A bed or house bug is a small insect (on average 1 - 3 mm) light or dark Brown. In the photo you can see what a blood-sucking linen bug looks like. The triangular head is small in size compared to the body. The insect is not capable of flight, but moves both horizontally and vertically. vertical surfaces very quickly and deftly.

The female is always larger than the male. The body of an insect in a hungry state is flat, flattened, almost transparent, no more than 1 mm long. Once a couch bug has attached itself to human skin, it does not stop feeding until it becomes spherical. The body becomes red with blood and increases in size to 8 mm.

A bug can live without food for about six months. The total lifespan of one individual is one year. The insect is extremely prolific. One female is capable of laying up to 500 eggs in her life, each of which has a high chance of survival at home. A week later, voracious larvae hatch from the laid clutch, whose lifestyle is no different from adult individuals. The photo shows a female and larvae close-up.

Types of bedbugs

Bedbugs are a suborder of coleopteran insects. Species diversity there are a lot of them. Over 12,000 species of these insects live in Russia. For the most part, they are completely harmless to humans. There are also beneficial bugs in nature: Podisus, which eats Colorado potato beetles, flower bugs and soldier bugs, which destroy the larvae of garden pests.

The only type that sucks blood is the bedbug. This is the correct biological name, although they are popularly called linen, household, room, furniture and even sofa. These are not varieties, but simply different names for the same insect, which can be different sizes and shades of color.

The pest received such a variety of names because of its ability to settle in cracks in wall plaster, seams in bed linen, sofa upholstery, mattresses, and furniture joints. A bedbug is often called another insect - a louse, which is not related to the bedbug family. The photo shows a furniture bug that has spent several months without food.

How do bedbugs get into the house?

• through cracks, ventilation from one apartment to another due to the ability to move quickly (an adult overcomes 1.25 m in a minute);
• together with used furniture, especially sofas and mattresses;
• blood-sucking animals are often carried by long-haired domestic animals;
• bed linen, in particular, the seams of pillowcases and duvet covers.

Signs of the presence of bedbugs in the house

Often the insect moves along the ceiling, hovering above the sleeping person in bed and falling from there onto the skin. At first, when a person sees a bite in the morning, he thinks that he was bitten by a mosquito. When the population has grown, it is no longer possible not to notice the aliens.

The main signs of bed bugs appearing in a house:

• the bites are not single, but form a trail of small wounds;
• around the bug puncture on the skin a swelling forms with a lump in the center;
• toxins injected by insects into the blood of a sleeping person cause a typical allergic reaction in the form of burning and itching;
• Tiny blood stains often remain on the bed;
• places where insects accumulate (often under wallpaper on the walls) are contaminated with their excrement in the form of microscopic black dots;
• Pests can also be detected by the remains of the quinine coating, which they shed during molting;
• bedbugs have a specific smell - some call it cognac, while others think it is the aroma of rotten raspberries.

Where can bedbugs live in an apartment?

Indoor bugs usually live in clusters, forming nests. These are peculiar colonies in which insects of several generations live. There are clutches, larvae, adults, remains of the chiton shed during molting, and excrement. Such clusters look terrible. They create a feeling of dirt.

Harm of bedbugs to humans

• psychological;
• biochemical.

The psychological damage caused by these insects is enormous. A person sleeps poorly, he is irritated, his performance decreases, and sometimes the living conditions seem unbearable.

Biochemical harm is as follows:

• When a bedbug bites, it injects poisonous toxins into the sleeping person's blood. The body develops a response to them. Histamines are activated, antibodies are produced, and inflammatory process. The area around the bite turns red, swells, and excited nerve receptors cause a burning sensation and itching.
• In some people, the reaction may be several times greater than normal. An allergy develops that requires medication.
• When scratching bites, infection can easily occur and secondary inflammation occurs.
• A small child who is constantly bitten by bedbugs risks a decrease in blood quality, including the development of anemia.

How to recognize a bedbug bite and what to do?

Bedbug bites are easy to recognize and distinguish from mosquito or flea bites. The bug, unlike other insects, makes several punctures in the skin, leaving a characteristic trail of tiny wounds (see photo). The bite points are located 2–3 cm apart, as in the photograph. After some time, a small blister with a bulge in the center forms around the puncture. The photo shows what the bites look like enlarged.

As soon as traces of bites of blood-sucking insects are discovered, it is necessary to take the same measures as for a mosquito or bee bite:

Control methods and prevention

People have been fighting bedbugs for centuries. There are a few folk recipes getting rid of such a scourge, which can also be used as an excellent prevention:

The most effective method is chemical treatment of the apartment. Before carrying out it, it is necessary to prepare the room:

• hide dishes and food;
• remove all textiles from windows and furniture;
• remove pets and aquarium fish from the home during treatment;
• do wet cleaning.

Chemicals are best purchased in the form of sprays. “Dichlorvos”, “Chlorophos”, “Karbofos”, which have proven themselves well in past years, have now been replenished with new ones effective insecticides: “Executioner”, “Combat”, “Mikrofos”.

All chemicals are quite toxic to humans. Most of them have hazard class 3. Before using them, you should carefully study the description (instructions) and strictly follow its instructions. When processing, you need to spray the spray on the following surfaces:

• sofa and mattress – Special attention pay attention to seams, bends, cracks;
• seams and peeling fragments of wallpaper on the walls;
• windows and window sills;
• baseboards;
• ventilation grilles - it is very important to treat them with an insecticide so that insects cannot escape to the neighbors and then return again.

To ensure safety during chemical treatment of an apartment, you should wear a respirator, rubber gloves and safety glasses. After spraying, the room should be well ventilated for several hours (preferably with a draft) and left for 3 days, after which proceed with spring cleaning. All dishes should be washed, the sofa and bed should be vacuumed and washed detergent, wipe all surfaces with a damp cloth, wash windows and floors.

Bedbugs have enough interesting appearance, since it constantly changes depending on living conditions and the degree of saturation. This leads to people confusing them with lice, cockroaches and even mites.

A distinctive feature of apartment bugs is that they are not able to form colonies with clear and demarcated structures. Despite this, they live in clusters, nests consisting of adult and active insects, ripening eggs and larvae.

Young larvae, or nymphs, have a light color, but if they are hungry, they become translucent. As for the older larvae, they are practically no different from the adult individual.

To find a cluster of bedbugs in an apartment, you should carefully inspect the following places:

There is a fairly simple and interesting test for detecting bedbugs in your own home. To do this, turn on the light at three or four o'clock in the morning. At this moment, you will notice insects that scatter very quickly different sides beds. Considering the fact that the speed of movement of bedbugs is very high, everything is done extremely quickly.

Baseboards, corners, the floor under the closet and bed, sofa are subject to detailed inspection. For these purposes you will need a broom. It is enough to sweep away the garbage and inspect its contents. If there are dark spots that look like poppy seeds, you should sound the alarm and take emergency measures. If there are carpets on the walls and floors, they should be moved away, as there may be rich concentrations of bloodsuckers underneath them.

There is no point in fighting bedbugs without knowing the cause of their appearance. Achieve positive result This is only possible if the source of contamination of the apartment or house is clarified. Bed bugs enter a home in the following cases:

To protect yourself and your home from bedbugs, you must maintain cleanliness, carry out preventative measures and be extremely careful.

What does a domestic bed bug look like, photo

It is quite easy to distinguish a bedbug from all the others, since it has many characteristic features. Despite this, all bedbugs have a number of specific signs. Basically it is a clear pattern located in the abdomen, wings and an angular body that hides under the wings.

A distinctive feature of a bed bug can be considered the absence of wings and patterns, and the body shape is more rounded, there is a clear, pronounced segmentation structure. Domestic bed bugs have eyes on the sides of their heads, a proboscis and fairly long antennae that provide blood feeding.

Appearance of eggs and larvae

The scientific name for larvae is nymphs. The main difference from an adult individual can be considered the inability to reproduce and smaller size, as well as more light shade. If the larvae are hungry, they may become transparent, but after feeding, a distinct drop of blood can be seen inside the abdomen.

Lesions occur only along one line; five punctures can be found every three centimeters.

That is why peculiar paths are formed on the human body, along which bedbugs can be identified.

The appearance of the bite is similar to a small red spot, in which there is a clear point and swelling in the very center. The main bite areas can be considered the neck, legs and arms.

If a person sleeps completely naked, then bites occur on the back and stomach. The swelling goes away on its own if you don’t scratch it with your hands.

Why you need to take action

How to get rid of bedbugs at home

Physical way:

1. Exposure to low temperatures from −20 degrees. As for freezing, this is suitable for winter period. For this purpose, you need to leave the room for half a day, turning off the heating and opening all the windows. A description of this method is floating around the Internet, but, unfortunately, it has no practical meaning. Since it does not in any way guarantee the killing of insects, and in the worst case, it also threatens to defrost the elements of the heating system.
2. Influence high temperatures from +40 degrees. In this case, you should start washing curtains, linen and clothes, toys in hot water followed by careful ironing, especially all seams.

The chemical method suggests using some pesticides. The most effective are crayons, gels, sprays, pastes and aerosols: Get, Executioner, Forsyth, Raid and Raptor, Karbofos, and Mashenka.

You can use available tools and prepare complex but very effective solutions:

• turpentine, camphor and ethyl alcohol;
• benzene, naphthalene and denatured alcohol;
• phenol, turpentine, and salicylic acid.

In combination with the proposed options, you can use folk remedies that will help achieve a quick, lasting effect. To combat bed bugs, you can use valerian tincture and vinegar essence, some essential oils, namely mint and rosemary, tansy and cloves, which are used to treat the corresponding areas of the room.

To summarize, it should be noted that the most effective way is a banal call to a service that professionally deals with insect baiting.

Prevention of insects

Prevention measures:

• seal any gaps located near the pipelines;
• do not allow the wallpaper to peel off;
• always check new furniture, purchased soft toys;
• do not forget about regular, thorough cleaning;
• carry out systematic inspection of bed linen and beds;
• inspect things after hospital, vacation, business trip.

Content

Bed bug

What does a bed bug look like?

On the head of the insect there is a proboscis of a unique structure: through one of its channels, saliva with anesthesia is injected into the victim’s body, and through the other, blood is drawn. The body structure is peculiar:

1. Wings are missing.
2. There are visible stripes on the body, the abdomen is divided into segments.
3. The body is so flat that the insect is difficult to grasp.
4. The appearance of the bug's body is changeable. A hungry person has a rounded body, while a well-fed one the body doubles in length.
5. The color of the body changes as it becomes saturated: from light red to black.
6. The adult is about 4 mm long.

Kinds

Development cycle

The larvae appear on the 3-4th day, they are similar to the adult, differ in size, color and inability to produce an anesthetic secretion when bitten. As the larva grows, it changes its now small shell five times every week. After the fifth “change of clothes” the size of an adult is reached, the insect is able to reproduce.

• of their own free will, they are able to migrate from neighbors when the population grows or during disinfestation;
• accidentally, when a person or pet carries an insect into the home on themselves or in things.

• resting places in the house (there may be bedbugs in beds, mattresses, sofas);
• furniture (closets full of clothes, bedside tables, tables, chairs, soft chairs) as the colony grows;
• walls, floor, ceiling (plinths, peeling wallpaper, curtains, carpets, paintings, sockets, etc.). Settles into any crevices, cracks, hard-to-reach places.

How do bedbugs bite?

They rarely attack domestic animals; they prefer to bite the thin skin of humans and feed on human blood. Bed bugs bite the victim in the bed at night carefully and consistently. More than 70% of victims of bed bug bites do not feel the bites, thanks to the introduction of an analgesic into the insects' blood. Bloodsuckers make a series of punctures, the bites look like a red carpet in the morning. The body's reaction to bedbugs can be as follows:

• normal – itching, redness and swelling;
• complicated – inflammation at the site of the bite when scratching, deterioration of health, allergic reactions, psychological discomfort (fear of going to bed, sleep disturbances, nervousness).

What do bedbugs carry?

How to get rid of bed bugs

• The chemical method has proven itself to be effective and quick remedy struggle. You can treat with insecticides yourself.
• Temperature methods are effective, but technically complex. Bloodsuckers are sensitive to external temperatures, hibernate at 15 degrees, and die at temperatures above 49 °C. For this reason, industrial hair dryers or heat generators are used, the room is subjected to freezing during low temperatures air outside.
• Traditional methods repel insects without destroying them. Suitable for preventing infection of an apartment, as an ambulance, while awaiting serious sanitization of the premises.

Synthetic products

• Gels - they are safe and effective. These are the drugs “Absolut”, “Globol (Globol)”, “Forssythe”, “Eslanadez gel”.
• Liquid products, are very effective, available in microencapsulated form (“Minap-22”, “Xulat S25”, “Mikrofos+”, etc.) and as emulsion concentrates (“Forsyth”, “Get”, “Lakterin”, “Foxit” ", "Primadid", "Aktellik").
• Aerosols are easy to use and give quick results (“Dichlorvos”, “Raptor”, “Combat”, “Prima-U”, “Reid”, “Carbozol”, “Perfos-P”, etc.).
• Powders are less toxic to people and animals, have a prolonged effect (Riapan, Neopin).?

GEKTOR against bed bugs

New generation drug main feature which has a unique operating principle: powder particles, sticking to the insect, suck out all the liquid from it within an hour. In this case, the insect cannot resist the drug, since its action is based on “mechanical action”. The composition does not contain toxic chemicals that can harm people and animals, which makes it possible to use it without fear for the health of apartment residents. In addition to its effectiveness and safety, GEKTOR is odorless, and to use it, you just need to cut off the spout of the bottle and spray the contents in places where parasites move and live. In the case of bed bugs, these are the joints of the bed structures, the mattress, the space under the baseboards and other cracks and cracks where bed bugs can be found.

More than 70% of people do not notice the bites of bed bugs, as a result of which the population of the latter in the apartment increases significantly.

The first discomfort appears when there are too many bites, the immune system weakens and allergies begin to appear. Then the question of exterminating bedbugs is acute: this task must be completed as soon as possible safe methods. But this is where the problem arises: there are many ways, but whether they are effective is a completely different question.

Photo of what house bugs (bed bugs) look like

Where do bedbugs come from in the house?

Having found out what pests look like and finding them in his bed, a person wonders where they came from. Many are perplexed: the apartment is clean, and the neighbors do not suffer from this problem. But in fact, dirt and sloppiness of the owners are not a condition for the presence of insects in the apartment. Insects need warmth, a source of food and secluded hiding places, which are easy to find in every home. So where do bedbugs come from? They creep in from neighbors, come with new antique furniture, are carried through clothes from friends, or appear as a result of long-distance migration.

Chemistry and SES against bedbugs

• non-toxic for people and animals;
• have no odor;
• destroy bedbugs for up to 3-6 months (good prevention);
• destruction is possible when people and animals are in the premises;
• easy to use;
• the effect appears instantly.

Folk remedies are the best prevention

Various photos of solutions and how to destroy bedbugs with them can be found on the Internet. Destruction of bedbugs traditional methods useful and effective only when there are not many of them. However, it is better to use them than to do nothing, because bedbug nests are truly terrifying. Many people know how to get rid of bedbugs and eliminate them forever, but they resort to ineffective methods.

The Moscow Sanitary and Epidemiological Station Department of Sanitary and Epidemiological Control gives a 1-year guarantee for the destruction of bedbugs in Moscow! The conclusion of an agreement is mandatory. Call +7 (495) 212-12-27. Consultation is free.

How to get rid of bedbugs at home? No way. Just look at real photographs of bed bug infestations in apartments and houses. Without our experienced disinfector, it is very difficult to cope with such situations on your own. Below are the nests of domestic bugs in the apartment and their photos. If you notice in your apartment something similar to the photo below. There is no doubt that there are bedbugs in the apartment.

How can you tell if there are bedbugs in your house?

Of course, the obvious sign that you have bedbugs in your home is to see them. The photographs of bedbugs presented above clearly demonstrate the situation when bedbugs appear in the house. Carefully inspect your sleeping area, in the most secluded corners, in the joints of the frame, in the seams of the mattress and folds of fabric, you can find them. Also, if the bed is light, then you will find the remains of bed bugs, many black dots. This is also a sure sign. Also, when changing bedding, you can find the remains of chitinous membranes after molting and dead insects. Has it happened to many people that when picking berries, such as raspberries, you accidentally crushed a bug? Remember this smell? So bed bugs smell the same, perhaps less intensely. The smell of bedbugs can also indicate their presence in the room. In America there are even services that search for bedbugs by smell using trained dogs. If you find brown spots, smeared blood and crushed insects on the bed. Then rest assured, these are bedbugs.

Signs of bedbugs in the house

What do bed bugs look like? Photo

People who encounter bedbugs and their bites do not always immediately understand what is happening in their home. Many believe that the cause of the appearance of red spots on the body is an allergy, and they begin to zealously search for the cause. In the early stages of its development, a bed bug can be confused with a small cockroach, flea or tick. Many city residents, far from the world of insects, may first hear about a bed bug at an appointment with an allergist, where they often come for an explanation of the origin of the red spots - bites on their bodies.

It is worth being aware of what bed bugs look like because if they appear, you will not be lost in guessing and waste precious time, but will immediately begin to fight them.

REFERENCE! You can check whether there really are bedbugs in the room or not thanks to simple way. It will be enough to turn on the light in the room in the middle of the night and look around the bed. Having discovered pests, you must immediately begin fighting them.

What is important for successful bed bug control? First of all, you need to know the enemy by sight. We bring to your attention detailed materials about whether bedbugs can live in clothes and what they eat, what to put on the skin to prevent them from biting, how to find and destroy their nests in an apartment, what traditional and folk remedies struggles exist, whether prevention will help avoid the appearance of pests and how to prepare your home for disinfection.

Reproduction and lifespan.

Appearance of bed bugs

What kind of bugs are they?

Soldier bugs that everyone has encountered in forests and parks in spring period They are very similar to bed bugs, the only difference is in color and size. But general appearance Almost all existing bedbugs have a fairly similar pattern. Common features All bedbugs have an oblong body, wings with ornaments and a clearly defined head with a proboscis.

The main features of the structure of bedbugs:

• no wings
• no pattern on the body
• clear separation between head and body

To forever remember what a bedbug looks like, you just have to see it once.

In a state of hunger, a bedbug is flat and light-colored, while a well-fed bedbug is more elongated and convex. A bug that has drunk blood becomes more vulnerable than a hungry bug. It can be crushed in your sleep and easily caught with your hands, which is almost impossible. In order to kill a hungry bug, it must be crushed with something hard. For example, a coin or a nail. Bed bugs have an elongated feeding apparatus on their head. These are the upper and lower jaws, which, as bed bugs evolved, stretched out and took on their real appearance. In the proboscis of a bug there are 2 channels through one the bug injects saliva, through the other it drinks blood. The bug bites through the skin in the immediate vicinity of the capillaries about 4-5 times and drinks blood at each bite site for about 2 minutes. This is how the trail of bites is formed, the main sign that you were bitten by a bug. After satiation, the bug crawls into a quiet, secluded place and the next time it goes hunting in 2-3 days.

The size of bedbugs ranges from 0.5 cm in a state of hunger and can grow, lengthening almost 2 times after saturation. Young bedbugs are almost transparent or give off yellow tint and extremely difficult to distinguish.

What do bed bug larvae look like?

What do bed bug eggs look like?

When examined closely, bedbug eggs and larvae look like small grains of rice, half a millimeter in size. The bug usually lays about 3-5 larvae at a time, and therefore they are quite clearly distinguishable. The larvae are found in the same place where bedbugs hide during the day, along with black dots-cysts (excrement) and skins shed after molting.

Everyone has probably seen an anthill in the forest and watched how hard-working ants drag various twigs and their larvae. So, bedbug larvae are very similar to ant larvae. A newborn bug sometimes resembles a transparent aphid; after a couple of meals and molts, as it grows, the bug begins to darken and becomes more like itself. In the transparent body of young bedbugs you can distinguish a black dot; this is the digestive system filled with blood. If a young bug is hungry, it is completely transparent yellow.

How to distinguish bed bugs from other insects

Differences between bedbugs and cockroaches. What do insects look like?

Bedbugs differ from cockroaches just like cats differ from dogs. Bedbugs have a more rounded and flattened body, they are not as fast and mobile as cockroaches and are 2 times smaller in size. Cockroaches have wings, while bedbugs are wingless. Cockroaches mainly live in common areas - kitchen, bath, corridor, toilet; bedbugs prefer to settle in bedrooms and living rooms. The only thing they have in common is that both insects try not to catch the eye of humans and hide during daylight hours.

Differences between bedbugs and lice

Differences between bedbugs and ticks

Many people think when they notice bites that they are ticks. But bedbugs differ morphologically from ticks. Ticks, like all arachnids, have 8 legs, and bedbugs, like all synanthropes, have 6.

Differences between bedbugs and fleas

Fleas bite mainly on open limbs and during the day, a flea bite is painful because... Unlike a bug, it does not anesthetize the bite site. Fleas are extremely mobile, but bedbugs cannot jump.

The main argument in favor of bedbugs is their characteristic bites in tracks of 4-6 points on the human body. No insect bites so specifically.