Pictures of Bed bugs on the pillow case hem.

If you have bed bugs you will recognize them by their shape, color and nesting habits. You will note that bed bugs like to nest in places that offer complete or partial covering in locations rarely disturbed. Here is a picture of a new nesting place in some pillows which are not moved very often. A cursory search daily is recommended.

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.

What to do to help stop the itch

Many readers are asking me, fine I got bed bug bites, I know what they look like, but, What do you do to stop the itch?

These instructions are for adults. Parents, use your own discretion when applying salves and balms to your children.

This is the way I have handled it: If there is no mark yet, just a pin-prick like itch, I scratch or rub the whole area until the skin is red. Let's say it is about twenty scratches' worth. The reason for doing this is because it activates the skin's natural repair responses. The tiny pin sized red spots show up within a minute. Now that you know where they are, do the following.

Option One: Rub the strongest rubbing alcohol on the spots. I have a handy spray bottle, one I got empty and clean from the dollar store which I fill with 99% rubbing alcohol. I spray the area with this and then rub it in.

(The reason I have it in a spray bottle is because bed bugs die on contact with it so it makes a good general spray when I see them live. That is another story.)

Option Two: A decent topical Cortizone cream does wonders. I apply it on all the red spots daily until the lesion is gone or stops being itchy. Also anything you would use to reduce the swelling on a pimple that contains a salicate, or salicilic acid is also perfect for bites.

Option Three: Mopiko, a Japanese ointment, if you can get it is great for insect bites. Due to the camphor content do not use on children two or younger. Tiger Balm will also work.

Option Four: Baking Soda wash. If you have scratched till bleeding you would not want to apply a salve or alcohol on the lesion without calming it down with a baking soda wash. 1 tblsp of soda to a cup of warm water. Dissolve and apply with a cotton ball or wash cloth gently.

Leave comments if you have any other tricks.

Bed Bug Humor: An Honest "Apartment for Rent" Sign.

Come Live where Bed Bugs Thrive! This is Your Chance to Rent and Share Your Space with that infamous biter. Wake in the middle of the night scratching! Wonder what bit you! Complain about it at work! Drive yourself insane searching for where in the thousands of cracks, crevices and nooks supplied in this old 1940's charmer they might be living! (Don't forget to examine the insulation between the walls!) Don't miss out! Rent today! What are you waiting for? Call now!

What's Biting You Guide Coming Soon!

Get your copy of the What's Biting You? guide and find out what is causing your horrible rashes. No sense treating for bed bugs if your problem is fleas! Get the answers to your most burning questions:

• Are these bites or just a rash?
• Why do I get these bites and my partner doesn't?
• How can you tell the difference? 
• Can you tell from the bite alone? 
• What about the location of the bite? 
• And the color markings around the bite zone? 
• Is it red because of scratching?
• Am I just going crazy?

"Look, I keep getting these tiny bite marks, two little punctures right beside each other. Could they be spider bites?"

Inside the Guide you will get:

-- Descriptions and photo examples of the red spots and marks that you can compare yours marks too.
-- Ways to trap whatever may be biting you to find out if it is a bug or what.
-- Steps towards taking care of the problem once you have determined what it is.

"I got my place sprayed three times for bugs and even sprayed my own can of spray everywhere only to find out I did not have bugs at all -- I was allergic to my laundry soap! I am glad that was all it was!"

How to Pre - Order: Click on the link below. It will take you to PayPal where you can take care of the payment, You will be added to the newsletter list and then we will notify you by email when the book is available and how to get it downloaded. It Is as Easy as That!

Normally $9.99 this book can be pre-ordered now for just $3.99


Guarantee Your 100% satisfaction is guaranteed. Not happy with your purchase? I will return every penny you paid for the book. But I am sure you will love it. What a relief it will be to finally identify what creature is biting you so you can finally take care of the problem once and for all!!!


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Note: If you prefer to pay the full price please do so here!

A Great Bedbugs and Skin Problems Picture Site

Recently, I found a great site with good information that I thought I would recommend. It is at MedicineNet.com.

It shows pictures of other skin irritations so you can compare between them and identify what your "red spots" could be. What is important in identifying what the mystery itchy red marks are is eliminating what it is not.

Here is a list of links that open in a new page up at MedicineNet.com, a reliable site for medical information. There are hundreds of slideshows, photos and articles which I have sifted through to pick out only the ones relative to identifying skin problems.

Here they are:

Itch Mite (Scabies)

Head Lice

Psoriasis

Nerve Pain (itching with no lesion)

Bad Bugs (bugs and their bite)

Ring worm

Bed Bugs

Childhood skin Problems

Spiders (black widow & brown recluse)

Lyme desease

Boils

Skin Cancer

Skin gallery

Bed Bug Article

Skin Primer, Part 1

Since Bed Bugs feed by inserting their beak into the skin, I thought a primer on skin would be good.

This diagram image from Kidshealth.org shows a cutting of skin.

My questions are:

1. What does the skin emit that lets the bed bug know skin is near?
2. How deeply does the bed bug beak have to penetrate to get blood?
3. Can bed bugs bite through a layer of material?
4. How thick would the material have to be before the bed bug cannot penetrate the skin?

What skin emits:

From cosmetic sites I found out that skin actually does not breathe, so it does not emit carbon dioxide or any other waste gasses per se. However the sweat glands release salt, water and toxins, and the oil gland releases oil. When we sweat, as in during a work out, ketones get released in the sweat, a by product of breaking down fat. What does get emitted is infrared radiation.

How deeply a bed bug has to penetrate to reach blood:

Here is an image of the bed bug's mouthpiece from bed-bug.org:

What we need is a measurement.

To quote directly mdconsult.com (Ferri: Ferri's Clinical Advisor 2011, 1st ed.)

A bedbug’s bite is a wound caused by the penetration of the bedbug mouthpiece into the skin as the insect feeds on blood from vessels or extravasated blood from the damaged surrounding tissue.

Do they need to hit a capillary or a vein? Does breaking the skin, the outer layer cause bleeding?

To find out more I had to get more technical. The mouthpeice is called a "haustellum"which is defined as

haus·tel·lum/hôˈsteləm/ Noun: The sucking organ or proboscis of an insect or crustacean. (wikipedia - Merriam-Webster The Free Dictionary)

In looking for information about how deeply a bed bug has to insert the haustellum to get blood I came across an interesting examination of a tic-like blood sucking insect called a Ked engorging a mouse ear.

Melophagus ovinus: Feeding mechanism on transilluminated mouse ear

W.A. Nelsona and Denis M. Petrunia1,

Veterinary-Medical Entomology Section, Research Station, Canada Department of Agriculture, Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada

Abstract

Melophagus ovinus (L.), the sheep ked, when fed on a mouse ear, is a vessel feeder (solenophage). The haustellum of the ked penetrated the skin through the stratum corneum by rapid eversion of the prestomal teeth reinforced by pressure on the haustellum. It probed the subepidermal tissue with a reciprocating motion, accompanied by continuous activity of the prestomal teeth. When the labella contacted a venule of 30–100 μ, they immediately penetrated it, the prestomal teeth everted and anchored the labella to the vessel wall. Sucking of blood followed immediately and engorgement was complete within 5–10 minutes. Bursts of saliva were seen entering the vessel four or five times during engorgement. Sheep skin biopsy material containing the haustellum indicated that the ked fed from venules near the level of the apocrine glands and bases of wool follicles. Previous work is discussed in relation to these results.

Prestomal teeth. Labella. Bursts of saliva. This is what is happening folks!

I learned from cirrusimage.com/bedbug that

"[Bed Bug] mouthparts are modified for piercing and sucking.....Bed bugs grasp human skin with their forelegs, pierce the skin, and inject anticoagulant and anesthetic-containing saliva." 

which pretty well describes the above quote about the ked. The Cimex family (bed bugs) are also solenophages.

The stratum corneum (n. , pl. , strata cornea) is the horny outer layer of the epidermis, consisting mainly of dead or peeling cells, as per answers.com. I gather that the mouthpiece only needs to penetrate the outer dead skin layer, which, according to en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/437704 is between .01 and .04 mm depending on the "grip requirements" (e.g. the palm or sole of the feet, it is thicker.) They provide this image of skin layers:

I have never felt bitten on the sole of my feet or on my palm so by this I see they prefer the thinner layer areas on the body.

Can Bed Bugs bite through a layer of material?:

Yes, they can.

How thick does it have to be so that the mouthpiece does not reach the skin?


I do not know yet, however in one experiment I have attempted to do with trapped bed bugs in a bottle is to cover the bottle opening with material and press this up against my skin and see how long it takes for the bed bugs to realize there is skin under there and to see if they take interest and try to bite.

This is how I got onto this line of questioning which is far from answered.