Good night, sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite! I am sure we have all heard this from our parents at bedtime or we might use this line on our children now. But we don’t literally mean it, we are just trying to be cute and wish them a restful night sleep. Well that has all changed with the latest news on bed bug infestations! Recent headlines have been announcing that bed bugs have been found in New York buildings, stores, prestigious hotels and theaters…

Pretty gross, huh? What’s worse is that this widespread issue is not simply a matter of cleanliness; one can even hitchhike home with you from a trip.

Bed bugs were common in the U.S. before World War II and became rare after widespread use of the pesticide DDT began in the 1940s and 1950s. They remained prevalent in other areas of the world and, in recent years, have been increasingly observed again in the U.S. Increases in immigration and travel from developing countries as well as restrictions on the use of chemical pesticides may be factors that have led to the relatively recent increase in bed bug infestations. We even ran an article about this in the March/April 2009 issue of the FMJ titled “Don’t Let the Bed Bugs Bite”.

What specifically sparked my interest on this subject was a story I saw on TV the other night.  I don’t remember what I was watching or what channel it was but what caught my eye was the use of trained bed bug sniffing dogs to detect bed bug infestations. Once the dog’s job was done and an infestation was detected, pest control professionals would then take over and use a method of heating up a house to high temperatures using special heaters in order to kill the bugs. We usually hear of trained drug sniffing dogs but I never thought there would be trained ones for bed bugs. According to Wikipedia, Bed bug detection dogs are trained to pinpoint infestations, with an accuracy of 97.5%, and are often able to do this within minutes as opposed to a pest control practitioner who may need an hour.[76][7] In the United States, about 100 dogs are used to find bedbugs as of mid-2009.[77]  What I also found interesting was the heating method used to kill the bugs.  I am familiar with the use of pest control chemicals but increasing the temperature of a physical area to deal with these pests never occurred to me. Then again, it does make sense since one of the tips to prevent bed bugs in the first place is to always wash bed sheets in hot water.

Check out the Bed Bug Hub http://www.pestworld.org/bed-bugs created by the National Pest Management Association for everything bed bug related!

DM