Bed Bugs

If you have a bedbug infestation, it’s best to find it early, before the infestation spreads. Treating a minor bedbug  infestation is far less costly and easier than treating the same infestation after it spreads.

Often bites on the skin are a poor indicator of a bed bug infestation. Bed bug bites can look like bites from other insects (such as mosquitoes or chiggers), rashes (such as eczema or fungal infections), or even hives. While some people do not react to bed bug bites at all.

An accurate way to identify a possible infestation is to look for physical signs of bed bugs. When cleaning, changing bedding, or traveling away from home, look for:

• Rusty or reddish stains on bed sheets or mattresses caused by bed bugs being crushed.
• Dark spots (about this size: •), which are bed bug excrement and may bleed on the fabric like a marker would.
• Eggs and eggshells, which are tiny (about 1mm) and pale yellow skins that nymphs shed as they grow larger.
• Live bed bugs.

When bed bugs are not feeding, they can hide in many places. They can be found around the bed, near the piping, seams and tags of the mattress and box springs, and in cracks on the bed frame and headboard.

If a room is heavily infested, you may find bed bugs in the following:

• seams of chairs and couches, between cushions, and in the folds of curtains.
• drawer joints.
• electrical receptacles and appliances.
• Under loose wall paper, behind pictures and wall hangings.
• At the junction where the wall and the ceiling meet.