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Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

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Re: Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

#31

Post by fbdab103 »

jamesjuicy55 wrote: post #19
lm28469 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Might as well use this https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatomaceous_earth

I fought bed bugs once with DE, heat, and dry ice traps or you can use a co2 fish tank pump to attract them into a trap. We also placed containers filled with oil at the bottom of each bed post. It took a year but we were successful

Dry ice is an interesting idea. I want it to work, because it is just so deliciously different.

However, I assume the harsh reality says that it is nearly impossible to suffocate the entire infestation, and more than a few survivors or eggs would remain after the treatment.

Re: Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

#32

Post by adrian_b »

tiltowait wrote: post #3

I worked pest control for a few years until 2021. We all knew that pesticides basically don’t work on bed bugs—it was old news. The article glosses over heat treatments, which is odd, because it really does work, and usually in a single session. It’s a very labor-intensive and invasive procedure, though. The residents must leave the house for 8 hours while the techs bake each room and throw everything around. By the…

I believe that not only the bed bugs but most or all bugs related to them (Hemiptera) are more resistant to insecticides than most other insects.

Where I live, in Europe, when I was young there were abundant insects of many kinds, butterflies, dragonflies, lacewings, flies, bumblebees, wasps, beetles, crickets and many others.

Now all have disappeared, but various kinds of bugs (Hemiptera) are still abundant, actually more abundant than before, when many other kinds of insects existed.

Re: Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

#33

Post by fbdab103 »

spiderxxxx wrote: post #12
lm28469 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Might as well use this https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatomaceous_earth

I can confirm, DE works. Just don't breathe the stuff, which you're supposed to puff onto surfaces. Once it's there, the bugs have to crawl across it so it'll cut them up like little razor blades, or a thousand paper cuts. So satisfying.

Basically anything microscopic is increasingly found to be just horrible to inhale, but this blurb from Wikipedia says there are probably significantly worse things to handle for a one-time treatment.

   ...In a 1978 study of workers, those exposed to natural diatomaceous earth for over five years had no significant lung changes while 40% of those exposed to the calcined form had developed pneumoconiosis.[46] Today's common diatomaceous earth formulations are safer to use, as they are predominantly made up of amorphous silica and contain little or no crystalline silica.[47]

  The crystalline silica content of diatomaceous earth is regulated in the United States by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and there are guidelines from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health that set maximum amounts allowable in the product (1%) and in the air near the breathing zone of workers, with a recommended exposure limit at 6 mg/m3 over an 8-hour workday.[47] OSHA has set a permissible exposure limit for diatomaceous earth as 20 mppcf (80 mg/m3/%SiO2). At levels of 3,000 mg/m3, diatomaceous earth is immediately dangerous to life and health.

  In the 1930s, long-term occupational exposure among workers in the cristobalite diatomaceous earth industry who were exposed to high levels of airborne crystalline silica over decades were found to have an increased risk of silicosis.[49]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatomaceous_earth

Re: Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

#34

Post by _dark_matter_ »

koolba wrote: post #28
jp57 wrote: post #26

The obvious answer is centipedes. If you are going to have to tolerate any kind of bug in your house, Scutigera Coleoptrata, the common house centipede, is the one to have. These creepy, long-legged brown centipedes were familiar to everyone I knew growing up in the northeastern US. They are shy of people and tend to stay in the basement at night and only come out at night when it's dark, cool, and quiet (increasing…

If you have centipedes in your house then de facto you have other bugs. They’re strictly carnivores. So as cool and helpful as they are, their continued existence indicates you have other problems as well. Best to consider them like Sully in the movie Commando: “ I like you. I’m gonna kill you last. ”

How is it possible to have a house with no insects? I just don't even see that as feasible, except maybe for a small new house with no shrubbery (and probably in a desert environment?). There ain't no way you're living in a house with zero bugs.

Re: Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

#35

Post by scarmig »

fbdab103 wrote: post #31
jamesjuicy55 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fought bed bugs once with DE, heat, and dry ice traps or you can use a co2 fish tank pump to attract them into a trap. We also placed containers filled with oil at the bottom of each bed post. It took a year but we were successful

Dry ice is an interesting idea. I want it to work, because it is just so deliciously different. However, I assume the harsh reality says that it is nearly impossible to suffocate the entire infestation, and more than a few survivors or eggs would remain after the treatment.

The goal isn't to suffocate them, but to draw them into a trap--they're attracted to CO2 because we exhale it. Over time, the hope is you trap and kill the entire population.

I think it'd work for mild infestations, but for larger ones the heat method is really the only option.

Re: Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

#36

Post by amelius »

koolba wrote: post #28
jp57 wrote: post #26

The obvious answer is centipedes. If you are going to have to tolerate any kind of bug in your house, Scutigera Coleoptrata, the common house centipede, is the one to have. These creepy, long-legged brown centipedes were familiar to everyone I knew growing up in the northeastern US. They are shy of people and tend to stay in the basement at night and only come out at night when it's dark, cool, and quiet (increasing…

If you have centipedes in your house then de facto you have other bugs. They’re strictly carnivores. So as cool and helpful as they are, their continued existence indicates you have other problems as well. Best to consider them like Sully in the movie Commando: “ I like you. I’m gonna kill you last. ”

It's not like the centipedes are going to farm the bedbugs.

Re: Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

#37

Post by fbdab103 »

scarmig wrote: post #35
fbdab103 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dry ice is an interesting idea. I want it to work, because it is just so deliciously different. However, I assume the harsh reality says that it is nearly impossible to suffocate the entire infestation, and more than a few survivors or eggs would remain after the treatment.

The goal isn't to suffocate them, but to draw them into a trap--they're attracted to CO2 because we exhale it. Over time, the hope is you trap and kill the entire population. I think it'd work for mild infestations, but for larger ones the heat method is really the only option.

I suppose that seems much more plausible, if significantly less cool, ahem, than making a low hanging CO2 bath.

Re: Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

#39

Post by cassepipe »

If you ever have bed bugs, do yourself a favor and buy water vapor gun, with a large tank.

Adults and larvae die at 60 degrees so vapor is like the nuclear option to them. Also it's non-toxic to you, it doesn't stain and the vapor can penetrate anything anywhere.

For example : https://www.kaercher.com/fr/home-garden/nettoyeurs-vapeur/sc...

Re: Getting rid of bed bugs: trickier than ever

#40

Post by greggsy »

RajT88 wrote: post #10
weatherlight wrote: post #4

We had a house centipede infestation when I lived in NYC. It was awesome. No bed bugs. No roaches except in the end of summer, (the giant flying variety and it was really just the month of August when the humidity is out of control they would come out of the drains.) No bugs in general. Those house centipedes ate everything.

They are creepy, but they eat baddies. The last time one showed up in our bathroom, my wife yelled at me to "Stop marveling at it!" It was the biggest one I had ever seen, close to 3 inches. RIP Uber-coleoptrata scutigera!

I just googled the scutigera and they’re somewhat more adorable than the giant centipedes we have in Australia (no they’re not everywhere, but they’re enough to startle you).
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