How Can I Tell If I Have Bed Bugs In My Home Or Apartment?

What a common bedbug question. I hear it and answer it almost every day on the job.

Here’s an article that will show you pictures and share great information about how to tell if bed bugs are around. Check it out here at the University Of Kentucky website.

Bed Bug Biology, Control, Description and Habits – Pictures and Info Continued Here

Here’s another article that I run across on an article directory.

How To Know When You Have Bedbugs

You may say that you regularly clean your household and there is no way that bed bugs could possibly invade your home. Wrong. Having bed bugs at home does not mean that your home is filthy. Both clean and unclean houses can be infested with bed bugs.

Many people do not even know when they have bed bugs. They don’t even know what bed bugs look like. (Try Google Images and search them, or check out the link above)

Bed bugs are ‘shy’ insects. They crawl out from their hiding only when you are asleep at night. Bed bugs will crawl back to their homes when finished feeding or when you move from your position.

Before you stress yourself out, get the proper information, try to answer the basic questions of “Do I Have Bed Bugs” and “How Can I Tell”. After that, it will be time to get rid of the bedbug infestation.

So, how would you know if you have bed bugs? I get this question a lot.

How to know if you have bed bugs – Fact 1: Know Your Bed Bug.

Usually the first sign that you have bed bugs is that they will bite you and you will show red spots where the bites are. Your body reacts to the bed bug bites much like mosquito bites.

With bed bug bites however, usually there will be two or three bites in a fairly straight line, a couple of inches apart for each bed bug feeding. A good strategy is to make an appointment with your doctor to confirm they are bed bug bites.

Would you know a bed bug if you see one? Of course, the answer is usually no, unless you have had recent experience with them or have searched out their pictures for identification.

Few people these days have seen a crawling bed bug unless they are living in a bed bug infested home. We have been without them for the last 50 or so years, until they started coming back about 7-8 years ago. They are making a comeback and now are approaching pandemic proportions.

Even in hotels and motels, the bed bugs initial havens, you usually won’t see one crawling on your bed unless you wake up and turn the lights on to catch them out. As mentioned earlier, bed bugs are shy, they are nocturnal and photosensitive.  And it normally won’t go after you to feed if you are moving. They wait until middle of the night when you are asleep or lying still.

Description of bed bugs – Bed bugs can be seen by the naked eye. They are described sometimes as shaped like big appleseeds, reddish brown in color, oval shaped, flat and wingless. The distinctive characteristic of bed bugs is its oval-flat shape.

Another way to tell if you have bed bugs, is to take the bedding off and inspect your bed mattress and box spring. Bed Bugs leave tell tale spotting where they are nesting.

I love Google for searching out bed bug pictures and bed bug infested beds. There is so much information on Bed Bugs now that a simple search will bring up lots of  images and info.

– How to know if you have bed bugs – Fact 2: Know how Bed Bugs behave.

Bed bugs are nocturnal. They feed during the night, and are most active before dawn breaks.

When Bed bugs have been multplying for some time, they can have this offensive, sweet-like, musty scent. Some people can smell this odor in a room or area that has bed bugs infestation. Some pest control companies have specially trained dogs that can determine a bedbug infestation in it’s early stages. It is not perfect though, there may be as high as 25% false positives.

Bed bugs want to be near to their food supply. So, to know if you have bed bugs, check out the area where people sleep. The bedroom bed headboards and frame, mattress and box spring, night tables, dressers, living room sofas and chesterfields are the usual hiding places of bed bugs. In serious well established infestations though, they can be found just about everywhere in the home.

– How to know if you have bed bugs – Fact 3: Catch a Bed Bug and get it identified.

So, one of the the first things to do if you suspect that you have bed bugs, check the seams and undercover of your mattress and edge lining, box spring if applicable, anything around or under your bed, night tables and headboard. You know that you have bed bugs if you can see dark reddish brown stains on these area and some shed insect skins. The dark reddish brown stain is bed bugs dried excrement.

If any female bedbugs have laid eggs, you will see some really small white creamy colored eggs and maybe some small nymph stages of bed bugs there. There is no need to look further to find out if you have bed bugs if you see excrement stains and shed skins. Not to mention eggs and nymphs, this pretty much cinches it.

You have a case of bedbugs. Put this together with the bed bug bites and you will want to call in a professional pest controller to solve the problem.

Your bed bug problem is then diagnosed. More on treatment and preparation for treatment later.
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To Real Estate Companies and Property Managers: If you own or manage multi unit residential properties in Richmond, Delta, or Surrey, BC -  feel free to call or email me for quotations on pest control services in your neighborhood.

Al Smith – 604-723-9722
alsmith@metro-pest-control.com