Are bed bugs biting you ?

Posted: February 11th, 2012 | Author: blogman33 | Filed under: Blogs talk | No Comments »

Amongst the most feared and misunderstood pests known to the world may be the bedbug (Cimex lectularius). How many of us dropped off to rest at bedtime as young ones with the parting rhyme of our parents inside our ears “sleep tight and don’t let the bed bugs bite”?

Bed Bugs most probably started to dine on people at about the period when we moved into caves, the bat bugs Cimex pilosellus and C pipistrella mostly fed on bats and it’s also a fair chance that bat feeding species of bugs evolved to nourish themselves on man when our ancestors started sleeping in bat infested caves.

Before the arrival of DDT in the early twentieth century bed bugs were common unwelcome guests in most slum quality homes.

The later years of the 20th century saw pest operatives having very few bed bug infestations indeed, their presence being mostly restricted to budget holiday homes and student housing etc.

A lot of people mistake dust mites, which aren’t visible to the unaided eye, with bed bugs which deinitely.
Adult bedbugs are reddish in colour, about a quarter of an inch in size and very swollen after dining on the blood of humans.

Bed bugs regularly prey on human blood every week or so, coming out in the early hours of the morning and locating their target by detecting the exhaled carbon dioxide from human breath and once close to their target, they sense infra red heat.

In the absence of an appropriate human host to dine on they can stay in a period of dormancy for periods of up to a year or more.

Often the first sign of a bedbug problem are spots of blood on bedding and on the corners of mattresses and a lot of people can react badly to bed bug bites.

The first part of the 21st century has seen bed bug numbers expoding everywhere on our world, the easy availability of overseas and economic migration have both been given as reasons for the resurgence.

What is certain is that they are now making a real fightback not just in cheaper quality homes but high class hotels, schools and not to mention hospitals.

One London borough reported a doubling of bed bug bites infestations every year from 1995 to 2001.

One evening stay in an infested bed is all it requires, they catch a ride in your suitcases or bags.

Pest control companies are also now reporting cases of transport related bed bug infestations on all kinds of transport so a simple trip home on an infested tube or train could be sufficient to spread bed bugs to your own home.

They are an difficult pest to deal with as despite popular opinion they do not just live in beds. They hide in any nook and cranny suitably close to a sleeping human, beds, electrical sockets, televisions, bed side telephones etc and dealing with them is both difficult and time consuming. They have even been discovered found living under the toe-nails of infirm people and in the creases of flesh on flabby people.

They are not a pest that can be successfully tackled by a beginner and a pest control professional will definitely be essential.

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