How to get rid of bedbugs in an apartment once and for all?

A bedbug is one of the types of parasites that live in a person’s home. Their appearance is most often not associated with the pollution of the apartment and the presence of animals in it. Bed bugs can appear even in a perfectly clean living space. The fight against bedbugs must begin immediately after they are discovered, otherwise they will multiply and much more effort will be needed to remove them. To exterminate bedbugs, you can use both chemical and folk remedies. In this article we will talk about the main methods of control and remedies that have helped many families get rid of bedbugs in their apartments.

What do bed bugs look like?

A bedbug is a blood-sucking insect that is an ectoparasite of humans and warm-blooded animals. Wikipedia considers it from the point of view of an obligate synanthropic insect - its existence is completely connected with human life and housing. There are several types of bedbugs: black, white, brown.

If you already know firsthand what bed bugs look like and don’t want to learn their appearance and detection tips, you can skip straight to the extermination tips.

What do insects look like? The size of a bed bug ranges from 5 to 8.5 mm, with males always being smaller than females. Insects have a yellow, brown or dark brown color, which is directly caused by saturation with blood. The bug has a flat body, the front edge of the head is equipped with a special proboscis, which helps the insect pierce the skin and suck blood.

Stinging setae form the upper and lower jaws. They are divided into two channels: through the large channel, blood enters the body, and through the small channel, saliva is released for injection when bitten. To successfully exist in the vicinity of humans, house bugs are endowed not only with a miniature and flat body with low weight, but also with small notches on their paws, which allow them to move along walls and ceilings.

Many people are sure that bedbugs are able to fly and jump, but this is not the case; the bedbug does not have developed wings, and its legs are not adapted for jumping.

Quartzization

Another interesting method of combating domestic bedbugs. Using ultraviolet lamps works one hundred percent. The main thing is that the treatment is carried out over the maximum area. To do this, you need to disassemble all the beds, armchairs and sofas, and unroll the bed linen and hang it right in front of the lamp.

Review

Maxim: “When bedbugs infested our apartment, my mother (she works as a nurse) brought a quartz lamp from the hospital. She was then guided by the usual logic - if quartz treatment kills bacteria, then it will also affect insects. We repeated the procedure every day for a week. You know, the bedbugs really disappeared. This is such an interesting method!”

Lifestyle, nutrition and period of activity of the bug

How do bedbugs live and what do they eat? They lead a parasitic lifestyle, feeding exclusively on the blood of humans and warm-blooded animals. Insects are active only at night, and during the day they hide in dark, secluded places. Their nocturnal lifestyle helps them get close to a sleeping person unnoticed and easily choose the most suitable place for collecting blood.

The linen bug emerges from its hiding places between 1:00 a.m. and 7 a.m. It only takes 4 to 10 minutes for it to become saturated with blood, after which it leaves the human body and hides in a shelter. One “meal” of food lasts an insect for an average of 5–6 days. A bug that has drunk blood noticeably increases in size and can reach 9 mm. It is noteworthy that when fed, the bug becomes very clumsy and vulnerable, it loses its reaction speed and can be easily caught and crushed. This is why you can see blood stains on the bed; a thick and clumsy bug can be crushed even in your sleep.

The most developed sense organ of a bedbug is smell; it is able to sense carbon dioxide, which is released when a person breathes, at a distance of up to 3 meters, and the warmth of a sleeping person - at a distance of up to half a meter.

Bedbug reproduction and lifespan

The reproduction of the household bug does not stop throughout the year. Fertilization of the female occurs in a very unusual way: the male introduces his seminal fluid through the integumentary tissue of the female, piercing her belly. The storage of seminal fluid by the female lasts throughout her entire life. She spends it gradually, laying up to 5 eggs per day. In total, a female bedbug is capable of laying from 250 to 550 eggs over its entire life cycle.

Bed bugs love to settle in mattresses, so their eggs can be found there, as well as on furniture seams, in fabric covers and other dark, hard-to-reach places. In appearance, the eggs are similar to small grains of white rice, which turn yellow as the embryo matures.

The fastest and most proven way to kill bedbugs inside a mattress is to use a special protective mattress cover. The product is a sealed case with a micro-zipper. By putting such a cover on your mattress, you will seal and thereby kill the insects inside, without resorting to disposal of the mattress itself.

The complete development cycle of the egg until the appearance of the larva is 7–10 days. If conditions are far from favorable, then the cycle can increase to 20 days.

Larvae are small bugs that absorb blood for the speedy onset of molting and the transition to a new level of development. When molting, the larvae shed their dark brown shells. Shed skins can be observed in places where parasites are most concentrated: behind sofas, in mattress seams, bedding fabrics, pillowcases. Before the larva becomes an adult, 5 moults must occur.

The larvae are not able to produce a special anesthetic secretion that adults secrete, so when bitten a person may feel a sharp, unpleasant tingling sensation.

Bedbug reproduction occurs faster when temperatures are favorable and the insect is provided with food.

How long do bedbugs live?

The lifespan of a bed bug ranges from 11 to 14 months. When hunger, low temperatures or other unfavorable conditions occur, bedbugs slow down their life processes and enter a state similar to suspended animation. They can remain in this state for over 12 months, while maintaining full viability.

It is noteworthy that bedbugs are able to migrate between apartments in search of more favorable living conditions. They easily crawl through ventilation holes, cracks in the walls of houses, chimneys, and in warm weather they move well along the outer walls of houses. An adult can walk 1 meter in 1 minute.

What do bite marks look like?

A roombug, when saturated with blood, can make up to 7 bites at intervals of 1 – 2 minutes. Thanks to the anesthetic saliva secreted, a person often does not feel a bedbug bite. Traces of bedbug bites on the human body can be distinguished by a characteristic line of closely spaced red dots, which can be compared to mosquito bites. Itching and burning of the bite site is an individual symptom that may not appear. A large number of people do not experience any physical discomfort associated with the bite.

A characteristic symptom of a bite is redness of the bitten area and its thickening. This differs from a mosquito bite, traces of which disappear from the human body within a few hours.

Most often, bites occur on less protected areas of the body with delicate skin - the neck, shoulders, and back.

Cost of processing a cottage (house)

To get a consultation

Are bedbug bites dangerous for humans?

Scientists have not proven the danger of a bedbug bite and the serious diseases it carries, but there are organisms that are carried by bedbugs and can cause diseases such as:

• brucellosis;
• smallpox;
• Hepatitis B;
• tuberculosis.

What to do if bedbug bites itch very much and instantly increase in size, weakness, nausea and dizziness occur? An allergy to an insect bite should be excluded. In the absence of timely medical attention, allergies can lead to the development of complications after a bite, including anaphylactic shock.

Bed bugs are carriers of infections, but there have been no cases of them infecting humans. Quite often, infection occurs by the person himself when scratching the blisters and introducing microbes into the wounds.

Bedbug bites cause nervousness, malaise, and lack of sleep. A person loses his former ability to work, the quality and pace of life decreases. Constant psychological discomfort can transform into prolonged depression.

Essential oils

It's the same here as with herbs. Only if some herbs smell unpleasant, then people love essential oils, because they seem to fight bedbugs, and, it seems, there is a divine aroma in the apartment.

But you already understand that if a bug is faced with a question of life and death, either it crawls out and bites a person at the smell of some tea tree oil, or it is dying of hunger, it will crawl out and bite.

By the way, turpentine should be included in this same category - this is also an essential oil from different parts of coniferous trees. It just doesn’t smell as pleasant to humans as eucalyptus oil. But bedbugs don’t care; they react to turpentine the same way as to any other oil.

In the same category, Zvezdochka balm is a mixture of fat-based essential oils with the same inaction on bedbugs as pure aromatic oils.

Various perfumery products are completely similar to oils: perfumes, colognes, deodorants. To some extent, bedbugs will bite a heavily perfumed person less aggressively, partly because the smell of perfume will mask the smell of sweat and carbon dioxide, which bedbugs focus on when searching for a person. But perfumes cannot reliably protect against their bites.

We treat bedbug bites, remove bite marks

Bed bug bites not only bring discomfort and unpleasant sensations, but also look unsightly on the skin. In order to get rid of the first symptoms of a bite and reduce inflammation, it is recommended to rinse the bitten area with clean water and then treat it with a solution of vinegar or citric acid.

To relieve the skin from itching, you need to soap the bite area with glycerin soap and let the soap foam dry a little. After 7-10 minutes, rinse the bite site with warm running water.

To treat skin bites, a prepared mixture of baking soda and water will help. Apply the paste mixture to the affected areas of the body and leave for 30 - 50 minutes, then rinse off with warm water.

In order to reduce the rash, you can use lemon juice or St. John's wort decoction. It is enough just to lubricate the bite area with cotton wool a few times.

To prevent the development of infection, it is recommended to apply a gel containing aloe vera juice to the affected areas of the body. A special gel, Gektor, after bedbug bites, is ideal for this purpose. It relieves redness and promotes rapid healing of wounds, restoring a healthy color to the skin. The gel is applied in a thin layer to the damaged area.

The ointment after bites, which contains hydrocortisone and cortisone, effectively removes traces of bites. It promotes the resorption of blisters, relieves itching, and reduces pain.

Allergic reactions and swelling of the skin can be relieved with antihistamine tablets such as Benadryl. It must be taken into account that they have contraindications that can lead to exacerbation of chronic diseases.

If the reaction to a bug bite is accompanied by a rise in temperature, fever, nausea, muscle weakness and headaches, then you should immediately consult a doctor for qualified medical care.

Smells of plants

According to our statistics, this is the favorite pastime of those who have not yet been bitten by bedbugs too much - trying to scare them away with odors. As a group, we compiled a list of such means when we remembered what people tried to scare bedbugs with:

• Sagebrush
• Black cohosh
• Garlic
• Lavender
• Mint
• Mustard
• Valerian
• Tobacco
• Chamomile
• Eucalyptus
• Geranium
• Needles
• Birch buds and birch bark
• Orange
• Bay leaf
• Fern

It’s unclear what fern or birch bark has to do with it, because they have practically no smell. But the smell of geranium can drive people out of an apartment, but not bedbugs, although for some it is a normal houseplant.

Many people get headaches from the smell of geranium.

In general, all these herbs are countless - if the grass has a smell, someone will certainly try to scare away bedbugs with it. But we have already talked about the result: no one has ever succeeded in scaring off bedbugs for good with at least some of these herbs individually, even though with a whole bouquet of them. We don't know of such cases. I think if such grass had been found that could drive bedbugs out of an apartment, we would have lost our jobs a long time ago.

What causes bed bugs?

Every person who has ever found bites on their skin has wondered where bedbugs come from in their apartments. After all, a well-kept apartment not inhabited by pets and located far from garbage dumps is not a guarantee of safety from bed bugs.

How do bedbugs appear in the house? The main source of their spread is neighboring apartments. This problem is especially relevant in old buildings, Soviet high-rise buildings and communal apartments. Bedbugs move quite actively, capturing new territories to inhabit.

In rural areas, bedbugs appear in barns, chicken coops, poultry houses, and then safely move into human habitation.

Due to their high adaptability to unfavorable environmental conditions and good viability, bed bugs can enter the house in a variety of ways:

1. From a trip . Traveling to warm countries, the risk of getting bed bugs is quite high. It is enough to bring one adult female in a suitcase or backpack and after a while the apartment will be densely populated with blood-sucking insects.
2. Furnished . When buying used furniture, a person also runs the risk of acquiring bed bugs. Bloodsuckers often settle in sofas, armchairs and poufs, since it is on this furniture that their potential victim is located.
3. With clothes . Bedbugs hide in the folds of clothes, so trying on something in a store can bring back an uninvited guest. Also, used clothing stores are at risk, so after purchasing used clothing, you must thoroughly steam it.
4. With household appliances . Bedbugs like to wait out the daytime in secluded places, which serve as reliable protection for them. Laptops, TVs, microwave ovens and other equipment are good shelters for bedbugs; they often even lay eggs in the openings of household appliances.
5. On animals . Bedbugs very rarely parasitize animals, but there have been cases of them being carried by domestic animals and birds.

Bedbugs live in shops, warehouses, libraries, clinics, offices... Often, people don’t even notice small insects until their population reaches a huge number.

Where do bedbugs hide - habitats

You can determine the main habitat of bed bugs by their name; of course, this is the bed. Bed bugs live under the mattress, in the folds of bed linen, pillow seams, and bedside tables. They are especially attracted to sofas and armchairs with soft upholstery, in which they safely accommodate their entire colony.

The main criterion for such placement is proximity to the power source, namely to the sleeping person. In bedrooms, a comfortable temperature is most often maintained, which allows bedbugs to actively reproduce.

Where do bedbugs hide? They usually settle in hard-to-reach places such as:

• cracks in linoleum;
• parquet cracks;
• linen closets;
• carpets, rugs;
• bookshelves;
• upholstered furniture;
• Appliances.

You can find bedbugs under baseboards, behind wallpaper, in wardrobes and even in electrical outlets.

How to independently detect the presence of bedbugs in a room?

Independent detection of bedbugs indoors is difficult because the arthropods are very small and nocturnal. But by paying attention to some characteristic signs, you can still recognize insects:

1. The appearance of bites on the body is the main sign that there are bed bugs in the apartment. To distinguish bedbug bites from mosquito bites, you need to look closely to see if there are small droplets of coagulated blood on them. When bitten, a mosquito secretes a hemostatic mucus, which the bug does not have. The bug only numbs the bite site, so blood particles remain on the wound.
2. Blood stains on bed linen. A parasite that has drunk blood becomes very large and clumsy. It moves slowly and can easily be crushed by a sleeping person. In the morning, if you look closely at the bed linen, you can see small blood spots.
3. The presence of black spots - bedbug excrement. They can be on the sofa, in bedside tables, wardrobes.
4. The keratinized membranes of parasites that remain after they molt. The shells can be found in areas with large concentrations of insects and excrement.
5. Live insects, eggs, larvae. To detect adult individuals, you need to lay out the bed and turn on the lights sharply at night. Insects will definitely be noticed, as they will not have time to hide.

To simplify the search for pests, it is recommended to use a flashlight and a magnifying glass. It is necessary to examine all hard-to-reach places in the house. A magnifying glass will help in identifying excrement, eggs and larvae.

Bedbug trap

Unfortunately, bed bugs are quite difficult to attract with anything. Therefore, now there is only one type of trap on sale, which uses your sleeping place as bait. Such traps are plastic containers with a special “catching groove”.

The trap should be placed under each of the bed legs, and the bed itself should be moved away from walls and other furniture. Bed linen should never touch the floor. If all this is done, then bed bugs will have no other option but to crawl up the legs of the bed.

The bug, having climbed to the top along the outer rough side of the trap, encounters an obstacle in the form of a groove with a slippery surface. An insect thirsty for blood cannot understand in time that its legs are unable to grasp such a surface. Trying to get through the obstacle, the bug slides down, from where, for the same reason, it cannot get up.

This trap is usually sold in a set of 4 pieces.

Light

Bed bugs are really afraid of light and normally do not bite either in the light of the sun or in artificial light. But if you simply do not turn off the lights in the room at night, then on the third or fourth day the bugs will begin to crawl out and bite people in the light. This has been verified.

We filmed those videos where our volunteers were bitten by bedbugs in the evening in the light, and the parasites bit safely, sucked blood and did not think of running away somewhere:

And many people tell us that after a long absence indoors they were bitten even in daylight. That is, bedbugs are afraid of light, but only when they are full and happy, and they are definitely not afraid of it enough to leave a constantly lit room.

The best modern chemicals for bedbugs

The unpretentiousness of insects and their ability to live in the most unpredictable places makes the fight much more difficult. To remove bed bugs, it is recommended to use proven and effective chemicals. Next we will look at some of them.

Here's what an employee of one of the capital's pest control services said:

Oleg Roshchin

I am a professional exterminator, I have been removing insects from apartments and private houses for 7 years.

Moscow bedbugs have unimaginable resistance to drugs. Our branches in the outback never cease to be surprised - they say you have bad bugs. Resistance to the drug develops from the second generation: if the parents were poisoned with one drug, it will no longer affect the offspring of bedbugs. Therefore, we have to constantly change processing agents.

Gektor

Hector is probably one of the most popular and modern remedies against bed bugs. The product was able to achieve this thanks to its unsurpassed effectiveness, as can be seen by reading numerous customer reviews. The drug is presented in the form of a powder based on silicon dioxide SiO2. The main feature is the principle of action - the product dries out bedbugs, completely dehydrating them. The drug is safe for use in apartments and private homes. There is a caveat - the product does not work instantly, and the effect appears after about a week, but it lasts for a long time.

Karbofos

Karbofos has a nerve-paralytic effect that helps remove bedbugs. Once on an insect, the substance immobilizes its muscular system, which leads to the death of the parasite. You need to know that Karbofos is a very stable product; when applied to interior items, the paralytic effect lasts for up to several months, which can pose a danger to children and animals. When using this substance, you must carefully read the instructions.

Get Total

Get Total will help get rid of bedbugs, cockroaches, fleas, ants and many other insects and will maintain the effect for up to 6 months (as the manufacturer claims). The instructions advise you to first clean the room, find areas where parasites have spread, pour boiling water or hot steam over them, and then thoroughly treat them with the drug. It is also very important to close all escape routes for bedbugs: cover cracks in baseboards and walls with masking tape, close hoods and joints of walls and communications. Then treat the entire apartment with a product diluted according to the instructions. Active ingredient: chlorpyrifos (5.0%). One bottle of the drug is enough for 20-22 sq.m.

Dichlorvos

Dichlorvos is an aerosol intexicide, which is available in cans. Aerosol is the best remedy that helps to quickly get rid of bedbugs. Surfaces pollinated with a spray retain insecticides for a fairly short period of time. To increase effectiveness, repeat the treatment several times a week. It is necessary to spray places where insects accumulate and where they might live. After spraying, you must immediately leave the room for 40 - 60 minutes, and then ventilate the apartment. Dichlorvos must be used following safety precautions.

Hot fog

Hot fog is the fastest and most effective way to get rid of bedbugs today. The chemical is poisonous, so it is recommended to call a special service for treatment. This method consists in the fact that the destruction of bedbugs occurs with any preparation heated to 80-90°C, which is sprayed indoors.

Hot fog heats the temperature in the apartment to 50°C; a fatal temperature for a bedbug is 45°C. Disinfection will take an hour on average, but suspended particles of the drug will settle within 3 to 7 hours. The descending particles must act on the eggs and larvae for at least another 4 hours to destroy them. Only after 8 – 11 hours can you begin wet cleaning of the room.

Xulat Micro

Xulat Micro is popularized as a remedy for home use against bedbugs and cockroaches, with which you can get rid of insects yourself. It is one of the microencapsulated preparations: after the liquid dries, the intexicides form a thin film on the treated surface.

Microcapsules stick to insects running across the surface, leading to poisoning of their body.

In what cases does an apartment need to be re-processed?

After treating the sofa against domestic insects using improvised means at home, the parasites die within a month. It happens that insects adapt to chemicals. The survival rate in this case exceeds 93%, both adults and eggs remain.

With direct spraying, people die within 30-40 minutes, mass damage occurs within 2-3 days.

During this period of time, the parasites spread throughout the apartment, spreading across the surface of the poisoned floor and receiving their dose of poison. Young individuals die 2 weeks after disinfestation; larvae hatching from eggs also die. If capsule preparations were used during processing, the shelf life is extended by 30 days. These drugs have a longer duration of activity and can act for a long time.

Don't panic if the insects appear again after treatment; wait another 2 weeks.

Repeated treatment with stronger poisons is carried out in the following cases:

• new bites constantly appear on the skin;
• the habitat has changed: insects have moved from the bedroom to the living room or children's room;
• infection occurred again at home: through ventilation or through clothing;
• self-hypnosis in the subconscious - it seems to apartment owners that the pests have not disappeared anywhere.

If you do not follow pest control rules, not all eggs will die the first time. Possibly improper preparation or loss of the nest while spraying the poison. The second option is that they did wet cleaning too quickly, the poison did not work.

If the sofa is old, you can treat bedbugs with a more effective method: you need to remove the upholstery, after treating the upholstered furniture, it is thrown away along with the new material.

Survivors develop immunity to the drugs, which is passed on to their offspring. Secondary disinsection is carried out in several stages, and this is best done by professionals. The algorithm looks like this:

• the level of infection is assessed;
• the most dangerous areas are identified;
• food and personal belongings are removed from the room;
• small children, animals and adults, except for the exterminator, leave the apartment;
• furniture moves to the center of the room; passages to the walls must be open;
• the chemical composition is prepared;
• spraying is in progress.

The specialist closes the windows tightly, the room can be ventilated after 3 hours (according to the instructions). Additionally, wet cleaning is carried out.

This method allows you to permanently clean furniture from parasites.

Clue! A few days after the procedure, the room will need to be cleaned - the insects will come out of their hiding place and die. You can use a vacuum cleaner to collect dead or half-dead bloodsuckers.