How do I get rid of bed bugs permanently?
A bed bug is a tiny parasite that sucks and feeds on blood from humans and warm-blooded animals. Its scientific name is Climax Lectularius and is mostly found in sleeping spaces such as bedrooms, inns, and hotels.
If not eliminated in time, bed bugs can lead to restlessness and sleepless nights. Given the way they reproduce, bed bugs are not easy to get rid of. When in the form of eggs, bed bugs do not respond to any treatment.
It calls for successive therapies to be able to get rid of bed bugs from your home altogether.
But what is the best way to get rid of bed bugs?
To reiterate, it is not easy to treat bed bugs.
Factors such as how big the infestation is will determine whether you succeed or not. You also have to consider the clutter, whether the neighbors have an outbreak, and the willingness of all the affected people to participate.
If the bed bug infestation is in all over a large residential building, the measures you put in place could take weeks or months before you see any results. But all the people living in the building should be willing to cooperate.
1. Ask a Professional for Help
To ensure the bed bug infestation in your home become a thing of the past, you should ask for professional help.
There are professional pest management companies that use recognized and safe insecticides to spray your home and get rid of bed bugs.
When scattered, these chemicals kill all the beg bugs to leave your home safe to sleep in.
This is the best way to get rid of bed bugs from the entire house. The only room that could be spared of the chemicals in the kitchen.
But you have to make advance preparations which involve moving furniture, covering the beddings, and keep away your valuables and electronics.
Since the first application could have left behind some bed bug eggs, there has to be a follow-up after two weeks.
2. Steam Treatment
Did you know that using steam at 120° F can destroy bed bugs together with their eggs?
The best way to do it is dry steam applied directly onto the bugs. This will also remove mold and other allergens from sections of the house.
This is the best way to get rid of bedbugs when all you can do is a DIY job. The steam can be applied in crevices as well as other surfaces like carpets.
3. Set Bedbug Traps
To quickly get rid of bed bugs, you should set traps. The best form of this is using hair dryer hot air to force bedbugs out of crevices and cracks.
As soon as they start appearing, you can then use a paper towel to kill them. The alternative is to lay a sticky tape in the path of the bedbugs to trap them.
4. Clean and Disinfect the House
The fact that your home or hotel is spotlessly clean does not necessarily mean that there will be no bedbugs.
All that bedbugs need to thrive is a source of warm blood. In the house, they hide in beds, behind baseboards, and in closets.
Of course, you must clean your spaces. Start by de-cluttering to ensure that the bugs have a tiny area where they can hide. You can now use other methods to get rid of the bedbugs completely.
5. Launder the Beddings and Linen
If you have any beddings, linen or clothes that have come into contact with bedbugs, wash them.
This will help get rid of all signs of a bedbug infestation including fecal matter, exoskeletons, and blood stains.
Once you are done, put the clothes on a dryer and set it to the highest levels of heat. Leave them there for 20 minutes or more. This is the best ways to get rid of bedbugs and their eggs.
6. Vacuum Using A HEPA Cleaner
Take a HEPA vacuum cleaner and use it around your home. In addition to that, you should vacuum clean all the rugs and carpets in your home on a daily basis.
Don’t forget the couches, bed frame, and other pieces of furniture. The vacuum cleaner comes with a brush and crevice tools.
Use these in the hard to reach areas. If your filter uses bags, seal them up after cleaning and dump them in the trash cans outside your house.
If the vacuum cleaner is filter-based, make sure you use hot water and soap to wash the filters. After vacuuming, you could also use steam to kill bedbug eggs.
7. Cover and Seal Cracks
Bedbugs are very clever. During the day, they hide in cracks and crevices only to emerge at night to feed. Cover the cracks and crevices in furniture and walls using sealing tape.
This will minimize the spaces where the bedbugs can hide and breed.
8. Throw Away Infested Items
In most cases, salvaging infested items is near impossible. No matter how hard you try to clean and disinfect, getting rid of bedbugs is not that easy.
If you have box springs, get rid of them. The infestation in these items can be so heavy that it is nearly impossible to clean or treat them. Put such things in a plastic sheet and discard them after labeling them as bedbug-infested items.
Unsuspecting people will avoid picking the pieces up. This is the best way to get rid of bedbugs from most parts of your home.
9. Use Diatomaceous Earth Powder
Did you know that diatomaceous powder is in instant bedbug killer?
It is composed of sharp molecules which target and rip the bedbug’s innards, killing them on the spot.
The only precaution is that the layer to be applied should be thick enough so that the bugs can crawl through and swallow it.
Before you ask the powder, you must first give the house a thorough vacuuming.
Don’t use toxic dust. Make sure it is organic, food-grade, and not harmful to you and your pests. Leave the powder undisturbed for at least three weeks if you want it to work.
10. Install Bedbug Inceptors
When they get into the bed at night, bedbugs can quickly leave you sleepless. Find a way of preventing them from getting into the bed.
Use bedbug inceptors. Install them on every one of the legs of the bed. You may also want to use the bedbug inceptors on the legs of the other furniture pieces in the home.
11. Use a Mattress Cover as a Seal
Since it is part of the bed, the mattress is a primary culprit when it comes to a bedbug infestation. Picking the bedbugs from the mattress one after the other could prove impossible.
The best way to get rid of bugs from your mattress if to seal it using a mattress cover.
If there are any bedbugs in the bed, they will suffocate and die. But you have to treat the mattress with a chemical spray first, before using this method.
12. Buy and Use a Bedbug Oven
Is your home or business premises prone to frequent bed bug infestation?
If ‘yes,’ then you need to prepare yourself for anything.
Buy a bedbug oven. Even though an expensive investment, it will prove worthy in the very end. Collect all the infested items and put them inside the treatment chamber. Turn on the oven and watch as it kills all the bed bugs and their eggs.
Bed bugs will die when exposed to a temperature ranging from 120°F and 155°F. When you remove the items from the oven, there should be no sign of bed bugs anywhere.
13. Use Tea-Tree Oil
This is a natural remedy for a bed bug infestation. The tea-tree oil is used directly on the bed bugs. As soon as it comes into contact with them, it causes death.
But the tea-tree crude has to be used in its undiluted form. The downside is that undiluted tea-tree oil can endanger your life and that of your pets.
You don’t want to develop complications, just because you were trying to get rid of bed bugs.
14. Do a Thorough Check for Any Signs of Bed Bugs
No matter which method you used to get rid of bed bugs, it is likely that some will remain. Keep checking indications of bed bugs in suspect places.
Comb through box springs, mattress corners, the floor, papers & magazines, inside books, and behind picture frames. This should be done for a couple of weeks or more after the treatment.
If you notice any bedbugs, call in a professional to inspect and treat your home once again. Only when you are sure the problem is ended should you stop.
It is foolhardy to think that you have gotten rid of bed bugs after the first treatment. Make sure to follow it up every two weeks.
The remaining eggs could have hatched and re-infested your home. Don’t stop until you know you have gotten rid of all the bed bugs.
