Bed bugs are on the rise in Australia. Some scientists believe there has been a 5 000 fold increase in numbers, partly because of cheaper travel.
Bed bugs usually enter a property on clothing, luggage, or furniture. The most common way to bring bed bugs into your home is to stay in a hotel with an infestation. Bed bugs, or their eggs, get into clothing or suitcases and wait for you to take them home.
The best way to avoid bringing them home, is to not bring dirty washing home with you. Bed bugs don’t need people to live on. They’ll happy feed on the things they find in your dirty clothes.
Bed bugs (Cimex lectularius or Cimex hemipterus) are oval, wingless insects and are rusty brown in colour. They ared around 4 to 5 mm long when fully grown, and can swell up to 7mm after feeding.
Bed bugs are blood feeding insects that prefer to bite humans and generally feed at night when people are in bed.
Thanks to their size, bed bugs will hide (and lay eggs) in a variety of household objects close to where humans sleep such as mattresses, bed frames, furniture, behind skirting boards, loose wallpaper and floorboards, and in cracks and crevices of walls.
Bed bugs generally feed at night, which makes them harder to spot, but will come out to feed during the day if they are particularly hungry.
Scary fact: Adult bugs are able to survive more than a year without a blood meal.
Bed bugs usually enter a property on clothing, luggage, or furniture. The most common way to bring bed bugs into your home is to stay in a hotel with an infestation. Bed bugs, or their eggs, get into clothing or suitcases and wait for you to take them home.
The best way to avoid bringing them home, is to not bring dirty washing home with you. Bed bugs don’t need people to live on. They’ll happy feed on the things they find in your dirty clothes.
Bed bugs (Cimex lectularius or Cimex hemipterus) are oval, wingless insects and are rusty brown in colour. They ared around 4 to 5 mm long when fully grown, and can swell up to 7mm after feeding.
Bed bugs are blood feeding insects that prefer to bite humans and generally feed at night when people are in bed.
Thanks to their size, bed bugs will hide (and lay eggs) in a variety of household objects close to where humans sleep such as mattresses, bed frames, furniture, behind skirting boards, loose wallpaper and floorboards, and in cracks and crevices of walls.
Bed bugs generally feed at night, which makes them harder to spot, but will come out to feed during the day if they are particularly hungry.
Scary fact: Adult bugs are able to survive more than a year without a blood meal.
How do I know I have bed bugs?
 | Bed bugs are hard to spot because of their size and where they like to hide. The most common way you’ll know you have them is through their continuous biting and irritation. Some people do not react to bed bug bites, some feel immediate discomfort and struggle to sleep, while others show a delayed response of up to nine days. Severe bed bug infestations can often have a distinctive sickly sweet smell and/or blood spotting on the mattresses, bedding or nearby furniture. Good news: While bed bugs can be quite irritating, they are not known to transmit disease. |
How do I control bed bugs?
Since bed bugs can live more than a year without blood, treating infested areas including all possible hiding places should be treated with an appropriate insecticide and by a professional.
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As always, when in doubt, please call Tammy or myself and we will help you confirm if your home is infested with bed bugs.
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