Bed bugs cause a lot of pain. They can appear in any apartment or house, and contrary to popular belief, lifestyle and social status do not in any way affect the possibility of bedbugs infesting a room. House bugs feed on human blood. They are nocturnal and hide during the day. The habitat can be all sorts of cracks and crevices in walls, floors, ceilings, and furniture. The best shelter is a sofa or bed. A person's sleeping place is the bedbug's eating place. He doesn't have to walk long to drink blood. And after satiation, you can quickly hide in the thickness of the sofa or mattress.
If there are bedbugs in the sofa, it will be difficult to get them out. Most likely, not only upholstered furniture is affected by insects, so after treatment they will appear again. Bedbug eggs are more resistant to external influences, so they can wait out unfavorable conditions, after which the larvae emerge, and the torment of the owners continues. The eggs may not be in the sofa, so treating just one piece of furniture will not lead to the desired result. How to get bedbugs out of a sofa? The fight must be waged on all fronts. Many people think that it is impossible to get rid of bedbugs in a sofa, and the furniture will only have to be thrown away. However, you can try to remove the parasites yourself.
Bedbug detection
The owners do not immediately find out that there are bedbugs in the house. At first, the colony may be small, and bedbug bites may be sporadic. An adult can come out to feed once every 4–7 days. In one bite, she drinks up to 7 ml of blood. Many people confuse bedbug bites with mosquito bites. But unlike the attacks of other insects, bedbugs can leave a trail of several punctures in the skin along the blood vessel. So, several red blisters with severe itching are the first sign of the presence of bedbugs. After this, it is necessary to immediately inspect the room to discover their habitats and egg laying.
Signs that your sofa has bedbugs:
- black dots on the sleeping area are insect excrement;
- crushed bedbugs - after being saturated with blood, they increase in size, the chitinous shell becomes too vulnerable and breaks at the slightest pressure, so a person can easily crush them simply by turning over in their sleep;
- characteristic smell - bedbugs have glands from which in case of danger they squirt a secret, the unpleasant smell of which is designed to scare away enemies.
If these signs are found, then you need to find other places where insects are concentrated. These can be baseboards, back walls of cabinet furniture, paintings, lampshades, pet beds.
When the enemy is discovered, it is necessary to begin the fight against bedbugs.
The appearance of parasites in furniture
Bed bugs look like small insects with translucent bodies. They prefer warm places , found in bed, behind baseboards, on carpets, curtains and on the sofa. Small parasites hide in upholstered furniture and come out when they want to eat. Having bitten a person, they crawl back into tight folds and seams. The insects do not go far, because during the next attack of hunger they are in dire need of human blood.
To understand why bedbugs appear in a sofa, you need to learn about the ways they penetrate into a human home. Pests appear in the house when buying new or old furniture. A person can bring with him unwanted “guests” from trips and cheap hotels. Parasites are often found in stale bedding and blankets on trains. Many antique items can also be infested with bedbugs. If neighbors poisoned parasites in their apartment, insects may migrate to the nearest premises. Bedbugs can easily be carried in a bag or shoes after visiting a guest or in an infested store.
Bed bugs gather in one place and live in clusters. Here they lay eggs and molt, which helps to detect them in a living room. These pests multiply and grow quickly. One female or several larvae is enough for insects to fill all convenient corners of the house in 2-3 months. For people who are sensitive to bites, it may seem like the parasites have gone away overnight. This feeling also occurs among those who have never encountered a similar problem.
This video shows how to kill bedbugs on a sofa:
Temperature method
The most effective option, since bedbugs cannot tolerate sudden changes in living conditions. And if bedbugs become immune to insecticides and other chemicals, they are powerless against freezing. It is most effective to lower the temperature in the room where the bedbug-infested sofa is located, to at least -10. In private homes, you can turn off the heating in winter and open the doors and windows wide for several hours or days. This is exactly how they fought bedbugs in the villages. However, in the modern world it is very difficult to arrange such a freeze. You can, of course, take the sofa outside, but bedbugs, their larvae and eggs will still remain in the apartment. In addition, after significant temperature changes, upholstered furniture can deteriorate. It must be dried well to prevent mold from forming. In short, this method is effective, but difficult to implement.
A comfortable temperature for bedbugs is 25 – 30 degrees. So you can use the temperature method to remove bedbugs, but do it at high temperatures. In hot summers, when the air temperature exceeds 30 degrees, you can take the sofa out into the sun. However, it is worth remembering that the temperature inside the sofa will be lower, which means there is a high probability that it will not be possible to completely “fry” the bedbugs.
Another way to get rid of bedbugs using high temperature is to treat the sofa with a steam generator. The steam will definitely kill all the bedbugs, but it is necessary to treat the furniture in all hard-to-reach places.
How to treat a sofa?
Domestic bugs quickly get used to active toxic substances. To prevent this from happening, you can simultaneously treat with two means at once.
This will improve your work efficiency. Before using the drug, you need to check whether it leaves marks on the fabric. Modern chemicals do not allow stains on the treated surface.
Traditional methods can have unpleasant consequences for upholstered furniture, for example, after using turpentine, the fabrics are not washed.
Careful processing of all folds of the sofa is necessary. From the bottom side, you need to spray chemicals on the compounds, fastenings to the metal or wooden frame of the structure. Pay much attention to the internal structure.
Since you need to fight bedbugs throughout the entire apartment, you don’t have to limit yourself to just one sofa. Domestic parasites occupy all the space, they multiply very quickly.
All cracks, sockets, heating radiators, shelves in closets, pipes, places under window sills, paintings, clocks on the walls need to be treated. Lastly, you can spray the chemical on the treated sofa again.
Mechanical method
Bedbugs can be collected. They don't move very fast, especially when they drink blood. In addition, they are clearly visible on light-colored upholstery. Of course, this is an unpleasant, ineffective method, but it can be used. You can collect them manually, but it is better to use a vacuum cleaner. If the vacuum cleaner has good power, then it can get bedbugs from under the upholstery. You can also use fly tape to catch some of the bugs as they move. Bedbugs collected by hand or with a vacuum cleaner do not die, so it is necessary to use insecticides against them or send them to the sewer.
Folk remedies
At home, you can remove bedbugs from your sofa using proven folk methods. Firstly, it is treating the sofa with strong-smelling substances, for example, turpentine or a concentrated solution of vinegar. These products do not kill bedbugs, but repel them. However, after such treatment it will be problematic to use upholstered furniture, since the smell will persist for a long time.
Another folk remedy for repelling bedbugs is essential oils with pungent odors. This could be lavender, peppermint, tea tree, clove. The furniture and floors next to it are washed with water and oils dissolved in it. You can also treat bed linen with essential oils. If a person tolerates such odors normally, then the oils really protect against the approach of bedbugs. But they don't destroy them.
Diatomite
Mineral based powder. This is a natural remedy that is not dangerous to humans and pets, but is harmful to bedbugs. Diatomite (also called kieselguhr) is applied to the elements of the sofa with a syringe and left for several days. After this, the powder is collected with a damp cloth. The only problem is that the powder affects parasites through direct contact, so there may be individuals left in the sofa that are not affected by this product. That is, the colony will reproduce again.
Chemicals
If there are bedbugs in your sofa, you can be sure to get rid of them using chemicals. To do this, you will have to disassemble the sofa into its component parts. The insecticide is diluted in the required proportion. All furniture parts are sprayed with it. Everything needs to be treated: upholstery, armrests, legs, joints, bottom, folds. After treatment, it is necessary to wait for the time specified by the manufacturer in the instructions for the drug.
Important: furniture in which bedbugs have appeared must be treated in compliance with safety requirements. You need to use a respirator and wear gloves. After treatment, effective ventilation must be ensured.
You can enhance the effect of chemicals if you do encapsulation, that is, cover the treated sofa with film or an airtight cover. After treating the sofa and removing the “capsule”, if used, it is necessary to ventilate the room and carry out wet cleaning.
Typically, the insecticide is used twice. Repeated treatment is carried out after a couple of weeks. If eggs, which are more resistant to chemicals, remain in the sofa after the first treatment, then new larvae may emerge from them. To destroy them too, a second treatment is carried out.
The range of products for removing bedbugs is very large. We recommend using MediLis-Supersila for bedbugs and MediLis-Antiklop. These are products designed to combat bedbugs specifically. They are offered in the form of a spray and are ready for use. You can also use general insecticides - MediLis-Ciper, MediLis-Permifen, MediLis-Neo, MediLis-Super. They are effective not only against bedbugs, but also against other insects. They can be used to treat not only sofas, but also any other surfaces. Namely, complex treatment is the key to effective control of parasites.
Basic mistakes
Here are the most common mistakes that lead to low efficiency of self-treatment of the apartment and the reappearance of pests.
- Not all nests have been discovered. Before starting treatment, it is important to find all clusters of parasites. If even one is missed, the insect colony will grow again.
- Rules for working with chemicals are not followed. When using insecticides, you must strictly follow the instructions for their use, observing the requirements for the amount and time of exposure to the substance. If this is not done, the effectiveness of the treatment may come to naught.
- The insects' escape route is not blocked. When treated with chemicals, bedbugs begin to crawl away from the place where the insecticide was applied. Therefore, it is important to block their migration route. If this is not done (or done poorly), then one or more fertilized females may leave the poisoning site. This will lead to the complete revival of the colony after a certain time.
- Failure to comply with safety regulations. Before using chemicals, not all people make sure whether it can be used in specific circumstances; they neglect to wear a mask and gloves. This often leads to poisoning.
Prevention
Bed bugs appear in an apartment and a sofa in different ways. They can be carried on shoes and pet fur. They are carried on clothing, you can bring them home from an infected room or from transport, for example, from a hotel or train. So after visiting a room that could potentially harbor bedbugs, you should wash all your clothes in the washing machine at high temperature to kill the pests.
And although, as mentioned above, everyone has a chance of finding bedbugs, regardless of lifestyle and social status, it is worth taking preventive measures:
- regular wet cleaning, you can use antibacterial agents;
- maintaining order, avoiding debris from furniture and things - these are the places bedbugs love;
- It is advisable not to buy used furniture or antiques, but when purchasing them, carefully inspect them for the presence of parasites and, if possible, treat them.
If bedbugs were found in the sofa, then preventive cleaning and treatment of the furniture should be carried out regularly.
Preparing the sofa for processing
The action of insecticides will be effective if the apartment is properly prepared for treatment. To do this, you need to open all the places for better penetration of the toxic substance.
Take out all things from closets, personal belongings, toys, books or pack them hermetically in strong plastic bags. It is better to take indoor flowers to your neighbors. Lift the mattress onto the bed and place it vertically.
It is better to throw away old furniture; this is often where most bedbugs live. Pack the dishes tightly, hide the food in the refrigerator or take it out of the apartment. Cover all equipment with bags. Move furniture away from the walls.
At the sofa, you need to pull out the linen drawers (if any), unfold the structure so that the folding mechanisms and springs are visible.
If possible, you need to remove the covers and prop up the back wall of the upholstery. Parasites often hide in these places. During chemical treatment, it will be convenient to spray the poisonous substance on all egg clutches. This guarantees a positive result.
