The rate of reproduction of this blood-sucking parasite largely affects the degree of its survivability. Therefore, getting rid of bedbugs can be difficult, and their population is growing exponentially.
Understanding how bedbugs reproduce will help in their eradication.
What to do in such a situation? To get started, we recommend reading this article. This article describes in detail methods of controlling parasites. We also recommend that you consult a specialist. Read the article >>>
Life cycle of bedbugs
The lifespan of an adult insect is 12-14 months. The maturation period takes about 30-35 days, but if conditions for development are unfavorable, the larva goes into suspended animation.
During this period, life processes slow down, but as soon as conditions change for the better, the larva comes to life and goes through the entire life cycle starting from the interrupted stage.
The development process of a parasitic insect occurs in 3 stages. First, the fertilized female lays eggs. The egg then develops into a larva (nymph). After a short period of time, the larva becomes an imago (mature individual).
There is no intermediate transformation into a pupa, so entomologists classify bedbugs as insects with an incomplete cycle of transformation.
The bedbug's diet consists exclusively of blood. It is necessary for it at all stages of maturation and for further viability.
Reproduction through violence
The method of reproduction of these insects can be called violent. The mating male uses a painful and quite traumatic method of insemination: he attacks the female, pierces her abdomen with the genital organ and injects sperm into the resulting hole.
The injected seminal fluid is enough for the female to reproduce offspring for the entire life cycle. She spends it gradually, as needed. In starvation conditions, the digested part of the seed can even become additional nutrition for the female.
Thus, a female mate only once in her entire life. Males are capable of sexual intercourse up to 200 times a day.
Males are promiscuous in sexual relations and can attack another male or a nymph incapable of fertilization.
A violent act can lead to its death, so nature has endowed the larva with the ability to secrete a repellent enzyme that causes a feeling of anxiety in the male.
Sexual intercourse with a male leads to mixing of seminal fluid in the body of the injured party.
As a result, during the next mating, the most viable sperm enter the female’s spermatheca.
Stages of development
The bug goes through several stages of development.
- Egg . In a favorable environment, the larva appears within 3-5 days. This process can be delayed by drought or cold temperatures. However, one should not expect rapid death of the embryo; development will continue even after several months.
- Nymph . Not much different from an adult, the difference lies in the color of the chitin and size. The larva goes through several molting stages, after each of which it grows until it reaches a size of 4.5 mm. The nymph feeds on blood and bites people more often than the adult insect - it needs a lot of food to grow and cannot drink much water. When bedbugs appear in an apartment, they multiply quickly, and the number of larvae constantly increases. Their bites are especially unpleasant for owners of infested apartments, since the nymphs do not inject painkillers. If there is not enough food, the larvae hibernate until better times.
- Adults . After the 5th molt, the nymph turns into an adult insect. Males are now capable of fertilization, which occurs up to 200 times a day. Females seek blood because without it the reproductive cycle slows down.
Typically, the female lays 10-20 eggs a day, which look like tiny grains of rice. In unfavorable conditions, their numbers decrease, and sometimes bloodsuckers even hibernate. Parasites in this state are indistinguishable from skins shed during molting, but awaken upon contact with moisture.
Eggs resemble grains of rice
The development of insects in apartments and houses occurs regardless of the time of year, so you should not delay their appearance. Knowing how bed bugs reproduce will make it easier for you to take action!
Appearance of eggs and larvae
The egg develops in the female body for no more than 3-4 days, after which she lays it. The egg capsule resembles a translucent grain of rice, no more than 1 mm in length, making them difficult to detect.
At this stage of development, the bug is practically invulnerable: the shell of the egg is resistant to shock, temperature changes and does not allow pesticides to enter. Therefore, even after treatment, parasites may reappear in the house.
The larva that hatches from the egg is called a nymph. She looks like a mature individual, but is smaller in size. The color of the insect at this stage is almost transparent; you can even see the sucked blood in the abdominal cavity.
Larvae require a lot of nutrition to grow. At one time they consume less blood than adult arthropods, but feed more often.
The bites are painful and immediately cause itching and burning, because... their saliva does not contain anesthetic. When a sexually mature bug bites, it injects a substance similar in effect to an anesthetic.
Whitish from birth, the larvae begin to change color due to molting. The chitinous shell does not stretch as the bug grows, so the insect sheds it every 5-6 days.
With each molt, the shell becomes darker in color. After the fifth molt, the nymph is ready to reproduce.
Structure
The parasite's body is flat, which allows it to crawl into the tightest crevices. The length of the body is from 3 to 8 mm, the color of the chitinous cover is from gray-beige to dark brown. On the head there is a proboscis with which the insect pierces the skin, and 2 channels for administering saliva and sucking blood.
The body of a bedbug consists of several segments, due to which it has considerable flexibility; it is not so easy to crush it on the soft surface of a bed. At the ends of the legs there are claws, with the help of which it is held on the body of the victim.
On the abdomen there are glands that emit a special “bedbug” smell, reminiscent of cognac. This aroma serves to scare off enemies and attract sexual partners. In a room densely populated by insects, it is felt already at the entrance.
On the back there are the remains of wings; bugs used to be able to fly, but as a result of evolution they lost this ability. But even now they can accurately plan from a closet or wall to a bed.
How quickly do bedbugs reproduce in an apartment?
Under favorable conditions, the female lays 3-4 eggs per day, from which larvae hatch within a week. When a new generation develops into sexually mature insects, the colony's population begins to grow exponentially. How quickly bed bugs reproduce is affected by ambient temperature, as well as access to regular food. On average, a female lays 400-500 eggs during her life.
Where do bedbugs breed in an apartment?
Bed bugs spend their entire lives in hidden shelters, and come out only to hunt at night once every 5-7 days. There, in the shelters, the bugs mate and lay eggs, and the nymphs molt and develop. Bedbugs make shelters in the area of a person's sleeping place so that the journey to a food source and back does not take much time. The frequency of mating and the number of eggs laid depend on regular feeding.
The incubation period of bedbug eggs lasts 1-2 weeks, after which the first stage nymphs appear. Before becoming an adult bug, the nymph goes through 5 stages of development, each of which ends with molting. One of the signs of a bedbug nest is the yellowish empty chitinous skins of nymphs. To transition to each next stage, the nymph requires a portion of blood, so bedbugs become bloodsuckers from the moment they emerge from the egg. After nightly bloodsucking, the nymph hurries back to the shelter, where it begins to prepare for the next molt.
The full development cycle from egg to adult bedbug at room temperature and constant access to a source of blood lasts 5-7 weeks.
How do bedbugs reproduce if there is only one at home?
Sometimes people ask whether one bedbug can multiply in a room if it somehow made its way alone from neighbors or through other means. One secret is that after mating, the sperm is stored in the female's spermatheca for a long time. And the developing eggs that she lays daily will be fertilized by sperm until they run out.
Therefore, the uninterrupted breeding of offspring is not greatly affected by how often bedbugs reproduce, because one insemination two or three months ago is enough. And if even one single adult female gets into the apartment, then viable eggs will appear in the sofa or bed even before she has time to bite anyone.
Inbreeding is the secret of bedbugs' superpower to reproduce
Inbreeding (incest) is the crossing of closely related individuals within a population. In the animal world, close inbreeding, as a rule, leads to genetic deformations, and on a mass scale – to a sharp decrease in the gene pool and even extinction. But, as it turned out, this law does not apply to bed bugs.
The study of bedbug genetics was carried out by a group of entomologists led by Coby Schal and Edward Vargo from the University of North Carolina. Scientists examined the genes of bed bugs living in three high-rise buildings in North Carolina and New Jersey and found very low levels of genetic diversity. This means that all the bedbugs in these buildings were closely related. So close that scientists speculate that the infection began with one or two insects.
The works of entomologists are gradually lifting the curtain behind which are kept the secrets of the amazing resilience of the biological species Cimex lectularius. While bedbugs reproduce through dangerous traumatic insemination, this does not prevent them from conquering the world at an alarming rate. And resistance to the negative consequences of inbreeding makes populations of bloodsuckers genetically invulnerable. Understanding the intricacies of how bed bugs reproduce in an apartment helps you build a thoughtful and realistic control strategy. Despite the stubborn persistence of these parasites, thousands of people manage to get rid of them.
What prevents reproduction
Females and males reproduce quickly only in a comfortable environment. When unfavorable conditions arise, insects slow down the rate of population increase.
Temperature
The optimal temperature for the development and life of an insect is +25…+30°C. Until the ambient temperature drops to +10°C, bedbugs will continue to reproduce, but at a slower rate.
This process stops completely when suspended animation occurs, i.e. when the ambient temperature drops to +5°C and below. Frost from -10°C is fatal for bed bugs.
Humidity
Bed bugs feel most comfortable in warm and dry rooms. Parasites cannot tolerate high humidity; the optimal indicators for them are 40-60%. Low humidity is easily tolerated by adult insects; they replenish the lack of fluid by increasing the amount of blood they consume.
The eggs run the risk of dying, because if there is a lack of environmental humidity, they quickly dry out and the embryo dies. If the humidity is too high (70% or higher), the eggs are susceptible to fungal infections.
Lack of food
A bedbug can live without blood for 3-4 days, a larva - 2-3 days. But even a month of hunger strike does not lead to the death of the bed parasite. If the insect does not receive food within 14-16 days, it will fall into a “inhibited” state - suspended animation. In this state, all processes in the body slow down, and nutrient consumption is reduced to a minimum.
Important! With the lack of food, the ability to reproduce offspring stops.
Anabiosis
Anabiosis is the next stage of “slowing down” the life activity of the bug. This state occurs at a temperature of 0…+5°C. Too high a temperature does not lead to suspended animation, it kills the insect. The larva dies at +45°C, the adult bug lasts up to +70°C.
In this state, the parasite stops moving, feeding and reproducing.
Can a bug reproduce alone?
The bedbug is not a hermaphrodite, so the insect must mate to procreate. The female is inseminated once in her life, and begins to lay eggs daily. If there is one fertilized female in the room, there is normal humidity, plenty of food and an acceptable temperature, then after 2-3 months the number of insects will increase significantly.
If one male bug appears, it will not reproduce.
Bed bugs reproduce quickly but are highly dependent on environmental conditions. Cold indoors (below +5°C) puts the insect in a state of suspended animation, which stops the reproduction process. High or low air humidity (above 70% and below 30%) destroys eggs. Also, the reproduction process stops when there is a lack of food for more than 2 weeks. All these features are often used in the fight against bed bugs, for example, by freezing the room.
Favorable conditions
The conditions in the apartment are suitable for the existence of bedbugs: in urban housing there are no sudden temperature changes, optimal heat and humidity are maintained. The sanitary condition of the premises does not play any role; in any housing there are many secluded places for building a nest.
Bed bugs love warmth, it stimulates their vital activity, so they reproduce most actively in the summer. A comfortable temperature for the parasite is 20-25 °C. Darkness is important for hunting. The most important condition for a prosperous existence is a source of food (human) and quick access to it.
A nest of bed bugs in the sofa.
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Read further:
How to effectively and permanently remove bed bugs from your apartment
How long does a mosquito live: life expectancy, after a bite, in an apartment
Bed bug larvae: what they look like, life cycle, how to get rid of them
Bedbug bite in a child and an adult: what it looks like and how you can get rid of it
Means for killing bed bugs at home
What do mosquitoes eat, besides blood, females and males, in the swamp and in nature?
Location of the colonies
During the day, parasites hide in nests that contain adults, larvae, eggs and skin molts. Most often they settle in the following places:
- in the crevices of beds and nearby furniture;
- inside household appliances;
- in the cracks between walls and baseboards;
- under the wallpaper;
- in the folds of sofas or armchairs.
Large nests are found near beds, and there may be several colonies in a room. Even getting rid of one nest may not solve the problem, and it needs to be treated comprehensively.
