How to get rid of bed bugs
The content of the article:
- What are bed bugs and how dangerous they are
- How to find bed bugs in an apartment
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How to get rid of bed bugs at home
- Physical methods of pest control
- Insecticide treatment
- Professional pest control
- How to get rid of bed bugs in an apartment using folk methods
- How to prevent bed bugs in your apartment
Getting rid of bed bugs can be tricky. Let's figure out together how to deal with these harmful insects.
In urban apartment buildings, you can often find bed bugs - household insects that feed on the blood of warm-blooded animals, primarily humans.
What are bed bugs and how dangerous they are
Bed bugs have a flattened body, the length of which varies depending on the saturation of the insect with blood - from 3 to 8.5 mm. The average life span is 12-14 months. The color varies from yellowish to dark brown. Males are smaller than females, bloodsucking is typical for both adult bed bugs and larvae. The proboscis on the front of the bed bug's head is adapted for piercing tissue and sucking the host's blood. Wings are absent, however, insects are able to move through the air for a fairly considerable distance due to their low weight and structural features of the body. After the bed bug has drunk blood, it becomes less mobile, its body becomes more rounded. Photo of bed bugs makes it possible to examine them in detail and get an idea of how they look.
Despite missing wings, bed bugs can travel long distances
Bed bugs are predominantly nocturnal; during the daytime they tend to hide in the folds of the bed, under the wallpaper, in furniture, wall crevices, books, bird cages and other secluded places. Usually bedbugs attack humans and warm-blooded animals (most often pets, rats, mice, birds) in the early morning and drink blood in open areas of the body. In some cases, insects attack during the day.
Bed bugs feed regularly every 5-10 days. In the absence of food, they fall into a state resembling suspended animation. Moreover, their viability lasts for a year, and sometimes even more, including at a sufficiently low ambient temperature. At a temperature of 50 ° C and above, parasites and their eggs die instantly. Bedbugs are able to migrate through ventilation ducts, and in the summertime along the outer walls of houses.
Bed bug bites impair nighttime sleep, thereby impairing performance, cause itchy skin rashes, which, when scratched, are at high risk of infection, can provoke local and general allergic reactions, and some other symptoms depending on individual health conditions (for example, seizures tachycardia in people suffering from cardiovascular diseases), and in addition, act as a traumatic factor.
The possibility of transmission by bed bugs of the causative agents of tularemia, typhoid fever, brucellosis, tuberculosis and some other diseases is not excluded, but reliable evidence of this has not yet been obtained.
During an attack, the bed bug rarely remains in one part of the body, preferring to move along the host's skin. As it moves, it leaves behind itself a peculiar path of successive bites. The distance between individual bites can be up to several centimeters. For one bloodsucking (lasts 10-15 minutes), the bed bug drinks about 7 μl of the victim's blood, which is twice its weight. If an apartment is infected with bed bugs, it is possible to get 500 or more bites in one night.
Bed bugs lay eggs in bed, clothing, household appliances, animal dander, books, paintings, and other household items, which contributes to their rapid spread. The complete development cycle of a bug from an egg to an adult is 30-40 days, in unfavorable external conditions it can reach 80-100 days.
How to find bed bugs in an apartment
70% of people do not notice bug bites, at least until they have multiplied to a large extent. In addition to skin manifestations, the presence of bed bugs in the apartment may be indicated by brown marks on the bed linen, which remain when an insect is crushed by a random movement in a dream. In addition, with a large number of bed bugs in the room, a specific smell arises.
Since bed bugs are active mainly at night, the presence of their colonies in an apartment may remain unknown for a long time. In most cases, the first sign that testifies in favor of the resettlement of bed bugs in the room is the regularly appearing bite marks on the skin of a person, usually found in the morning. At the time of the bite, bed bugs inject an anesthetic substance into the wound, so itching on the damaged areas of the skin usually occurs after the bed bug has time to hide. Bed bugs prefer to bite on areas with the thinnest and most delicate skin. Their bites can be mistaken for allergies.
It is possible to find the habitat of bed bugs by the accumulation of dark spots, larvae, discarded chitinous covers
If you suspect bed bugs, you should look for places where they can hide and lay eggs. The habitat of bed bugs can be identified by dark patches of excrement, eggs and / or discarded chitinous cover can also be found. Bed bugs take root equally well in different rooms, regardless of their sanitary condition.
To find bed bugs, the most thoroughly inspect the bed (folds and seams of bed linen, slots in the mattress), furniture joints (especially wardrobes and bedside tables), folds of clothes, space under the baseboards, doorways, cornices, frames of mirrors and paintings. Parasites can settle under wallpaper, in wall crevices, under carpets, near heating radiators. Usually finding insects is not difficult with close inspection.
How to get rid of bed bugs at home
The choice of the method by which you can get rid of bed bugs is carried out taking into account the number of parasites in the apartment. It is advisable to start the fight against insects together with neighbors, since bugs often occupy several apartments located nearby and can move from one room to another.
The easiest way to get rid of bed bugs in an apartment is at a stage while the insect colony is still few in number and the parasites have not had time to leave a clutch of eggs.
Physical methods of pest control
While there are few of them, it is possible to get rid of bed bugs by thoroughly cleaning the room with a vacuum cleaner, but it is not always possible to reach the places of their accumulation. To combat bed bugs, steam generators, industrial hair dryers and special irradiators can be used, which, unlike a vacuum cleaner, allow you to destroy parasites in hard-to-reach places.
An effective way to get rid of bed bugs is the complete simultaneous heating of infected rooms with dry steam (at a temperature of at least 50 ° C) for 20 hours. The countdown starts from the moment the room warms up to the specified temperature.
To get rid of bedbugs, you need to carefully process all possible habitats.
The processing of the apartment should be aimed not only at the destruction of adults, but also the larvae and existing eggs. Most bed bug killing drugs work on adults. For this reason, insect control must be carried out in several stages with certain intervals between the treatment of the room.
To get rid of bed bugs faster and more efficiently, in addition to the premises, it is necessary to process things and bedding. To do this, wash at a high temperature followed by ironing with a hot iron. However, it should be remembered that for effective control of bed bugs, these methods are additional, not basic.
Insecticide treatment
When self-treating an apartment with insecticides, it should be remembered that these drugs are mostly poisonous to humans and can have an adverse effect on the body. Cases of severe poisoning are regularly recorded, the cause of which was non-compliance with safety regulations when trying to get rid of bed bugs on their own.
First of all, pest control should not be carried out by people prone to allergies, as well as pregnant women, breastfeeding mothers, children. Before pest control begins, people and pets should be taken out of the apartment, personal hygiene items and dishes, as well as food, should be tightly packed.
The treatment of the apartment with insecticides must be done by protecting the skin with rubber gloves, the respiratory tract with a respirator or cotton-gauze bandage, and the eyes with goggles. There should be as few exposed areas of the skin as possible, clothes should have long sleeves and legs, a scarf should be tied on the head or a hat should be worn. Immediately after finishing the treatment of the room, you should go out into fresh air, change your clothes, wash your hands and face thoroughly with soap and water. The apartment becomes habitable in a few days after self-treatment of the premises with insecticides, followed by thorough wet cleaning and airing.
Professional pest control
It is possible to get rid of bed bugs by chemical means in one stage with the professional treatment of the apartment by an organization specialized in this. For disinsection, in this case, drugs are used that have a prolonged effect, which make it possible to destroy both adult bed bugs and larvae that appear after some time.
It is best to entrust the processing of an apartment from bed bugs to professionals
Other benefits of professional bed bug control include the safety of the drugs used for humans and pets. Professional processing of the apartment does not require much time (usually 1-2 hours), you can stay in the apartment immediately after the disinfestation performed.
In rare cases, even professional pest control is ineffective. Then you can get rid of bed bugs in the apartment only by overhauling the premises and replacing old furniture with new ones.
How to get rid of bed bugs in an apartment using folk methods
You can get rid of bed bugs using folk methods with the help of kerosene, vinegar, turpentine. A mixture of kerosene and turpentine with the addition of camphor or naphthalene can be used to treat wooden furniture, baseboards, cracks in the floor. Each of these substances can be individually treated with the places of the suspected habitat of the parasites. However, you can get rid of bed bugs using this method only by daily processing of the premises for a long time. It is not recommended to treat upholstered furniture and carpets with the listed substances, since stains and stains will remain on the surface of household items, the colors will be disturbed. Fabric surfaces can be treated with vinegar, ethyl alcohol or denatured alcohol.
The smell of tansy is believed to deter bed bugs.
Popular ways to get rid of bed bugs also involve the use of herbs, which are believed to scare off parasites with their smell. Such injuries include bitter wormwood, tansy, wild rosemary. Unfortunately, such a simple and thus attractive method is not highly effective, therefore, it is possible to lay out these herbs in an apartment only in combination with other methods of dealing with bed bugs.
How to prevent bed bugs in your apartment
Reduce the likelihood of the apartment being populated by bed bugs by taking a number of measures:
- carry out regular cleaning of the apartment;
- in the case of purchasing clothes or other items in second-hand stores, carefully check purchases for bugs before bringing them into the house, and immediately wash them at a high temperature;
- during your stay in hotels, check the seams of the mattress and pillows for the presence of bug excrement, try not to leave luggage on the floor;
- if you suspect the presence of bed bugs in the apartment, immediately take measures to destroy them.
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Anna Aksenova Medical journalist About the author
Education: 2004-2007 "First Kiev Medical College" specialty "Laboratory Diagnostics".
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