Bed bugs and their bites

 

Among all human parasites, blood-sucking insects are one of the most visible and cause the most trouble. And the bugs from them are doubly unpleasant in that they prefer to settle mainly in a person’s dwelling, as close as possible to their main source of food. It is not surprising that in especially neglected cases they are able to turn a comfortable home into an absolutely uninhabitable room.

Bed bugs - they are bed bugs, or domestic (lat. Cimex lectularius) is a very common type of household blood-sucking insects.

Depending on the degree of saturation with blood, the bed bug may differ in both size and color shades. Let's take a closer look at the appearance and features of this insect.

 

What do bed bugs look like

Everything in the body of the bug is adapted to sucking blood from the human body. At the same time, bugs practically do not parasitize on other mammals.

A wide and flat abdomen, a small head, from the front of which a proboscis extends, thin paws - these details of the structure of the body of bedbugs indicate their high specialization and adaptability specifically to parasitism.

Due to the flat belly of the bug, it is very difficult to crush it even on purpose. He becomes a little more vulnerable when he pumps blood. Over millions of years of evolution, the bugs have lost their wings, which additionally protects them from damage by the victim tossing and turning in their sleep.

An insect that is on a starvation diet usually does not exceed 3-4 mm in size and has a light red or yellowish-brown body color. After a hearty meal, the size of the body of the bug reaches 9-10 mm, and its color becomes blood-brown with a dark tint.

The jaws of the bugs are a piercing-sucking apparatus and form two channels: a wide one through which blood enters, and a narrow one - for the release of saliva during a bite, in order to make the absorbed blood more liquid.

Bed bugs feed at night. In one night, the insect manages to pump as much blood as it weighs itself. Both adult bugs and their larvae suck blood.

The breeding method of linen bugs is fully adapted not only to a parasitic lifestyle, but also to the fastest possible capture of territories.

In the body of a female after mating, up to 5 eggs are formed daily, and during her life one successor of the genus generates up to 500 eggs. She almost every day puts them in secluded places. Development from an egg to an adult occurs, on average, in 4-6 weeks.

Usually bed bugs live in whole colonies, among the inhabitants of which you can find both adults and larvae that look like smaller copies of adult insects of a lighter color, and new laying of eggs. Most often, such an accumulation of bedbugs, under favorable conditions for their development, looks like a continuous moving spot of light brown color with a grayish tint.

 

How to distinguish bed bugs from other insects: lice, ticks, cockroaches

Among insects, linen bugs are not the only inhabitants of a human dwelling. They are found here with cockroaches, fleas, ants, occasionally with ticks. But bugs are quite different from all these neighbors.

• First of all, the bed bug is a flightless insect, very small (definitely smaller than adult cockroaches) in size. His wings are practically undeveloped, so the bugs do not fly, which also distinguishes them from cockroaches.
• From the larvae of cockroaches, which also do not have wings, the bugs are quite easily distinguished by their uniform color: the larvae of the gray cockroach have a noticeable light brown spot on the cephalothorax, and the larvae of the black cockroach are almost always larger than the bugs.
• Bed bugs do not form separate "nests" like ants do. However, their masonry is most often located near a food source, in secluded places (sofas, beds, wallpaper joints, baseboards).
• The hunting of these insects takes place at night, which means, unlike lice, the bite marks of linen bugs will begin to itch and will be found in the morning, after a night's sleep. In addition, if lice parasitize precisely on the hairy part of the body - on the head, in the groin and armpits, then the bugs, on the contrary, bite only on the back, arms and legs - where there is the least hair.
• A characteristic "mark of distinction" of linen bugs is their specific smell, secreted by the special glands of these insects to scare away enemies. In a room where there is at least one nest-colony of linen bugs, a rather unpleasant smell is sure to appear, reminiscent of the sweetish smell of sour berries.

 

Bed bug bites and their features

The consequences of contact of a linen bug with a person are always very noticeable. However, it is not always possible to immediately distinguish a bug bite from a bite of another insect.

The main difference between bedbug bites and any other insects is their specific location - a kind of path of 4-7 punctures, most often in open areas of the skin.

These parasites do not suffer from special selectivity, biting men, women, and children. However, in general, due to thinner skin and, as a result, a better smell of blood, women and children are attacked more often. During the night, up to 300 bites can appear on the body of an adult who was in a room infected with linen bugs!

First of all, at the site of the bug bite, it starts to itch a lot and a burning sensation appears.A person very often confuses these manifestations with allergic reactions, but taking antihistamine (antiallergic) drugs does not bring relief.

Then a pinkish swelling appears with a slight swelling. If the affected person is prone to allergic reactions, then gradually the size of the swelling will increase, and the sensations of itching and burning will disturb for a long time. In addition, every night the number of bites will increase, and, accordingly, the acuity of sensations from them will increase.

It has not yet been clearly established whether bedbugs carry any infectious diseases, such as ticks and mosquitoes. However, today it is impossible to speak with 100% probability of the impossibility of transmitting diseases such as hepatitis B, typhoid fever and even HIV.

 

Where do bed bugs live and how to look for them?

Bed bugs are nocturnal, so they can be detected primarily by the results of their vital activity: bites on the skin, as well as the appearance of small specks of blood and insect excrement on bedding or clothing.

And one more thing: you can stain bedbugs in different ways. You can use pacifiers for six months, or you can initially to kill bloodsuckers with proven means and methods ...

If you search for linen bugs during the day, then first of all you need to look into secluded places: the insides of sofas, beds, joints of wallpaper and under them, cracks in the floor and walls, as well as on bookshelves. The variety of hiding places for a colony of these parasites will lead to the fact that you will have to inspect almost the entire apartment - from clothing to electronics (for example, speakers with a wooden case).Justifying their name, they can hide in the folds of bed linen and clothing. However, single individuals are more common here, and nests are located in more reliable and secluded places (so getting rid of bedbugs by simply crushing them from time to time is almost impossible).

It is important that even yesterday's absence of bedbugs in the apartment does not at all mean that the owners are protected from them today. Bedbugs are quite mobile and easily move from their neighbors. Moreover, they occupy with equal ease both premises in poor sanitary condition and apartments with fresh modern renovation and regularly cleaned. Therefore, no one is safe from meeting with them.

 

What are home bugs and how to recognize their appearance in the apartment

 

Useful video on how to detect bed bugs