“This may be the problem that puts the family into crisis”

by Renee Corea on March 8, 2010

in Issues and Challenges

It’s sometimes difficult to make sense of presentations found on the internet. Meaning is often lost in all those bullets in the absence of the speaker.

Not so with this presentation from the last Central Ohio Bed Bug Summit by Kim Carpenter, titled Medical and Social-Emotional Effects of Bed Bug Infestations (PowerPoint), available at the website of the Central Ohio Bed Bug Task Force. Still, I wish I had heard it.

I hope you’ll check out the work of the Central Ohio Bed Bug Task Force often. They know what they’re talking about.

That’s all I got. Stay out of trouble with you-know-who.

{ 0 comments }

Girault, cont’d

by Renee Corea on March 8, 2010

in History, Research

So there was that hotel stay in 1907—the attack, to use his word.

But two years earlier Girault had published a major article about bed bugs followed by an extensive critical bibliography, likely the entire literature of bed bugs until that time, which unfortunately I haven’t found, though surely much of it is in Usinger… but I wonder if only the useful bits and not the outlandish stuff that one really wants to find. In any case, Girault wrote several articles on the bed bug. We have time for only one.

There is this remarkable passage you should see about his “very unpleasant experiences” during a summer spent in “a small town in Virginia” (Girault studied at Virginia Polytechnic):

The whole place was thoroughly infested, and it was not an uncommon thing to see mattresses and bed-slats turned out to air, which were literally white with the insect’s eggs. The writer’s room was as bad as the rest; the old-fashioned bedstead was full of them, while during the day scores of them could be detected hiding in the walls. The place was almost unbearable, for the insects were not satisfied in staying indoors, but were frequently found secreted in one’s clothes. One night, returning to the room from outside, two were found beneath the collar, while occasionally, one would be found hiding within a pamphlet which was carried in my pocket. Wherever they were very numerous, many could be found frequenting privy-houses or other similar places, where they would be sure to obtain an occasional meal, visiting the host at every chance, night or day. That these insects are very active and freely move from place to place, that is to say, not necessarily confining themselves to certain rooms or houses, and hence not directly dependent upon any one host, is evidently true.

Remarkable, yes? Reminds me of WCW’s hat.

As if that were not vivid enough, Girault continues with this account of a colleague’s bed bug experience in an entomology lab:

Mr. William F. Fiske informed me that when stationed at Tryon, North Carolina, while working in the laboratory at night, bedbugs would crawl along the under sides of the edges of the table and stealthily approaching his bared arms, would attempt to feed.

Girault, A. A. 1905. The Bedbug, Clinocoris (=Cimex=Acanthia=Klinophilos) Lectularia Linnaeus. Psyche 12: 61-74. doi:10.1155/1905/10393

(What’s with Clinocoris… Acanthia? They couldn’t figure out what to call the bed bug at one time? Pity they didn’t ask us.)

I think Girault was having a bit of fun with the following, which he cited from an 1885 source, Lintner:

A correspondent wrote as follows: “ ‘Will you tell us something about the bed-bug, what its habits are, when it “spawns,” what it eats, how long it lives, and if it ever dies? I ask because I have moved into a house that I find was already occupied by several colonies of the pest. The room in which I have my library has the most. They are in my files of papers and periodicals. They seem to grow fatter every day, but for the life of me, I cannot tell what they live on. *******. Can it be that they live on the paste on the wall paper? As for remedies, ******. The latter (red pepper), I have sifted through my papers and books, and wherever I could get it; but instead of driving them off, they seem to fatten on it; ***************.****’ ” pp. 6-7.

And we may laugh at it too, for it is fantastic. What it eats!

Girault called bed bugs abominable. Actually, odious and abominable:

The trouble then is, that definitely stated facts are wanting concerning much of the life-history of this pest. This has doubtless been caused, partly on account of its being so common everywhere, and having an extensive literature, thus causing modern writers to believe it at first glance to be well studied, and partly because of its odious character and abominable nature. The last cause seems to have the most to do with it.

And:

It is the insect most directly affecting man, and the one, if any, which should be thoroughly studied, and yet, not until as late as 1896 (Marlatt, 1896 a) was its true life-history made known.

This is not scientific literature without personality. Girault could say of the body of a first instar that had just fed that it “became stained a very beautiful, deep, purplish red.” Nymphs are described as “sordid yellow.”

Like many, he fed bed bugs himself; except for 5th instars which caused “a distinct itching sensation,” he was not responsive to the bites. These are some of his notes on feeding bed bugs:

A single nymph or larva hatching during the morning of June 24th and isolated in a small glass vial, was fed at once. It was very active after hatching, and at first made attempts to escape, though in a few minutes readily took food. Just as soon as the least bit of blood entered the body it could be traced to its destination, and as more was sucked in, the body became stained a very beautiful, deep, purplish red. The abdomen, at first flt and round in outline, soon became distended, lengthened, and cylindric, and the nymph then measured 2.00 mm.a

On the afternoon of the next day (25th), the nymph was again fed, and the abdomen was much darker, not stained as previously. Again on the morning of July 6th, it was fed. It had not changed. On the morning of July 6th, it fed long and eagerly, until the abdomen became so large and distended that it was all out of proportion to the rest of the body; it was then stained purplish red, as after the first meal. The insect after this gluttonous meal did not lose its usual activity. The first molt then occurred about 7 P. M., 7th July. It had thus fed four (4) times during the first instar.

And his findings on feeding times for each instar:

The nymphs are very voracious, and at a single meal gorge themselves until unable to hold more. The time therefore given to each meal is limited by the capacity or size of the nymph at the time of any one meal, the capacity of course depending upon, or rather being more or less bounded by, the different instars. Hence, in each instar, the time taken for any single meal is more or less definite, shorter in the earlier, longer in the later instars, as the capacity is less in the earlier, greater in the later instars.

For its first meal after hatching, in instar I, it requires on the average, about three (3) minutes to glut itself, and if another meal is taken in this instar, a slightly longer period. In instar II, five (5) minutes; in instar III, six (6) minutes; in instar IV, eight (8) minutes; in instar V, ten (10) minutes, and when adult, from ten (10) to fifteen (15) minutes. These may be taken as averages, as the time for individuals varies somewhat.

He found that adults were unable to re-feed for at least 48 hours.

This is his table detailing the lifespan and the number of eggs deposited for two females, one fed and the other unfed:

Oviposition of fed and unfed female bed bugs - Girault 1905.jpg

oviposition and lifespan of fed and unfed female bed bugs - Girault 1905

I think of Girault sometimes. He pops into my head. I’m glad he was in the world. And wrote about bed bugs.

{ 0 comments }

Girault and the bed bugs

by Renee Corea on March 3, 2010

in History

Alexandre Arsène Girault checked into an elegantly furnished room in one of the best hotels in Cincinnati on October 29, 1907. It was close to midnight. Later he would have occasion to ask the hotel manager if anyone had slept in his room the night before.

Girault worked for the U.S. Bureau of Entomology. He was 23. His major work on chalcid wasps — and the many “eccentricities” that were to shape his tragic life — were in the future.

He takes pains to describe the events of the night in detail. This is his description of the room:

This room was on the second floor, and proved to be a rather small one, about 18 feet long and about 12 feet wide. It was elegantly and neatly furnished, with the walls painted a dark gray and ornamented with mural paintings of flowers; the floor was well carpeted. The bed was of iron, painted black, and the whole room, including the rest of the furniture, presented the usual neat, cleanly, and attractive appearance found in hotels of this class. The room was lighted with two 16-candle power electric globes on a chandelier suspended from the middle of the ceiling, and about six and a half feet above the floor. Also these lights were just about four feet above the bottom third of the iron bedstead; the bed was therefore in full glare of the light. A neat, bronzed steam radiator supplied heat.

The temperature in the room was 75dF.

I found a photograph of a (comparable?) hotel room, c. 1910:

A room in the Chittenden Hotel, Columbus, Ohio, c. 1910 - Library of Congress

And this is Cincinnati in 1907:

Vine Street, Cincinnati, Ohio Digital ID: 69526. New York Public Library

(And for more history, this is the lobby of the Hotel Havlin, one of the grand Cincinnati hotels of this time, but perhaps too grand for the account in question.)

At 12:30 am Girault noticed a third instar nymph on the bedspread:

[T]his nymph was pale. I killed it. After this, I looked the bed over, and finally decided not to get into it, but to lie across it after disrobing, leave the lights on and obtain such sleep as possible under the circumstances.

He left the light on. Like all of us have done.

This lasted half an hour before he saw several bed bugs crawling away from him “swollen with blood” — they were 2nd, 3rd, and 4th instars:

The time was about 1:20 A. M. Between this hour and 3:30 A. M., I dozed off from time to time, lying in the same place, but distinctly remember waking at 2 A. M. and 3:20 A. M. and discovering numerous specimens hurrying away over the coverlid. Each time I arose and killed all of the bugs in sight, and also those, which having been glutted from the host, had left it, crawled 2 or 3 feet away, and were hiding in the bed linen; these latter were discovered after a brief search, and were evidently hiding temporarily. At both of these times, the majority of the insects were in instars III and IV, but two were found in V, and one in I, the latter discovered coolly feeding from my fingers, and from its color, evidently obtaining its first meal. At 2 o’clock, I also killed one or two rather pale nymphs of about instar III, crawling toward the host. No adults were observed.

No adults. And one first instar.

At 3:30 am he called it quits and slept in a rocking chair until 6:00 am.

At 9:00 am he conducted a search of the bed and the room but could not find any bed bugs. There was a suitable crevice at the head of the bed but there were no bed bugs there either. The mattress was a hair mattress with covered springs. He thought they were hiding in the spring coverings. He found no bed bugs and no eggs.

And the previous night’s guests?

I learned through the kindness of the hotel management that the room had been occupied on Oct. 28th by two persons, but in spite of that fact, the bedbugs which I encountered did not seem to have been recently fed. Unfortunately, I could not ascertain whether the bed had been utilized, or whether they spent the night there.

Incredibly, this was not Girault’s first account of what he called “very unpleasant experiences” with old Cimex l. There’s a great deal more, as always! Hopefully we can review some of it next.

A. Arsène Girault, Notes on the Feeding Habits of Cimex lectularius Linnaeus, Psyche, vol. 15, no. 4, pp. 85-87, 1908. doi:10.1155/1908/85427

{ 7 comments }

Best wishes…

by Renee Corea on March 2, 2010

in New York vs Bed Bugs

Slight change of plans. This week is the last week of New York vs Bed Bugs.

So then, just a couple of posts to wrap up.

First up, Girault. I’ve been meaning to tell you about him for some time and I also really want to make amends to a good friend of New York vs Bed Bugs—someone who works closely, let’s say, with certain captured elements of the enemy—who told me about a bed bug encounter once and received this response from me: yeah, but did you take notes like Girault?

May you always keep clear of the dread bed bug.

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

Temprid gets bed bug label

by Renee Corea on February 23, 2010

in News

Temprid SC got a bed bug label (PDF), see the Bayer press release at PCT.

One wishes to say, godspeed Temprid, but alas not in New York. (I have no idea why. But it’s tempting to think that DEC has its hands full ensuring we all get to use foggers for bed bugs instead.)

I guess we’ll hear whether it makes a difference. In those 48 states. The active ingredients are a neonicotinoid (imidacloprid) and a synthetic pyrethroid (beta-cyfluthrin).

In a trial with bed bug populations in poultry facilities (Steelman et al., 2008), imidacloprid fared about as well as pyrethroids. However, pyrethroids fared well with the tested populations, which I guess highlights the need to test insecticides on the actual strains that are meant to be controlled.

See also this brief note at Bed Bug Central about what sounds like an ongoing field trial.

Steelman, C. D., A.L. Szalanski, R. Trout, J.A. McKern, C. Solorzano, J.W. Austin (2008) Susceptibility of the Bed Bug Cimex lectularius L. (Heteroptera: Cimicidae) Collected in Poultry Production Facilities to Selected Insecticides Journal of Agricultural and Urban Entomology 25 (1), 41-51 doi: 10.3954/1523-5475-25.1.41

I’ll leave you with this from these authors:

As evidenced by the relative susceptibility of bed bugs to pyrethroids in this study, it would be imprudent to suggest that pyrethroids are ineffective in field applications for remedial or preventive control of bed bugs. Rather, each individual control scenario will likely dictate the choice of insecticide, the manner of application, and the level of control afforded by multiple integrated tactics employed by a pest management professional. Careful rotation of insecticides, as has been a relatively common practice for any applicator attempting to sustain the use of an insecticide, and thorough and comprehensive applications will likely control bed bugs in most urban scenarios.

That strikes me as a lot of ifs, but one can always hope.

{ 0 comments }

Piercing/sucking

by Renee Corea on February 21, 2010

in Photos

Actually, I was wrong about the CDC. They also have these cool SEM photos in their Public Health Image Library (search for old cimex l. on this page).

Like this one showing the fascicle of doom inside its sheath:

Janice Haney Carr - CDC Public Health Image Library - ID # 11728

As described in Dickerson & Lavoipierre, the labium encloses the “needle-like stylets,” of which there are two pairs (mandibles are the outer pair and maxillae the inner pair) which together form a flexible “compact bundle” called a fascicle. The food canal (largish) and salivary canal (very small) are formed by the maxillae fitting together. The labium does not enter the skin; it bends to allow the fascicle to probe deeply into the skin. (To see photos of bed bugs feeding — and mating and being charming and all that — see this.)

All of this as it may be, once your mind latches on to an analogy, it’s hard to dislodge. Mine has been this one!

sake "juice box"

Alcoholic Juice Box by alexleavitt via flickr

Not quite, but tempting.

Here is another view of the tip of the mouthparths:

piercing sucking mouthparts.jpg

Janice Haney Carr - CDC Public Health Image Library - ID # 11731

What is that?

piercing sucking closer.jpg

Janice Haney Carr - CDC Public Health Image Library - ID # 11730

Like the spikes of a flail.

“The tip of the labium consists of 2 lobes bearing minute sensory papillae.” – Usinger, Monograph of Cimicidae, 1966.

But what are sensory papillae for?

Is the labium a suitable-skin-probing-site-sensing organ? And if so, what are the cues? Inquiring minds want to know… but can’t find out.

Anyway, while looking I found something that may interest you:

The bed-bug usually probes the tissues of the host repeatedly before settling down to feed, and it is most unusual for an insect successfully to locate a source of food immediately after the fascicle has entered the host’s skin. Sometimes probing is so prolonged that the insect becomes dissatisfied and completely withdraws the fascicle, changing its position on the surface of the skin and selecting a new site for probing.

Dissatisfaction? The mind reels.

Dickerson, G., Lavoipierre, M.M.J., 1959. Studies on the methods of feeding of blood-sucking arthropods. II. The method of feeding adopted by the bed-bug (Cimex lectularius) when obtaining a blood-meal from the mammalian host. Ann. Trop. Med. Parasitol. 53, 347–357.

This is their drawing of the stages of probing:

stages in the introduction of the fascicle of C. lectularius into the ear of a rodent - Dickerson and Lavoipierre 1959.jpg

schematic diagram of the successive stages in the introduction of the fascicle of C. lectularius into the ear of a rodent - Dickerson and Lavoipierre 1959

Bonus Dickerson/Lavoipierre:

Whilst probing, the fascicle often pierces, cuts across, and sometimes enters, minute capillaries and larger vessels, without ceasing its restless movement. This active probing results in the formation of small and large haemorrhages in the tissues, but we have seldom observed the bug to feed upon them. The fascicle continues its active movements in the tissues until it encounters and enters a vessel of suitable calibre, from which the blood-meal is then taken up.

What constitutes a “vessel of suitable calibre” is not elaborated upon except that they thought bed bugs ignored both very small capillaries and large blood vessels.

When engorgement is complete, the bug withdraws its fascicle, the blood pours out of the lacerated vessel, and a withdrawal haemorrhage is produced. If the fascicle has penetrated deeply into the tissues of the host the insect may have some difficulty in withdrawing it, owing to the small backwardly directed teeth on the tips of the mandibles, which fix them firmly in the tissue.

Blood and lacerated vessels. And we haven’t yet considered the saliva.

{ 1 comment }

Bite sensitivity, new data

by Renee Corea on February 17, 2010

in Public Health, Research

The results of the bed bug bite survey we heard so much about are reported in this new article, The Sensitivity Spectrum: Human Reactions to Bed Bug Bites (PCT February 2010, Michael F. Potter, Kenneth F. Haynes, Kevin Connelly, Michael Deutsch, Erich Hardebeck, Don Partin, and Ron Harrison).

This is unprecedented stuff, so let’s take a very close look.

474 respondents, all with confirmed bed bug infestations, in Chicago, New York, Cincinnati, Louisville, Atlanta, LA and Miami. 66% living in apartments and 15% in single-family homes. All ages. 58% female, 42% male.

The breakdown for infestation level:

Infestation level Bugs Respondents
Low ≤10 34%
Moderate 11-100 47%
High 101-500 14%
Very high > 500 5%

“Have you experienced any bites or skin reactions from the bed bugs in your dwelling?”

70% yes, 30% no.

Essentially the reverse of what was previously thought. Though there were also skeptics—see this note about last year’s article by Reinhardt and others.

The female/male differences were not statistically significant. And neither were ethnicity differences. The level of infestation was also not a factor.

Not so with age, however:

Significantly more people over the age of 65 reported no bites or skin reactions than those who were younger. Forty-two percent of the eldest individuals surveyed said they had no bites or reactions from bed bugs in their dwelling, whereas 26 percent of those aged 11 to 65 reportedly did not react.

This corresponds with an earlier survey where 76% of elderly tenants in one “severely infested” building did not react to bites (or reported not reacting). Possible reasons for this mentioned by the authors include reduced responsiveness to allergens in the elderly, medications that suppress the immune response (corticosteroids), and “diminished awareness due to other competing health issues.” For another discussion of a similar case, see the ASHES/Orkin white paper (PDF) from last year.

I think everyone is rightly worried about the elderly. Their infestations may go unreported, grow undetected, and then may be treated incorrectly.

Relationship to mosquito bites

The bed bug bite response reported in this survey corresponded with the level of mosquito bite response in the following way:

  • “Barely visible” mosquito bite reactions = 53% reacted to bed bugs
  • “Small (dime-size) welts” from mosquito bites = 77% reacted to bed bugs
  • “Large (quarter-size)” / “severe (half-dollar size or larger)” mosquito bite reactions = 89% reacted to bed bugs

Characterizing the reactions of the 70%

  • 72% had “itchy red welts”
  • 50% had “redness or discoloration”
  • 28% had “itching in the absence of welts”
  • 21% had “a ‘pinprick’ or ’stinging’ sensation”

Okay, let me pause here. On this last point the authors say: “which may or may not be symptomatic of bed bugs.”

Personally I have to say I can’t count the times people have reported this. Bed bugs!

There’s a lot more about the reported reactions.

The public health question, etc.

This is remarkable:

Other oft-mentioned symptoms from respondents living with bed bugs included nervousness, paranoia, anger, frustration, embarrassment, devastation and depression. Anxiety, stress, sleeplessness and depression are medically important symptoms that can lead to other conditions. Dismissing bed bugs as “not a public health pest” on the grounds that they are unproven disease vectors ignores the pain, suffering and emotional distress inflicted on their victims. When government agencies finally concede this point, additional resources may be allocated to combat the problem, as they were years ago.

I may have to put that on a post-it.

I hope they’re right.

{ 2 comments }

#44

by Renee Corea on February 17, 2010

in Public Health, Statistics

Not sure how I missed this but check out the CDC’s internal site search stats for 2009. Bed bugs rank #44 on the list of keywords, behind scabies, above smoking.

25,506 searches. Frustrated searchers to be sure.

I’m good for at least 20.

As previously noted, nothing but some journal articles and a key.

{ 1 comment }

Laundry and the motivating power of the bed bug web: Q&A with Richard Naylor

by Renee Corea on February 16, 2010

in Featured, Interviews, Research

First, the study.

Naylor, R. A., and C. J. Boase. 2010. Practical Solutions for Treating Laundry Infested With Cimex lectularius (Hemiptera: Cimicidae). Journal of Economic Entomology 103 (February): 136-139. doi:10.1603/EC09288.

In keeping with our recent interest in the first line of these research abstracts, here is this one:

The common bed bug, Cimex lectularius (L.) (Hemiptera: Cimicidae) is known to become associated, from time to time, with clothing or linen.

From time to time…

The author surveyed 100 websites offering information on bed bug control in 2007, and found specific, practical information lacking.

Washing

3.2 kg dry weight of laundry, about 7 pounds, washed at 30°C/86°F, 40°C/104°F and 60°C/140°F in a 90-minute cycle wash (that’s the standard cycle in the UK) with a standard laundry detergent. Bed bugs (10 adults, 10 third instar nymphs, 10 eggs) were placed inside clothes pockets, in cotton pouches and sealed with a sandwich bag clip.

The 40°C/104°F cycle killed all adults and nymphs, but 75.6% of the eggs survived.

The 60°C/140°F cycle killed all stages.

Tumble drying

7 pounds of laundry (dry) in dryers set to “hot” and “cool” for 10 minutes and 30 minutes.

The temperature in the “cool” cycle never got above 30°C/86°F.

The 10-minute “hot” cycle did not kill all bed bugs, probably because it took more than 15 minutes to get above 40°C/104°F. (The authors reference the published thermal death point from previous work in the 1930s-40s in the range of 40-45°C/104-113°F.)

30 minutes in the “hot” cycle killed all life stages.

Here is a graph of the temperature logged during these drying cycles. The 40-45°C zone is the (previously published) dead zone, but it took more than 15 minutes.

temperature change over time, hot (A) and cool (B) drying cycles.jpg

temperature change over time, hot (A) and cool (B) drying cycles - Naylor & Boase 2010

Cold soaking

7 pounds of laundry in about 15°C/59°F tap water, without detergent.

Almost nothing dies if soaked for two hours. But, interestingly, all adults and nymphs died when soaked for 24 hours.

The eggs, however, survived. All of them.

Dry-cleaning

Professional dry cleaning with perchloroethylene.

100% kill of bed bugs and eggs.

Freezing

A laundry bag of 2.5 kg (about 5 and a half pounds) in a freezer drawer of a standard household freezer with a minimum temperature of -18°C/-0.4°F — a separate test was done with bed bugs placed in pouches in the freezer for two hours at -17°C/1.4°F.

2 hours at -17°C/1.4°F killed all bed bugs and eggs when placed directly (not in clothes) in the freezer. But when a bag of laundry was placed in the freezer, it took about 8 hours for the temperature at the center of the bag to reach -17°C.

The researchers advise caution about the regional differences in laundry equipment:

[T]here are regional differences in the operation and performance of domestic appliances that stress the importance of understanding the local situation when making recommendations. For example, washing machines in Europe typically heat their water to the user-selected temperature, whereas washing machines in the U.S. and Australia tend to use the household hot water supply and are therefore limited by the temperature of the water coming from the boiler. Furthermore, wash cycles in the U.K. typically last 90-120 min, whereas in the U.S., wash cycles of 20-30 min are much more common (Procter 2000). As Tables 1 and 2 demonstrate, differences in temperature and duration may make the difference between success and failure in terms of clothing disinfestation. These differences emphasize the need for caution when considering adopting advice generated in one country, for use in another.

For comparison of these results with some American laundering tests reported by Potter et al. in 2007, see this PCT article.

Q&A

Richard Naylor is a doctoral student at the University of Sheffield (UK). Take a look at his bed bug photographs here. I particularly like this one:

bedbug cimex 6 - Richard Naylor University of Sheffield.jpg

Bedbug. Copyright Richard Naylor.

He generously answered our questions via email.

New York vs Bed Bugs: Your group regularly produces some of the most fantastically interesting research about bed bugs and yet I have to say it is a joy to ask you about something as simple as laundry. Because in fact it is not so simple… so it is wonderful that you took an interest in this subject. I like that your study shows that people have options (e.g., you can disinfest clothing even if you don’t have access to a dryer), but you note that regional differences in laundry equipment are important to consider. So, with that in mind, if we were to make judgments based on temperature and time (in places where one doesn’t really know the temperature of washers and dryers but can use, say, a household thermometer for some limited testing), what would be a useful rule of thumb? Often people are confused by thermal death points, especially because they seem not to be stable in the literature and have much to do with method and duration of exposure.

Richard Naylor: The important thing does seem to be the temperature, whether washing or drying. 40 degrees [Celsius] seems to be the magic number. In simple terms this is about the temperature of a nice warm bath, so it doesn’t need to be scolding hot. Some washing machines don’t heat their own water and so the maximum temperature they can achieve is the temperature that the boiler is set to. If your hot tap produces water that is slightly too hot to hold your hands under for any length of time, it is probably fine for killing bedbugs. Unfortunately one can’t get round having to know something about their washing machine if they plan to use it for treating bugs. Perhaps it would be simpler to fill the bath with hot water. As long as it is a bit too hot to hold your hands in it should be fine. Hot water penetrates the fabric much quicker than hot air, so time isn’t really a factor as long as all the air is pummeled out of it.

New York vs Bed Bugs: Did you really read 100 bed bug fact sheets on the internet? I am honestly impressed by that diligence because that sounds like torture to me. Did you find great variability in the practical information on offer?

Richard Naylor: Yes I did. A lot of the sites offering advice were run by local councils. The advice wasn’t particularly variable because people just republish the same “knowledge” over and over again. I just kept a tally of every mention of “hot wash”, “tumble-dry” etc. and worked my way down a google search. Every now and then you stumble over a blinder, involving a bloody steak and a roll of sellotape, which keeps the motivation up! I keep a folder on my computer of all the best bedbug misinformation I can find on the web!

New York vs Bed Bugs: Can I ask you what you are working on? What are some of the interesting questions in need of answering?

Richard Naylor: I am currently interested in their ecology and dispersal. We actually know a lot more about the ecology of swallow bugs than we do of bedbugs, simply because when an infestation is discovered, it is normally treated straight away. People don’t want to wait a few weeks for studies to be made and experiments carried out. The solution I have come up with is to build about a dozen 3 meter long arenas complete with blood feeding station and around 200 bedbugs in each. I am trying to understand how they behave in an infestation and to figure out what factors are important in driving their dispersal.

New York vs Bed Bugs: I once saw what looked like a carved wood panel of mating bed bugs at your university’s website (can’t seem to find it again)—I am curious about just how old that is? Is it an artifact of the current interest in bed bugs or is it from much earlier? It is beautiful and I wonder if you’ve always had it.

Richard Naylor: Well spotted. We (though not me) started studying bedbugs at Sheffield University about 15 years ago. Mike [Siva-Jothy] used to be particularly interested in sexual conflict, which is the idea that males and females of a species are purely out to do the best for themselves as they can, often at the expense of the opposite sex. Bedbugs are a prime example, as males will mate with females much more often than the females require to stay fertile and as a result the females live about 25% less long than they would otherwise. We believe that traumatic insemination arose out of sexual conflict as a way of males preventing females from exerting choice over paternity.

Anyway, the carving was commissioned about 6-7 years ago and is made up of lots of images from old books and photographs around the department. The bedbugs are copied from an electron micrograph that we had done of some of our bugs at the time.

{ 0 comments }

What’s working for bed bug control in multifamily housing: a new report from NCHH

by Renee Corea on February 15, 2010

in Featured, Issues and Challenges

The National Center for Healthy Housing, with funding from the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Pesticide Programs, has published a report on the actual practice of bed bug control: What’s Working for Bed Bug Control in Multi-Family Housing: Reconciling best practices with research and the realities of implementation (PDF).

The report is authored by Allison Taisey and Tom Neltner. It is intended for an audience of “health professionals, housing professionals, and pest management professionals seeking to plan for or respond to a bed bug infestation in multi-family housing. It is not a best management practices document” — this is important to understand I think. Practices are evolving and there is so much that is not known.

Don’t miss the case studies.

You can find other resources on the Healthy Homes Training website of the NCHH: Pest Control in Affordable Housing – Integrated Pest Management.

bed bug control in multifamily housing - National Center for Healthy Housing.jpg

click to download PDF

{ 3 comments }

← Previous Entries