Bed Bugs Treatment Guide

You might especially suspect bedbugs if:

* You or someone in your family has traveled recently, since bedbugs can invade your luggage or crawl onto your clothing in an infested hotel/motel room. Always keep your luggage off the floor of a hotel/motel room!

*You recently bought a used mattress or other used furniture.

*You live in an apartment building or college dorm, where bedbugs could have infested another apartment/dorm-room and have moved over into yours.

*You or someone in your family finds new unexplained bites each night. Having a dog with fleas,or living in an area at high risk for mosquitoes, might explain the bites, but in the absence of mosquitoes and fleas one might well suspect bedbugs.

*Carefully inspect seams or crevices of a mattress or box spring, check along the edge of carpeting,behind picture frames, and hiding inside recesses of furniture. You may need to take the furniture apart as much as possible, and in the end your may have to hire a professional exterminator.

Before you consult a professional you should conduct your own inspection/eradication operation.

Vacuum daily.
Vacuuming is your #1 tool to suck up bedbugs and the dirt that provides them shelter. Bedbugs are not attracted to clutter or dirt per se, but to the sanctuary filthy conditions provide. They are just as happy to to hide in the light fixtures of a McMansion bedroom as in the clothing of a homeless rummy.

Armed with a flashlight and a vacuum cleaner, your personal bedbug vendetta begins. Start with a thorough vacuuming of the furniture. Turn all your mattresses, box springs, armchairs and other furniture in every direction, vacuuming the entire surface area and crevices. Concentrate on creases, folds, seams, and under buttons and tufts. Do this with every piece of furniture that comes into your home, whether it is new or used.

Take your vacuum to cracks in bed frames and headboards, and between the cushions of couches and other upholstered furniture. Look for cracks in plaster and vacuum there. If a credit card edge can fit in a crack — so can a bedbug.

Check the folds of curtains and drapery, in the drawers of night stands, dressers, and bureaus. Check for loose wallpaper, which often can host hundreds of the little beasts. Check the backs of wall pictures and posters. Then vacuum the floors, baseboards, under the edges of carpets, around plumbing fixtures — wherever bedbugs can hide.

Empty the vacuum immediately! It would be a good idea to place the vacuum bag in a plastic container and throw it in the freezer for at least 24 hours before disposing.

Bedbugs die in extreme temps, so launder your linens in the hottest temperature possible as is safe, then throw them into a hot dryer. Sheets, pillows, pillowcases, bed skirts and blankets, comforters can all take the heat, but the bedbug cannot! Conversely, go ahead and bag your clothing and throw into the freezer for more than a day — that’ll fix any bedbug as well.

Steam-cleaning is also an effective way to kill bedbugs.

Another important preventative measure is to move the bed away from the walls. Try to keep as much clutter away from the bed as possible — all those toys and stuff under your child’s bed is a prime staging ground for nocturnal attacks on your child’s skin. Make sure that bedding doesn’t touch the floor.

Seal any crevices you find, repair loose wallpaper, caulk around pipes and electrical conduits, tighten electrical switch plates. For travel both domestic and international, at a minimum keep your clothing and your luggage off the floor. You might be well served if you travel armed with the proper tools — a flashlight and a hand-held vacuum. Do the same inspection in your hotel room as you do in your own home!

Related posts:

1. How Can You Tell If Your Rash Is From Bedbugs?

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