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Do you know whether you have ever come across a bed bug? You probably have not. Not yet, but the chances that you will are growing every day. This is because bed bugs are undergoing an explosion in their numbers and mankind is quite powerless to stop them at the moment, although a number of people are working on it.

You see, the difficulty is that bed bugs are pretty much resistant to every pesticide that we have. They were almost wiped out in the West in the Forties and Fifties with the widespread use of DDT, but the ones that survived and the ones that have been carried into the country are tolerant to pesticides.

Scientists are working on insecticides that will be effective against bed bugs, but there is no light at the end of the tunnel so far.

So, we are stuck with a growing population of bed bugs. How do you acquire bed bugs? Normally, you just pick them up and carry them home or someone does it for you. It is reckoned that foreign travel and immigration are largely responsible for the first members of our new bed bug community.

Nowadays, you can pick them up anyplace where people go: taxis, cinemas, restaurants, hotels, motels, cars, buses and planes. Even in the doctor’s surgery.

It used to be believed that bed bugs only flourished in poor peoples’ houses, but this is untrue. In fact, the rich are more likely to get them than the poor, because they travel more often. You can also be given bedbugs in secondhand furniture, clothing and suitcases.

Bedbugs like to creep into in cracks, so you could be sitting on a bus and one will clamber up the back of your coat and nestle under your collar. There it might lay a few eggs and walk away or it might go to sleep. When you get home, you will hang your coat in the wardrobe and a few days later you will have your very own colony of hungry little bedbugs. It is that easily done.

Some bedbugs will also reside on birds and bats. These bedbugs prefer bird blood, but if there are not many around, you may find them dropping from the ceiling onto you, if you have birds or bats in your attic. Bats are protected now, so you will have to have them removed, but you ought to discourage birds from nesting above you.

The bedbugs will be attracted to the CO2 on your breath and your body heat and then they employ pheromones to inform the others where you are. It typically only takes a bedbug five minutes to feed and then it goes back home to sleep it off for three to five days.

A mature bedbug has gone through six moultings and when a mature female has been inseminated, she can lay between 300 and 1,000 eggs in her lifetime of from six to twelve months. She will lay several eggs a day and they will hatch out in around ten days. So, you only need one expectant female and you are in trouble very soon.

If you have a couple of dozen females laying eggs in your mattress, it will take less than a fortnight before dozens of newborn bedbugs (called nymphs) are hatching out every day and then one of their relations will lead them straight to you.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece, writes on many topics, but is at present concerned with how do you get bed bugs? If you are interested in this, please go over to our website now at Picture Of Bed Bugs for further details.

Bed bugs are forging a gigantic resurgence in the West. They were practically wiped out in the Fifties due to the extensive use of DDT, which has since been banned. It took them forty to fifty years to recover, but in 1995 they started their comeback. In 2004, there were 82 cases of bed bugs in New York, but only five years later, in 2009, that figure had boomed to 10,985.

Of the top three Western cities with bed bug problems, two of them are in the USA. First is Colorado, Ohio, second is New York and third is Toronto, Canada. Fortunately, bedbugs do not relay human diseases, although there is no known reason why they do not. They feed by inserting two tubes into the host’s skin and squirting saliva containing anaesthetic and anticoagulant through one and sucking blood with the other.

This injection of saliva means that bedbugs can feed on you without you even knowing it, although that same spittle is to blame for the allergic reaction that most people feel in the form of red marks, swelling and itchiness.

Once bedbugs have established themselves in a building, and by the time you notice them, there is normally a serious infestation in your property, they are very hard to get rid of.

Once infected, you could have hundreds or even thousands of bedbugs. If you let it get this far, you will have to call in specialized pest controllers and you may also have to throw out a lot of your furniture including your bed.

The main refuge locations for bedbugs are mattresses, sofas, curtains, clothing, pillows and carpets. They may have to be thrown out as well. In very acute cases, you will have to move out for weeks while your residence is being treated.

Other favourite hiding places are furniture, the bed frame, skirtings, architrave, loose wall paper and damaged plaster. Sometimes whole plasterboard partition walls will have to be taken down, as might skirtings and architraves. Another way of combatting bedbugs is to seal this woodwork off with caulk, mastic or silicone.

The difficulty is that even if you get rid of your bedbugs, you may get them back quite easily. Just as easily as anyone else can. This is because bedbugs like to hitch a lift. They manage this by attaching themselves to your clothing, for example, under your collar, in your pocket or in the lining and letting you take them home, where they can begin a new infestation.

In Denver, staff at the central library discovered that bedbugs were distributing themselves inside the spine of their books. The fact is that you cannot predict where you will not find bedbugs. Infestations in judges’ chambers, dentists’ offices, doctors’ surgeries, cinemas, buses, taxis, schools and waiting rooms have all been de-infested.

It is time to be conscious of bedbugs, they are not a grave health threat, but they are not pleasant either. Nobody wants them. So, keep your eyes open, be careful of buying second-hand furniture and wash your clothes in very hot water or dry clean them if you are able to.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on many subjects, but is currently involved with getting rid of bedbugs? If you are interested in this, please visit our website now at Picture Of Bed Bugs for further details.

Bed bugs are a growing source of aggravation, especially in the developed Western world, because bedbugs were largely wiped out there by the late 1950′s. This means that most people under 50 years of age had probably never seen a bedbug until after 1995, when they made a big return. Their numbers are still increasing quickly, so a lot people are turning to thinking about killing bed bugs.

This is due to two major factors: their natural hardiness and their resistance to modern domestic chemical pesticides. Their natural toughness is due to a waxy coating on their bodies which protects them from surfactant pesticides to a great extent and their tolerance to chemical pesticides is probably due to the fact that they were eradicated in the West in the 1940′s and 1950′s by the extensive use of DDT.

The waxy coating on bedbugs blocks their rapid dehydration, which is why they can lie dormant for up to five months waiting for a suitable host to come along. It is also the reason why a lot of contact pesticides are ineffective. Therefore, one of the techniques for killing bed bugs is getting rid of that waxy coat.

People knew this 150 years ago, but they did not have the technology to actually take advantage of the information. People often used to put down crushed dried leaves or sharp sand. In the 19th century, lime, ash and diatomaceous earth were utilized to wear away the outer waxy coat. The latter was particularly effective and has seen an increase in usage over the last few years as an alternative to chemicals.

One method of killing bed bugs that will not work is catching them and crushing them, even if you did wrap sticky insect bands around the legs of your bed. Bed bugs cannot fly, but they would still get at you. They are not averse to traipsing up to the ceiling and dropping on to you.

If you want to test chemical insecticides, then there are three basic types. The first sort attempts to copy the effects of diatomaceous earth. It is a spray that includes pulverized glass or silica mixed with a contact pesticide. This does not sound a healthy environment for humans or pets either though. Breathing powdered glass or silica sounds like bad news.

Contact insecticides have limited effect, partly due to the waxy layer, but also because to be effective they have to be strong and this makes them a repellent, which means that the bedbugs will just keep away from it if they can.

Insect growth regulators are effective at killing the young, which is great, but the adults can live for about a year, so that is not so good, unless you are thinking about a long world cruise.

Professionals frequently use steam these days, because none of the bed bug’s life stages can withstand temperatures above 45c, so you could try this method by hiring a steam wall paper stripper or a hot air paint stripper for the weekend and going over your walls and woodwork. In fact, if all your wall paper and paint is going to fall off, you may as well combine the session with your next redecoration.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece, writes on many topics, but is currently 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.