BEDBUG HELP

[Lotusflower92]

Hello

ive just changed my dc’s bed and asked my husband to lift her mattress while I hoover under the bed and I found what looked like a bedbug on the side of her fitted sheet. I inspected both the sheets and the mattress and couldn’t find any marks that would indicate bed bugs. It’s a brand new mattress (pocket sprung) her bed is next to a wall. I ironed all corners of her mattress to see if more surfaced and they didn’t but now I’m in a real panic.

the bug had 6 legs and was red with a black mark and survived the hoover so I tipped it out and photographed it (it lost its legs in the process)

Help! Thankyou

Definitely looks like one to me. I've had unfortunately had a couple deals with these little darlings. Personally I would book a house spray with a pest control company if you can and buy some Zero in (we found this very helpful) that you can spray on all beds once a month once you have eliminated them. Hoovering everywhere will help, do not move out of the bedroom/get rid of mattresses etc as that can spread them around the house. If you have a steamer that can help too especially if your daughter has a head board.

Thanks so much! I was looking at getting someone round tomorrow to do a heat treatment..do you think this would be affective? I’m presuming since this one is quite large there must be more hiding somewhere?

Funny you say this my husband is a pest controller and just had an emergency bed bugs job this evening

You need proper pesticide he says- leave the room to dry for eight hours. Only effective treatment. Could be between £130-65

We had both the spray treatment (didn't completely irradicate the problem) and the heat treatment which did instantly- would strongly recommend the heat treatment. I feel for you. It happened to us just before the pandemic (son brought them home from college dorms, unfortunately he doesn't react to the bites so didn't realise) and honestly, from a personal point of view I coped with lockdown better than getting rid of those bastards.

oh really? Could you ask him whether we should get the heat treatment done tomorrow? I can’t find any signs of bed bugs at all aside from that one bed bug..but it did look like an adult

Thanks so much, I will definitely book this in for tomorrow! We live in central London and use the tube regularly so it’s not surprising really

Get someone round. They will be expert in finding eggs, so can give you lots of tips.

Clothes which cannot be washed at high temperatures can be put in the freezer for a few days.

Good you spotted it early if it is a bedbug, before things got out of hand. Was the mattress delivered in a van that also coned old ones they were removing?

I’m not sure to be honest, but it’s the first pocket sprung mattress we’ve had and I’ve just read that bed bugs like them 😖

You can buy mattress covers that are bed bug proof. They enclose the bugs within so they'll die as they can't feed, and any outside will be killed by heat or insecticide depending upon which treatment you opt for.

Thank you! I’ve just bought for all beds!

They can be quite resilient, so keep checking once you have had the treatment.
I have so far had 2 treatments which combined steam and chemicals, and we are still finding juvenile bed bugs.

We’ve had them. Drove me insane. We used a pest control guy recommended by someone on here. I’d totally recommend him- gives a guarantee for his work. So far we are bug free. www.bed-bug-experts.co.uk

What do you look out for ? I haven’t noticed anything at all that would have indicated bed bugs apart from this one bed bug I found tonight while changing my daughters sheets

Thankyou! Will call them in the morning

Get someone out to inspect first, I convinced myself I had bedbugs after finding a bug that looked like that and had an inspection and luckily I was bed bug free. some bugs can look very similar to a bed bug.

Did you find out what bug you had? I’m going to call the above recommendation tomorrow as they do inspections and treatments straight after if needed

We did a full house spray and basically couldn't hoover for 3 weeks while it killed everything. We would have done heat treatment after if that hadn't worked but it did. They multiply quick so definitely will be more somewhere. They loved our headboard. .

If you're in London, your local council will offer the service for a much lower cost.

We had them last year. DS was waking up every day with 1-2 bites. Only ever saw 1 dead bug after treatment, not sure if there were more.

We are! Thankyou I will give them a call

Hi @Lotusflower92 and @LumpyandBumps . Did you both manage to sort out the bedbugs?

We are three steam and chemical treatments down and have started getting very small bites again and this is usually how it begins for us.

Bedbug experts were recommended by a couple of people here. (Thank you sm33) Did you go with them or another company? Would be grateful to know how you managed to solve the issue! Thank you!

I tried the council - also in London. Guess a different borough because they were useless

We’re still battling. Two steam and chemical treatments, foggers and more chemicals. We thought we’d won the battle for several months but they seemed to appear again with the warmer weather.
We used a specialist company, and they are the ones our council contracts for their properties.
We did everything we were told. Washed bedding on hot cycle, moved stuff into centre of rooms ( rooms are not cluttered), hoovered to re invigorate chemicals. I have no idea why it hasn’t worked.

@LumpyandBumps oh no! Sorry to hear this. Who did you go with and do you know what chemical they are using? When was your last treatment and do you have a guarantee. Lots of companies are happy to come back. Fingers crossed it gets resolved for you.

There seem to have been a lot of bedbug threads so far this summer, they must be having a bit of a surge.

We eventually got rid of ours in 2019 using CimeXa which is a helluva lot less harmful and more effective than chemical pesticides. It works in a similar way to diatomaceous earth - i.e. it dries them out - but it works a lot faster. The trouble with DE is it takes about 10 days to kill them and until adulthood they moult every 3 or so days, each time getting a new, undamaged exoskeleton and so a fresh start. After their final moult DE will kill them in 10 days but they can mate and lay a lot of eggs in that time. CimeXa takes about 2 days, so effectively breaks the cycle.

They've got it on Amazon at the moment. It's pricey but worth it, we got through about 1/4 of the tub to treat a 3 bed house. Once it's applied it lasts indefinitely so I now leave all the beds in a pre-treated state for peace of mind.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Rockwell-2513-CimeXa-Insecticide-Dust/dp/B01FY3RZAA

Watch some YT videos for how to apply it.

Hi @Scooby2024 . Who resolved bedbugs for you? Would you recommend the company? Thanks!