No one wants to have bed bugs in their Phoenix or Tucson home. Not only are these pests a nuisance, they can impact your family’s health and ability to comfortably sleep. These pests are tiny and could go undetected for a long period of time. Are there signs that you may have bed bugs in your home? Let’s review some key indicators that these rapidly producing pests have made their way into your home.
What are Bed Bugs?
You have likely heard the saying, “Sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite”, but did you really know what that meant? What are bed bugs? Bed bugs are insects that live on the blood of animals and humans and rapidly reproduce, creating major infestations. Adult bed bugs have flat bodies about the size of an apple seed and are a brownish red color. After feeding, bed bugs’ bodies swell and are a reddish color.
Bed bugs do not fly, but they can move quickly over floors, walls, and ceilings. Female bed bugs may lay hundreds of eggs over a lifetime, each of which is about the size of a speck of dust. Under favorable conditions the bugs can develop fully in as little as a month and produce three or more generations per year.
Bed bugs bite to feed and survive. Bed bugs are most active at night and usually bite people while they are sleeping. Bed bugs feed by piercing the skin and withdrawing blood through an elongated beak. Most bed bug bites are painless at first, but later turn into itchy welts. They are unwanted pests in any home or business.
Do I have Bed Bugs in my Home?
Anyone is susceptible to a bed bug infestation. It doesn’t matter if your Phoenix or Tucson, AZ home is big, small, clean, or dirty. There are signs you can watch for that may indicate that you have bed bugs in your home.
- Bite Marks: One of the easiest ways to identify a bed bug infestation is by finding bite marks on your, or your family’s, face, neck, arms, hands, or any other body parts while sleeping. These bite marks may take as long as 14 days to develop in some people, so it is important to look for other clues when determining if bed bugs have infested an area (CDC).
- Finding Bed Bug Exoskeletons: Bed bugs leave behind casings or eggshells. While these are usually small and hard to see, due to their color, they can often be found in clusters. It is unlikely you will see them, but if you do, it’s a sign that you may have bed bugs in your home.
- Visually Seeing these Pests: If you happen to see bed bugs, you obviously have an infestation.
- Look behind picture frames hanging on the wall.
- Check along the edges of the room where the wall meets the floor, as well as in cracks and crevices in the floor.
- Check along the seams of upholstered furniture, not just in the bedroom, but in every room of your house.
- Unscrew outlet covers and check behind them. This is how bed bugs get into the walls and travel from room to room.
- Inspect your mattress seams.
- Discover their Marks: If you notice small brown or tan streaks on your sheets, blankets, pillows, and/or on the mattress or nearby furniture, you likely have bed bugs. Sometimes bed bugs leave excrement behind as they travel over your furniture. Both excrement and blood droplets show up best on light-colored items.
- Use the Sniff Test: If you start smelling a sweet musty odor and have no idea where it is coming from, there could be a bed bug infestation. When bed bugs shed and/or die, they leave behind a distinct musty smell.
Bed bugs breed quickly, so if there are signs that you may have bed bugs in your home, you should contact a professional pest control company right away. Bucksworth Home Services is your trusted bed bug pest control company in Arizona, in the East Valley and beyond. When you have a bed bug problem, contact us. With our 24-Hour Promise, we will be at your home in under 24 hours to fix the problem, and when it comes to bed bugs, the problem cannot wait.
If you find yourself with a bed bug infestation, while you may hope that you can wish the problem away, it isn’t that easy. Trust Bucksworth Home Services to help you eliminate your bed bug problem. Contacting us is the first step to protecting your home and family and getting back to sleeping tight without letting bed bugs bite.