Should I Throw Out the Couch?

Visitors are asking, if they have bed bugs, should they throw out their couch, or their bed?

The answer depends on circumstances.

When you discover you have bed bugs, the temptation is to throw everything out, which is fine, but do not bring in new furniture until the bugs are gone from your home. In most cases it is possible to clean the bed bugs from the furniture while you are treating the home against them.

But if you are insistent at throwing it out, for example the bed or the chair or the sofa or the couch could be the only thing that is infested or it is so badly infested you cannot imagine clearing it of bed bugs, and if so, please do throw it out.

If you decide to toss the items, to ensure that you do not spread the bed bugs around to others, take the following precautions:

• Contact your municipality to let them know you are throwing out a big item and that it is infested with bed bugs so they send the proper collection service. 
• Also paste a big sign on it "Bed Bugs!" warning pickers from taking it home with the bed bugs.
• Try to put it out on a sunny day, because the bugs will dehydrate with the heat and it will be less likely they will survive a hike to the nearest building.
• Also, put the item at least five feet away from the building so they don't have access to returning.

If you decide to treat the couch or bed, there are a number of steps to go through which I will go into in a separate posting, but I will share a really easy one:

Put the furniture out in the baking sun for a day.