****. Them.

Seriously.

In August of last year, at around 9pm, I saw something crawling to the corner of our headboard. I squished it and it was all bloody. Confused, I called Terminix.

We had bed bugs.



I would not wish these upon my worst enemy. They can't be killed with any household pesticide. So Terminix comes in, we sign a contract with them, they say it will take two or three visits to make sure they are gone.

TWENTY-SEVEN VISITS LATER...... Terminix has sent us a refund giving up. They are not really experts on bed bugs and don't know how to kill them properly. They've taken apart our bed, our furniture, everything, but its likely that they are in our walls, in cracks within our bedroom and they are really smart bugs. Two months ago they declared us "bed bug free", but, skeptical, we put sticky pads under our bed and sure enough, we are starting to see adult bed bugs on the pads. Reading more about them, when they sense a treatment somewhere they will spread somewhere else. To, say, my sons room. Kill me now.

So, our only real option at this point? Hire someone for $1600 to come heat our house up to 140 degrees for 3 hours. Heat is pretty much the only way to guarantee that all of them in the house are killed.

We have no idea how we got them but I believe they maybe came in our bed we bought from Room Store in Dallas (that has since gone out of business). The thing about bed bugs is that it often will take until they really mutliply to get noticed, hence once we were seeing them they had really spread throughout our room.

Let me tell you how much fun it is to know every time we sleep we may have bugs eating us. Its amazing. Luckily my wife and I have had almost zero reaction to them, so its not like we're itching from bites, but we can definitely see the discoloration on our skin.

Anyway, its time to nuke the bastards. But good lord talk about the most frustrating bug on the planet.

I didn't find a thread on them so I thought I'd use this opportunity to rant about them and answer questions about them, and hopefully find someone out there who has actually won a battle against them.

fortunately I've never had them. What you can do is steam your bed and everything you think they're on.

rubbing alcohol seems to work a well.

lol good luck with any of that getting rid of bed bugs

I know someone who had their home treated once every two weeks from May 2010 until March of this year to get completely clear of them. They threw out over $8,000 worth of furniture at the beginning of the process, replaced only their beds with encasements on the mattresses and used plastic furniture in the rest of the house. They have not seen a bed bug since but if they knew what they were in for at the start, they would have gone the heat treatment route as well.

Watching them go through all of this and seeing the pricing for thermal treatment actually had me brainstorming at one point about providing the service for furniture and other items that are infested.

OP, good luck with the heat treatment. I wouldn't wish bed bugs on my worst enemy.

Had em. Awful. They are quite amazing creatures though, check out the wiki page.

(they make sex by peircing through the abdomen and straight shot to the egg. Dont **** with bedbugs)

wow these are much worse than I thought.

What in your house would be damaged by 140F?

Well, they say that nothing is damaged by 140F. My initial reaction was "BS", but apparently they guarantee it.

I'm pretty sure I would have to move

I had an angry looking bug on my bed the other day that I killed and it was almost enough for me to make other sleeping arrangements.

I'm not afraid of bugs that I can see, but I am NOT DOWN with any type of bug ****ing with me while I'm sleeping.

GL to you op, I hope everything turns out alright for you.

Even so, you should probably take your dog for a walk while they do it.

Freakin' - bed bugs are worse than most people think unless you've had the misfortune to have them.

I didn't - but an ex-girlfriend of mine did (we were long distance, I was in LA, she was in Boston).

I know *way* too much about bed bug entymology, treatments, whatever.

It's horrible, just horrible - google "Bloomberg, NYC, crisis, bedbug" to understand just how bad it has gotten in NYC (specifically parts of Queens and Brooklyn).

There are estimates putting the number of bed bug infected hotels in NYC to be ~50%. Schools are another issue.

Anyway - if you don't catch the problem early, OP's story is sadly not that uncommon.

Nez - IIRC, up to ~50% of people do not have any reaction to bed bug bites.

In a way, that's awesome for you and your wife - but I suppose it's possible that because you didn't react, the problem got quite bad before you even noticed it at all?

Timeline references: when a bed bug/egg first enters your home, because of their feeding cycle (like once every 5 days) - you may not notice bites or anything for quite a while, maybe a month.

They are nocturnal and excellent hiders (very small bugs, and very flat - they like to hide in wood crevices and in walls). But they spawn exponentially. So if you don't catch the problem early, it can become very difficult to completely eradicate them.

I'd define "early" as within the first 2 months of noticing a bite.

If you actually *see* bed bugs - then I believe you're completely effed and the infestation has gotten quite bad.

Quick history of teh bed bug (experts please feel free to correct, but I think this is generally spot on):

Bed Bugs used to be very commonplace in the States from the 1900s to like the 1940s. Hence the nursery rhyme "don't let the bed bugs bite". People just lived with 'em. Until the advent of DDT in the late 1940s or so.

DDT was so powerful it just blew the f out of the bed bug population. The assumption was that the population was completely wiped out in the States. WRONG.

When restrictions on DDT usage/ultimate ban were put in place in the 1970s/80s, this provided the window for bed bugs to begin re-introducing themselves into the US population. (There are varying theories on where the f the bed bugs went to - one theory has them giving up on human hosts for a while, their preferred host, and being aviary parasites.)

Anyhoo - so there were few documented bed bug cases in the 1980s through 1990s but they were lurking around like a bunch of *******s. Entymologists trace the beginning of the current bed bug explosion to the 2000 Olympics in Sydney.

Bed bugs are excellent hitchhikers. Their eggs are sticky, and they like to hide in dark crevices (your shoes, your backpack, folded laundry etc.). And Sydney provided the perfect confluence of many people going to the same place from around the world and from the States, the beginning of a bed bug epidemic in Sydney, and then people flying back to their respective homes.

If you were to google reported incidents of bed bug infestations from 2000-2010, the growth has been astronomical.

Hotspots in the country are most major cities with international travel (NYC is far and away the worst area in the country)

Personally - I do the standard "bed bug check" every single time I stay in any hotel. I would not ever want to bring those *******s back to my home.

I know someone who had bedbugs. They had to steam clean everything, which took care of the problem.

I would get the heat treatment, since that seems to be the best way to get rid of them.


GL.

smooth - a simple steam cleaning will not eradicate a bed bug issue. If one has a problem with bed bugs immediately call an expert who knows how to get rid of bed bugs (not just some random exterminator).

Seriously - stop spreading lies. If you catch a bed bug problem early and do the correct treatments via a professional, I think you could definitely be fine.

The main issue here (and why NYC is so f'ed w/r/t bed bugs) - is if you live in an apartment complex. Bed bugs hide in walls and will travel from apartment to apartment. So, if you don't do a good job of eradicating the bed bugs in your apartment, you're just f'in everyone else in your building over.

This is why in NYC when people look to buy condos/co-ops/apartments, a bed bug check is super standard today. And also why co-op boards etc. are very loathe to disclose this information publicly as it will impact the pricing of their units.

Sal,


Good info, care to elaborate on standard bed bug search?

CQ - when you travel to hotels, this article covers the basics on what to look for:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11877871...ur-hotel-room/

You can also check out http://bedbugregistry.com/ to see if anyone has reported a bed bug issue (note that this is user supplied info, so it's not vetted by any sort of official authority). Also, basic hotel review websites will sometimes have someone complaining about bed bugs - but again, this is user supplied info - some people could be getting bites during their vacation, and think it's bed bugs.

For an in-home search (not sure if you're asking but I started to type this up so I'll finish): one of the most difficult things around the bed bug issue, is determining whether or not you actually have the damn things!

Hm - ok let me think how I would do this - well first, if you suspect you have bed bugs, you will very likely not see a bed bug at the beginning of an infestation (they are tiny, great hiders, and noctural, so by the time you get up they are hidden in your wall, your bed frame, whatever).

So, you must be bitten. If you are one of the 50% of the population that reacts, you will get a bite that closely resembles a flea bite (people of course have different reactions, some get huge welts, but I'm talking on average here). A tell-tale bed bug bite pattern is what is referred to as "Breakfast-Lunch-Dinner" - the bed bug takes one bite, sort of shuffles along in a straight line a bit takes another bite, then a third - so 3 raised welts in a row is a good indication.

If you notice bites - now personally, I wouldn't do a search myself as it wouldn't yield much. In fact, if you move alot of stuff around, the bed bug can get woken up and just hide somewhere even more remote (like move from your bedframe to the walls).

In fact - this is why bed bug experts will not recommend you do your own self-extermination - you will do a ****ty job, and the chemicals you spray around (like a bug bomb) will serve only to drive the bed bugs into deeper hiding places like your walls, making them more difficult to eventually eradicate.

I would call a NESDCA accredited bed bug dog and professional to verify the presence of bed bugs in my home.

http://www.nesdca.com/index.php?opti...eams&Itemid=19

If you don't have one in you're area, I don't know what I'd do. Probably search around for the best bed bug exterminator in my area, and have him at it.

A note about bed bug dogs:

I'm not an expert, but to my understanding:

With the recent population explosion of bed bugs, many people have started to get in on the bed bug dog business. Basically, a "trained" beagle or other dog with a great nose that can sniff out the bed bug eggs and hiding places (again, because they are such great hiders, and so tiny, it can be difficult for humans to find them and verify the presence of a bed bug problem).

Anyway, like any service - there are better and worse services and some of the bed bug dogs / trainers are not very well trained and not that great at locating bed bugs.

I noted NESDCA accredited because my ex-girlfriend used them with good success (as a pre-cautionary measure, I also hired a NESDCA one in LA to make sure my ex-girlfriend didn't bring bed bugs to my apartment). Also it is an actual accreditation process where the dog and handler have to go through X amount of hours of training.

Oh - and as far as treatment - from what I've read, a thermal treatment if you have a free-standing house is so the way to go! Bed bug eggs can't survive past ~180 degrees. And the eggs are what you are worried about (they are these oval sticky things in a protective casing).

The problem of course is if you are in an apartment complex. Then you probably need to go the route of strategically placed chemical solutions with an awesome bed bug exterminator who will have to make several visits (the first visit will not get all the bed bugs, as new ones will eventually hatch from those that are eggs, and at minimum a second visit will be necessary to kill off the entire generation - from what I've read if you catch it early and get a top notch exterminator, something like 3-4 visits works).

Pro-tip: if you believe you have bed bugs in your car, and live near a desert - external heat of 105 degrees or so translates to about 180+ degrees internally in a car, so you can just bake your car in the sun and get rid of the bed bugs.

Disclaimer: that may not actually work, but common sense tells me it totally might!

Thx man. Moving to ny (upstate) soon and this is news I can use.

CQ - no problem - more and more of my friends (mainly in NYC / Boston area) have been having problems with bed bugs.

Pretty sure that upstate NY is not too bad, especially compared to NYC - NYC is the worst - there was even an episode about them in 30 Rock - these f'ers are real and here to stay for a while is my guess.

I consider it an important PSA: since I bothered to do all this research several years ago, and most people have no idea what bed bugs are, and how much of a pain in the ass they are to get rid of - figure might as well pass on the knowledge.

pretty sure you are.

bed bug registry is useless, nearly every hotel in the northeast is listed on there. no one vets the reports.

also i don't think it gets much media attention, but it's reached crisis levels in nyc. most police stations and movie theaters are infested at this point, clothing stores commonly get infested and have to close for a couple of days to be gassed or heated or whatever the hell they do.

GT - I guess I'll take that as a compliment haha.

My information is from several years ago, but I am fairly sure there haven't been major advances in bed bug eradication technology (I remember reading about a device/trap that emits heat and melts dry ice giving off carbon dioxide - bed bugs are attracted to the warmth of your body and the breathing - but I don't think it works all that well).

That was my sense - I think it's better for when you're traveling to SF, LA etc - where there is way less of an incidence of bed bugs, so it could actually be useful.

It has gotten alot of play in the mainstream media - I occasionally read an article in USA Today or see a report on GMA or something - but yeah, it seems like people don't get just how bad it has gotten in the Northeast (my family is still there and I have a lot of friends still in NYC), and I think what people *really* don't get is how hard it is to get rid of them.

It's way, way worse than termites, fleas, cockroaches, etc.

Not your standard f'in infestation!

yeah, way worse, but I wouldn't be happy to have any type of infestation. I'm very lucky in that I've had 1 live roach in the 4.5 years I've been in my building. Pretty unheard of for a prewar building here.

I'm just grateful that my bedroom doesn't share walls with any other apartment.

If I had bed bugs, I would do whatever I could to get my hands on some Propoxur. F the EPA.