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Having bedbugs is a problem many people tend to face. They leave a feeling of discomfort, itchiness, bites, which can turn into infections if not treated timely. Hence, the sight of bedbugs often makes people panic, and they start worrying about how to eradicate them – in the right way. In this article, we will be going over some tips and tricks you can use to get rid of the bedbugs so that you can sleep peacefully. Don’t worry, bedbugs are beatable, and we will show you exactly how to do it!
Before we get into the subject, let’s go through some characteristics of bedbugs.
Why Are Bed Bugs So Hard To Eradicate?
They are Pyrethroid Resistant
Pyrethroids are a group of chemicals that are often used as pesticides/insecticides. Most pyrethroids are mammalian (animal) and bird toxic; they act swiftly and require little quantity of ingredients for killing insects. Certain bed bugs, however, have developed chemical resistance. Entomologists studied the mortality rates of bugs with no pyrethroid no-exposure obtained from households across the country. When the pyrethroid insecticide was introduced, the laboratory-raised bugs had a mortality rate of 100%. The bugs recovered from outside the laboratory demonstrated that they are almost immune to pyrethroid pesticides.
Depending on the bed bug population, there are various resistance levels. Still, experts believe that the resistance to pyrethroids is one of the crucial elements that prevent the eradication of bed bugs.
Their Population Grows Quickly
Another issue that makes it challenging to remove bed bugs is how fast they populate. A bed bug has around a year of lifespan. In their lifetime, the number of eggs of a female bedbug relies on the availability of the blood meal. Bed bugs usually feed every three to seven days if there is a meal available. In their lifetime, one female bed bug can lay around 113 eggs. Under ideal and comfortable air-conditioned temperatures, bed bug populations may double every 16 days.
They Have an Odd Behaviour
It is difficult to understand the activity, habits, and behaviors of bed bugs. Bed bugs have a weird lifestyle; they are active at night and stay together during the day in tiny fissures and fractures. They fit into an aperture no bigger than a toothpick with their flat bodies. They prefer to stay near their next meal (which is your bed and sofa, chairs anywhere you sit) and often reside in pulleys, box springs, frames, headboards, and side tables in the tufts and folds of mattresses. They are frequently found beneath baseboards and wall plates. Bed bugs do not have a central “nest” as termites or ants do.
If a single pregnant female is left alive after the treatment to remove bed bugs, the process of infection can start again. The habits combined with their life cycle make it extremely difficult to banish them completely.
How to Get Rid Of them the Right Way
First, Confirm You Have Bed Bugs
Bite marks, discomfort, or bleeding on linens do not prove bedbugs. (Nothing distinguishes the way a bedbug bite looks, and some people don’t respond or bleed on them.) And you don’t have them necessarily only because you’ve seen an isolated bug (even in your bed!) or because you have spent the night in a dubious motel, or have the bedbugs from your cousin next door. Look instead for bugs on your bedding, coloring, box spring or nearby baseboards, brown-blue, dot-like faecal stuff (digested blood). If your mattress is not in an enclosure already, inspect the seams and crevices of the mattress attentively – especially around the folds.
Use A Mattress Cover
It is a good idea to apply a bedbug-proof enclosure when you have vacuumed and cleaned your mattress and box spring. Any bugs or eggs still hidden in the mattress (or, if stayed within, can be caught inside the enclosure).
By adding a bed bug mattress cover, the bugs and eggs are going to die. It is vital to leave it for a year but ask for help from your PCO—do not open it! Furthermore, the encasement ensures that there are no additional bugs. And following signs of bedbugs on the flat white surface of the enclosure will be easier to detect. You may need your pillows enveloped as well.
Take the Matter In Your Hands
Try these remedial techniques if you need to make the insect-killing progress quickly while waiting for your treatment schedule.
Clear the clutters and put them in an external plastic bag. The vacuum will not solve the bed bug infestation, but it can help control their numbers. Don’t shift objects from one room to another otherwise, your problem spreads to other sections of the house as well. Clutter and rubbish should be collected in a bag and put out immediately. Clean the vacuum outside after vacuuming bug-infested regions. Scrub the area with a tapered brush to dispel the eggs.
Vacuum along all bed seams, cracks, gaps, and baseboards with the crevice attachment. Stay away from the wall as you steam! You may rapidly destroy bugs on your bed and bed frame with steam if you have a strong heat steamer.
Wash all bedding and linen and dry them. Toss sandals, paddles, pillows, and bins for at least 1 hour in a dryer to kill the bedbugs. Change your bedsheets. There are many types of bedsheets you can choose from. Try to change them every three days.
Consider putting your bed and the bed insect traps on the foot of your bed with a mattress and a box spring engraving. Each of these measures will help to remove some bed bugs, but it will not resolve the problem without further involvement.
Heat Treatment
If killing bed bugs is your priority, heat treatment can be an excellent method for you. Heat treatments by a licensed pest control firm can destroy bed bugs in a single day. The room gets heated to between 135°F (57.2°C) and 145°F (62.7°C). Some specialists think the increased room temperature makes the bed bugs come out from the hiding places during the day. If a bed bug (and bed bug eggs) gets treated to a heat temperature of 122°F (50°C), they die right away. A very competent technician is required for successful bed bug heat treatment. If no bed bugs come out at this temperature, the treatment will fail to exterminate the bed bugs.
It takes around 8 hours for the service to complete. While heat swiftly and efficiently kills bed bugs, the lingering effect does not exist. Any bed bug that migrates from another part of the house may start the infestation again. If a residual insecticide is used in conjunction with the heat electronics and delicate goods can be damaged.
Bed Bug Treatment with Chemicals
A treatment based on insecticides is significantly more economical than heat, but it takes time. The bugs that get actively subjected to the treatment die fast. Most of the time, bed bugs are indirectly in contact with the insecticide, which means that they go independently for a meal. Bed bugs come out of hiding only every three to seven days for a meal. Nor do most insecticides kill the eggs. A pesticide spray is necessary to kill the nymphs that have hatched from eggs.
The objective of this is to eliminate the nymphs before they can reproduce. While the use of chemicals is helpful for bed bugs, it is not the quickest method to kill these bugs.
Traps
Moat-style traps can be employed to isolate bed and residing bed bugs from their hiding place. Sticky pads can capture pests from under the bed, although they may be chaotic. Such “interceptor” devices can be purchased online but can also be DIY-ed at home.
Finding a professional
Because of their expertise, pest control experts can successfully eradicate a bed bug infestation.
Pest control professionals can:
- Strengthen the infestation
- Inspect the site and perhaps the surrounding locations.
- Use nonchemical and insecticide combinations for maximum effect.
- Treatment review to verify if the operation was successful or not.
- Recommend or apply methods to prevent further breeding.
How Much Does Professional Bed Bug Treatment Cost?
Bed bug treatments can vary in price depending on the effect. You may find a chemical treatment ranging from $300.00 to $1000.00 in one bedroom. Please be advised that this treatment is time-consuming, involves various chemical substances and equipment, a skilled bed bug professional is well trained in implementing these techniques. Some or most of these critical components are likely to be sacrificed at a lower end of the price range.
You can pay between $800 – $1000 if you get heat treatment for a room. The room’s size and building type decide how much material is needed to heat the room properly. The equipment used in this treatment is highly sophisticated and expensive. The expert team will be at home for at least 7-8 hours.
Most companies are committed to delivering exceptional results at cheap pricing. Insects that need time, product, and skills are difficult to kill.
Overview
There you have it. By following all these tips, you can now get rid of these bugs without any problem. They can be hard to get rid of and may stick around for a while. But if you try hard for a few days, you will successfully be able to combat them for good. Make sure to declutter your bedroom, call for help for further investigation, and keep following these tips, and sound sleep is just a walk away! Thank you for reading!