One of the most detested and misunderstood pest insect species known to the world is the bed bug (Cimex lectularius). How many of us dozed off to sleep at night as children with the parting words of our guardians in our ears “sleep tight and don’t let the bed bugs bite”?
Bed Bugs probably started to feed on people at around the period when we moved into caves, the bat bugs Cimex pilosellus and Cimex pipistrella primarily fed on bats and it is probable that bat feeding species of bed bus evolved to feed on man when our ancestors started sleeping} in bat infested caves.
Up to the production of DDT in the early 20th century bed bugs were commonplace stowaways in most low quality homes.
The later years of the 20th century saw pest controllers dealing with very few bed bug problems indeed, their presence being generally restricted to budget holiday hotels and student accomadation etc.
A lot of people mistake dust mites, which aren’t visible to the unaided eye, with bed bugs which most certainly.
Adult bedbugs are reddish in colour, about a quarter of an inch in size and swollen after dining on human blood.
Bed bugs usually feed on our blood every few days, coming out in the early hours of the morning and homing in on their target by sniffing the exhaled CO2 from human breath and when close in on their target, body heat.
Lacking a suitable human host to feed on they can lay in a period of dormancy for periods of up to a year or more.
Often the first sign of a bed bug problem are spots of blood on bedding and on the base of mattresses and many people can react badly to their bites.
The early part of this century has seen bed bug reports explode everywhere on the planet, the easy availability of world travel and economic migration have both been blamed for the resurgence.
What is positive is that that are now making a real resurgence not only in lower quality housing but high class hotels, schools and even hospitals.
One London borough reported a doubling of bed bug reports every year from 1995 to 2001.
One night away in an infested bed is all it needs, they catch a ride in your suitcases or bags. Stretford 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 can be sufficient to bring the infestation to your own home.
They are an difficult pest to deal with as contrary to popular notion they do not just live in beds. They hide in any nook and cranny suitably close to a sleeping person, beds, electrical sockets, televisions, bed side telephones etc and dealing with them is both difficult and time consuming. They have even been revealed found living under the toe-nails of infirm people and in the folds of flesh on grossly over-weight people.
They are not a pest that can be tackled by an amateur and a pest control professional will almost certainly be needed.
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