there is also a possibility that bedbugs have got at you. If this happens in your own bed, then you have problems. If you are in a hotel, go and complain to the manager.

You can be sure that most hotel managers will take complaints about bed bugs very gravely, because it is well known that the numbers of bedbugs are rising rapidly and have been since 1995. It is also common knowledge that large compensation awards have been made against hotels. Some of them were at hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Most so-called ‘bed bugs’ will only feed on humans if their favourite host, often chickens, are not available, but there is one that only feeds on human blood and that species is called Cimex lectularius.

Cimex lectularius was virtually extinct in the developed world by the late 1950′s because of the extensive use of DDT in residences and hotels to eradicate all insects such as ants, bed bugs, silverfish, millipedes and cockroaches.

However, there has been a massive revival in the number of bedbugs since 1995. In fact, between 1995 and 2001, one report on bedbugs in London reported that incidents of bedbug call-outs had doubled each year.

The resurgence in bedbug numbers has been ascribed to global travel and immigration from Asia and Africa. However, it is also likely that they were never completely eradicated and that they have become tolerant to modern pesticides. There is not much you can put down or spray around now that will kill bedbugs.

So, what do bedbugs look like? Well, there are lots of different types of bed bugs, but most of them are brownish, unless they have just fed and then there is a red tint to them. However, they can also be white to yellowish. Occasionally, they look banded because bedbugs are covered with short hairs which reflect light like a striped lawn.

Bedbugs have a beak-like mouth-piece with two tubes. One tube squirts saliva into you and the other sucks blood out. The spittle contains anti-coagulant and a pain-killer, so that you do not know that you have been bitten until long after the bedbug has gone home.

Some people never know, because they are not allergic to the saliva, others get a bump or slight swelling almost immediately, but sometimes the swelling can take a week to come out. These bites may or may not be itchy.

If you travel a lot, or if you go to regions of the world that are less concerned with hygiene, you must be careful about not taking bedbugs home with you. They will not remain on your body, but they may lay eggs in your clothing or hide in your suitcase. Therefore, either before you go home or without delay on arrival have your clothes washed at a temperature above 46c and blast your suitcase with a jet of steam or hot air.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article, writes on many subjects, but is at present concerned with bed bugs extermination. If you are interested in this, please go over to our website now at Picture Of Bed Bugs for further information.

Looking At Bedbugs

There are actually quite a few varieties of bed bug, but the one that most people are referring to by ‘bedbugs’ is Cimex lectularius. Other species of bedbugs will extract human blood, but normally only if their favoured host, like poultry, is not around.

Bedbugs are small, but not too small to see. Adults are about four or five millimetres in length and one-and-a-half to three millimetres in width. They are brownish in colour, but may appear banded because they are covered in short hairs.

Having said that, they are still not easy to have a close look at, because they are very quick and only come out at night. In fact, their preferred dinner time is more of an early breakfast, because they normally dine on us an hour before dawn. If you want to find or catch some bedbugs, this is the best time too do it, because you may see them trying to get home with full stomachs to sleep it off for a few days before setting out again.

So, rather than waste your time, it is probably better to look at a number of pictures of bedbugs first so that you know what you are looking for.. Bedbugs are attracted by heat and CO2, so one method of trying to catch a few is putting a bar of soap in a centimetre of water and then lying on the bed. After half an hour, get the soap and whip the bed clothes back. You can dab up any bed bugs with the soap.

Then you will have plenty of time to study them under a magnifying glass. If they are not residing in your mattress and you are sure that you have bed bugs, check behind any loose-fitting woodwork.

They love to get into dark crevices to sleep it off and skirting boards or architrave are ideal. So is damaged plaster, broken lino or ripped wall paper.

Hardly any crack is too thin for them, because they are so flat themselves, as you can observe from photos. They look as if they have been flattened. However, the nymphs or babies are very small, a bit rounder and frequently whitish. It takes six moultings for a nymph to become an adult and the moulted skins look just like the insect that left it, but with nothing inside it – as if it had been sort of sucked out.

The bedbug’s skin is actually the key to killing it, as bedbugs have become tolerant to most everyday insecticides. Their skin, or exoskeleton, has a waxy layer on it to prevent dehydration. If you can scrape off that wax, the insect will dry out and die.

Some modern bedbug sprays include finely powdered glass or silicone which sticks to the insect and as it wriggles into crevices, the powder rubs the wax off. Diatomaceous earth was used for the same reason long ago and it is making a comeback in the fight to exterminate bed bugs. It is non-toxic and environmentally friendly, so safe to use in your home and around your pets.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article, writes on many subjects, but is currently involved with bed bugs extermination. If you are interested in this, please go over to our website now at Picture Of Bed Bugs for more information.

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